The boys of Seventeen have returned to us with a brand new mini-album! If you are not aware by now, I’m a pretty big fan of Seventeen’s musical stylings. Woozi, who writes a lot of their music, has a very distinct style of writing that is so uniquely Seventeen, and I thoroughly enjoy hearing what they come out with. As such, when they announced Seventeen You Made My Dawn, I was pretty pumped.
I ordered a copy of the album from an eBay seller in Korea. This is a link to the exact one I’ve ordered. I got both copies for $21.99 plus free shipping. Plus, with eBay, you can save a little bit of money by using the E-Bates extension on your browser, as it will save you 2% on all album purchases, which definitely adds up.
What is E-Bates?
E-Bates is a cashback site that gives you money for purchases you may have already made. They even have an extension for multiple browsers so when you go to a website that uses Ebates, it will automatically pop up the cashback button to make sure you are saving money. I use this all the time, and I got over 80$ back from them for purchases I was going to make anyways. That’s about 3 more albums I can buy!
If you’ve never used EBates before, you can use this link to get $10 when making a qualified purchase of $25 when using EBates. You will also get whatever percent cashback is being offered from the site you are purchasing from. Sephora, typically has 4% cashback, through here. Sokoglam typically has 3%. These percentages Many other major retailers are on there as well.
Can I get it on Amazon?
Yes! You can pick up a copy using this link here for $27.99 dollars (not as good of a deal), with free shipping if you have Amazon Prime.
If you don’t have Amazon Prime, you can get a 30-day free trial using this link here. I will not lie, the free 2-day shipping, plus all of the free music and videos are totally worth it. I also now use it for books for my Kindle Paper White too, and it is honestly a life saver. They have a program called Kindle Unlimited where you can check out 10 books at a time, read them, and put them back in the kindle library. The program cost $7.99 a month, and you get the first 30 days for free with this link.
How do I read this post?
I recommend that you put the album on in the background, and read through it while listening to the track that I am talking about. It will help you understand what parts of the music I’m referring to when I talk about different instruments and different vocal parts. This is what I recommend for all of my song reviews.
Seventeen You Made My Dawn Track By Track:
Good to Me
Right from the start, Seventeen has created an intro to the mini-album that pulls your ear into their universe. This song possesses an extremely catch beat layered with some light percussive elements with those marimba sounds at the beginning. I also love how these marimba sounds are contrasted by the traditional percussion, such as cymbals and a drum kit. Overall, this song has simple instrumentation, but where it gets complex is in the vocal layers, and if you have read any of my reviews before, you will know that when done well, this is my happy place.
In regards to vocal ability, Seventeen is excellent as a whole. I do have a couple of notes that I would like to make though. To start, there is one note at the beginning where it sounds like Seungkwan (I think it is him) is pushing his voice in the wrong way. The word he is singing is 싶다가도, and on 싶, he constricts his vocal chords, but opens his mouth too much. He could strain his voice is he does that too often. To fix that, he can use a bit less air, push the sound up higher in his throat, and rounds out his mouth a bit. He’ll get a similar sound but far more control. He also sings that exact same phrase later in the track in a similar style.
Other than that, vocally, I don’t have any other issues with the song. I am going to take a moment though to just talk about how much I appreciate the fact that Seventeen tracks are written to perfectly compliment Hoshi’s routines. Their style is so modern and contemporary when it comes to music and dancing that a lot of people probably wouldn’t appreciate it. They go outside the box, and pull routines together in an unexpected way. Honestly, their music and routines are so detailed overall that you can listen or watch anything they have done, and still notice something new.
Home
So, I did react to this track while eating Ramen. If you want to watch it you can see it below:
Yet again, I like how we are pulling in this element of a marimba. This time it is down about two octaves though. This helps the transition between the first and second track sound more seamless. I’m not sure what instrument that high-pitched vibrating sound is (if you know let me know in the comments below), but it is really interesting to hear it fade in and out throughout the course of the whole track. It adds texture and drive.
