Album Review: BLACKPINK, ‘Born Pink’

Just two years after their bombastic debut studio album, BLACKPINK continues to reign as the world’s biggest girl group. Oddly enough, the K-Pop superstars have extended their stay at pop music’s zenith with some of their worst music yet on their latest record. Born Pink’s biggest offense isn’t the grating, dated production, nor is it the seemingly random selection of samples. Born Pink doesn’t say much at all. The moments where the album provides a glimpse at what defines BLACKPINK beyond the glitz are fleeting, but the album is a largely forgettable affair. The Album, the phenom’s last record, was pure, unadulterated fun. The girls sounded like they were enjoying the songs that they were recording. Born Pink, however, finds the quartet sounding quite serious. An unsavory combination of stale production and vapid lyrics render Born Pink completely devoid of the personality that carried previous BLACKPINK projects.

“Pink Venom,” the abrasive lead single for Born Pink, encapsulates a lot of what doesn’t work for BLACKPINK on this album. The song, which aims to express the group’s dual sweetness and lethality, is a nonsensical amalgam of interpolations of Rihanna’s “Pon De Replay,” 50 Cent’s “P.I.M.P.” and The Notorious B.I.G.’s “Kick in the Door.” The deep Black roots of K-Pop music production and imagery have been well-documented, but “Pink Venom” brings the conversation into new territory. These interpolations are a thinly veiled attempt to rely on familiar melodies and lyrics to anchor a song that is, frankly, an otherwise unenjoyable listening experience. From the grating “bra-ta-ta-tas” to the weak hook, there’s too much going on in “Pink Venom,” and almost none of it is good. Nevertheless, this is the most charismatic that BLACKPINK sounds on the whole album bar “Shut Down.” If there was ever a tough sell, it’s “Pink Venom,” but, somehow, they make it work.

The rest of Born Pink feels empty. “Typa Girl” reaches the end of its runtime before anything of note happens, and “Tally” is only somewhat passable because of the surprisingly pleasant hook. “Yeah Yeah Yeah” finds the girl group leaning into an 80s-indebted dream-pop lane reminiscent of The Weeknd’s “Less Than Zero.” Although they took a considerable amount of time to get around to this particular music trend, they pull it off very well. “Hard To Love,” a solo track from Rosé, features a slight Olivia Rodrigo-esque pop-rock moment that draws the album’s soundscape closer to the space where American pop music currently resides. While these songs sound good, they never bother to become anything more than playlist filler that will last three months at absolute best. The only thing worse than redundant and unimaginative songwriting is when it’s paired with poor production. The primary issue with Born Pink, which was primarily helmed by Teddy Park and 24, is the lack of balance. Everything is firing on all cylinders at all times. Pounding drums, blaring bass, and stabbing synths pack too much into songs that don’t have the lyrical foundation to support such audacious production. Thus, the songs crumble under their own weight. Even when things are stripped back to the piano ballad format, as they are on “The Happiest Girl,” the songs are still mind-numbingly drab. While this commentary on the loneliness of life as an idol in popular culture marks the most lyrical depth BLACKPINK has ever displayed, predictable melodic and structural choices cut the song’s edge.

The saving grace of Born Pink is “Shut Down.” Easily the album’s best song and the group’s strongest musical offering since their debut LP, “Shut Down” features the record’s slickest melody. The track’s juxtaposition of Paganini’s “La Campanella” against a trap-influenced beat is one of the few moments where Born Pink doesn’t feel phoned-in. BLACKPINK is arguably the most heavily scrutinized K-pop girl group, and they truly pull from those emotions in their delivery of this song. Each girl delivers her lines with a triumphant resistance that betrays the darker moments of life at the top. In a world where everyone claims to have someone praying on their downfall, BLACKPINK makes the claims feel believable on “Shut Down"; “It's black and it's pink once the sun down / When we pull up, you know it's a shutdown,” Jisoo and Rosé sing.

Born Pink is far from a strong album, but there are sporadic glimpses of the kind of bombastic power pop that BLACKPINK is capable of when they’re not relying on dated EDM-esque beats or scores of random samples and interpolations.

Key Tracks: “Yeah Yeah Yeah” | “Shut Down”

Score: 50