Well friends, the time has come for us to Keep Calm and Love EXO because I totally got my copy of the EXO Universe album in the mail, and I’m going to tell you all about it. Every Year, EXO does a Christmas release, and Universe is the 2017 release. It features 8 tracks, 7 of which are in Korean, the last is Universe sang in Chinese. I, personally, usually skip these tracks on the album because when I started learning Korean, listening to the Chinese tracks just confused me. If you want to know how I learned Korean, check it out here. Now I can thankfully, distinguish between the two, but I still prefer to listen to the Korean versions, just because I like the sound of Korean sung better.
Things you need to know about this Album:
Marked as the 6th extended play, and the 4th EXO Winter Special Album, Universe was released on December 26th, 2017. Initially, it was supposed to be released on December 21st, but due to the death of the labelmate Jonghyun of SHINee it was pushed back to the 26th. The single “Universe”, which won 4 awards on music shows, debuted at #2 on the Gaon Digital Chart and top the Billboard KPop Hot 100 for the first week of 2018. The album also took the first spot on the Monthly charts and the sixth spot on the Year End Charts.
- There is one version of this album.
- Things that come with the album:
- CD
- Photobook (about 80 pages)
- Postcard of the members
- Photocard (1 of 8)
- Pre-order only: Poster
- Songs on the album:
K-Points: 475/5
I truly love EXO, and quite frankly I would be a different person right now if it wasn’t for that fateful moment when I hear EXO’s Monster the first time. My life has been corrupted for the better because of them. Despite this corruption, this album doesn’t hit the 500 mg level for me. I love the cover art, and I do like the pictures inside, but I’m not 100% wowed. I’m more at the “it’s nice” level. The packaging is sleek, very well done, but it doesn’t feel as special as some of my other albums, such as the Super Junior Play Album, which is why it is only getting 400 mg.
Should you still buy it? Absolutely. The music on it is solid the one track on it, 지나갈 터니 has a wicked vibe to it. You can do all the body rolls to it. The packaging is still great, it just doesn’t compare to some of the other albums in my collection, if that makes sense. I will point out though, I like that it is more compact, cause it fits in my over-packed EXO shelf more easily… If they have one more massive album release, their shelf may need to be moved….K-Pop Problems…
If you want to watch me fangirl, I do also post reactions on my YouTube Channel. I have posted one for EXO’s Tempo, which you can watch below:
Where Can I Buy It?
You can get a copy of this at the following places:
- Music Plaza (I purchased mine here)
- Ebay (Can get Cashback with Rakuten)
- Amazon
- SubK Shop
If you want to see where I get almost all of the products I buy, you can see that here.
What is Rakuten?
Rakuten is a cashback site that gives you money for purchases you may have already made. They even have an extension for multiple browsers so when you go to a website that uses Rakuten, it will automatically pop up the cashback button to make sure you are saving money. I use this all the time, and I got over $80 back from them for purchases I was going to make anyway. That’s about 3 more albums I can buy!
If you’ve never used Rakuten before, you can use this link to get $10 when making a qualified purchase of $25 when using Rakuten. You will also get whatever percent cashback is being offered from the site you are purchasing from. Sephora, typically has 4% cashback, through here. Ulta typically has 3%. These are just some of the companies on the website, but there are other major retailers on there as well!
Rakuten also has a Google Chrome extension that will tell you as soon as you log onto a site that has cashback with a little pop-up in the corner so that you can ensure you are saving money!
Which EXO Winter Special Album is your favorite, K-Nuggets? Let me know down in the comments below!
사랑합니다!
–Rachel