Another thing that I really love about the composition of this track is how in the pre-chorus the volume and instrumentation builds. They add harmonies and percussion in steps that move you towards the chorus. Once you get to the chorus, you expect it to get even bigger, but they do a 180 and pull it all the way back. Then, they allow it to build again through the chorus. This completely breaks the typical pop song pattern of verse, pre-chorus, chorus, all build in momentum and volume by doing that.
Honestly, it is much closer to how real life is. It’s a roller coaster, just like this song is. Things don’t continuously build until you reach a climax, they go in and out and up and down. It’s not this straight linear pattern that most songs have. It also isn’t predictable, just like this song. I would class this track that is a bit more toned down with tracks like “Don’t Wanna Cry“. I’m also dying to see a performance video for this.
포옹 (Hug)
Complete change of pace from the previous two tracks, “Hug “is a ballad that I believe is just the vocal team and an electric guitar. Quite frankly, this track is beautiful and simple. It really allows the emotions and the message of the lyrics to come through. As a love song, it perfectly expresses the desperation that someone feels when they see their loved ones upset or hurting, and how much you want to help them.
I’m not going to lie, this song is actually probably one of my favorites on the mini album because of
칠리 (Chilli)
Changing pace! I love when Seventeen breaks out into units to highlight different members. You can tell within the first 10 seconds that this track is the hip hop team’s track. This song is about chilling inside with your mates on a cold day. They got the feel for that perfect by adding slides at the end of phrases, and “looser” instrumentation. When I say it’s “looser” I mean that there the entire track is more legato, not staccato, so it’s more soft not hard, if that makes sense. If it doesn’t, because explaining music in text is very challenging, this video probably explains it better (you don’t need to watch the whole thing, as he gets very technical, just about the first minute and a half or so).
Although this isn’t my favorite track that the Hip Hop team has put out, I love how it fits the snowy day inside playing video games and watching videos with your friends perfectly! For that, it gets A+ marks.
Shhhh
Time for the performance unit track! Every time the performance team puts out a track, I’m dying to see the choreography that they came up with. Of course, on occasion, they don’t release it, and I’m seriously disappointed. What I really love about this track is it moves in a more grownup direction that I am DYING to see. Typically, Seventeen is one of those groups that doesn’t swing in a dark, adult, sexy direction. Because of that, this is nice to hear. It has that feel, and it has that sound! Dino the
Because of the fact that this song was co-written with Hoshi, who choreographs their routines, he purposefully added elements that he can use to allow the dance to be on different levels, and have different “textures”. Basically, it won’t all be smooth and pretty. It won’t be all hard and accented. It will be a mixture of the two, as the music give you a lot to work with. I like it, but not as much as Highlight, which was an AMAZING track.
숨이 차 (Getting Closer)
So, this track was actually released back in December, and I must say, Seventeen seriously surprised me with this one. I was worried about the group getting stale because of the fact that many of their tracks use similar sounds, and then this track came out, which gave me a taste of the hard, intense, dark Seventeen that I have been dying to see. I cannot lie, when this came out, I
Musically speaking, this track is very hard and manly. At the same time, the harmonies that the group uses are so tight and many-layered that it makes my ears ecstatic. I love all of the layers of percussion and electronic elements in this song, such as the creak that continues through the whole track, and it makes me hopeful that this song is progressing us towards a full, dark, intense, sexy album.
K-Points: 172/5
Besides Seventeen’s Teen,age, I believe this is the first time that I Seventeen has received a perfect score on an album. So why is this getting top marks? Well, mainly because I can barely pick at it. Musically speaking, it feels new and innovative. It doesn’t feel like it has been done before. Plus, it feels as though it is progressing the group in a direction. I, and probably many Carats are dying to see a full, dark concept Seventeen. To be real, it feels like when EXO’Ls were handed Monster. In a few years, we may even get a few of them shirtless, just like Love Shot!
So should you get yourself a copy of this album? As a mini-album, this album is fantastic. It gives you a little bit of everything, and none of the tracks sound extremely similar. On top of that, it still manages to maintain that signature Seventeen feel. Should you stream it? This mini-album is definitely worth a listen. It has a lot of different styles on it, so there is something for everyone.
Which track on the album is your favorite, K-Nuggets? Let me know in the comments below!
사랑합니다!
–Rachel
