Poptimistically Rockist
The New, the Hot, the Hyped, and the Truth
BRIAN FALLON - “Not Bad For New Jersey” / “Better Before” (Lesser Known Records)
Five years off and Brian Fallon comes back sounding exactly like… Brian Fallon, which depending on your tolerance for boardwalk nostalgia and Springsteen cosplay is either comforting or exhausting. “Not Bad For New Jersey” reads like it was assembled from leftover Asbury Park refrigerator magnets - “On the shoreline, in the springtime…” - the kind of lyrics that feel less written than assembled. Musically, it’s what happens when “Glory Days” gets filtered through a Bryan Adams power-ballad, with the kind of poetry you find on greeting cards in Third World countries.
Flip it over and Fallon teams up with Canadian folksinger Donovan Woods for “Better Before,” a song that ditches the Boss for Bon Jovi-level melodrama and somehow still lands flat. It’s about breaking up, or maybe necrophilia, or maybe both. It’s hard to tell when Fallon’s whining about love being “better before” starts drifting into lines like “your expression's gone cold again” and “it's like loving the dead.“ Either way, subtlety was not invited to this session. The moment where Fallon reminisces about being “out here spilling all over the floor” in “the party zone” raises more questions than it answers, but hey, there’s a guitar solo here that would’ve crushed on MTV circa 1986, so I guess someone’s still living on a prayer.
THE STROKES – “Falling Out of Love” (RCA)
Six years after The New Abnormal, the Strokes return with Rick Rubin in the producer’s chair, a new album (Reality Awaits, due in June), and what appears to be a deep, possibly irreversible commitment to autotune. Not the occasional stylistic flourish, mind you, but a full-blown dependency.
If April’s “Going Shopping” raised an eyebrow with its processed-to-hell vocals, at least it still had a pulse. “Falling Out of Love” flatlines. Casablancas drifts in on a pitchy falsetto that somehow manages to miss notes despite all that technology - an impressive feat, really - before slumping into a half-spoken, half-sung verse that sounds like it was recorded while lying down
The song coasts on a stock chord progression that circles the drain for a bloated 6:21, occasionally dressed up with some tasteful guitar and bass that almost - almost - suggests a band’s in the room. But any emotional weight the lyrics might carry gets lost in Casablancas’ vocoder’d delivery, which lands somewhere between “detached” and “malfunctioning appliance.” Think lovesick robot with a low battery and no charger in sight.
By the four-minute mark, you’re checking the time. By six, you’re questioning your life choices. If this is the single, Reality Awaits might be less a promise than a warning, and “Falling Out of Love” a prophecy for Strokes fans.
BTS – ARIRANG (Big Hit Records)
When Elvis came back from the Army in 1960, Colonel Parker shoved him straight into a decade’s worth of increasingly unwatchable movies. When BTS came back from their own mandatory service in 2026, they rolled out a global tour, a Netflix special, and ARIRANG, their latest attempt to remind the world they’re still the biggest band on the planet. Points for ambition, sure. Points for execution? That’s another story.
If you’ve somehow avoided the BTS industrial complex, here’s the quick version: seven sharply packaged performers, a fanbase that operates with military precision (they call themselves “ARMY”), and a brand so airtight it makes Marvel look haphazard. Their name translates to “Bulletproof Boy Scouts,” which feels both oddly wholesome and unintentionally revealing.
ARIRANG borrows its title from the traditional Korean folk song, which makes a cameo early on, but don’t expect much reverence for history here. This is less cultural statement than global product. And yes, it’s easy - maybe too easy - to dismiss K-pop outright. But the real question isn’t why people love BTS; it’s why a group with this much reach delivers something this forgettable. To paraphrase Elvis, 90 million BTS fans can’t be wrong. Or can they?
Let’s be blunt: ARIRANG is not a good album.
The first half leans into hip-hop that never quite convinces. “Hooligan” tries on a snarl like it’s a rented leather jacket, and “2.0” aims for menace but lands somewhere closer to a school talent show version of “tough.” “FYA” briefly sparks to life, then fizzles out before it can actually go anywhere.
Then there’s “No. 29,” a minute and a half of silence capped by the ringing of an ancient ceremonial bell. It feels less like an artistic statement and more like a placeholder someone forgot to delete.
From there, ARIRANG pivots into glossy pop and R&B, but the energy doesn’t improve. “SWIM” and “Merry Go Round” drift by in a pleasant haze you’ll forget before they end. “NORMAL” stumbles along awkwardly, and “Like Animals” reaches for arena-sized passion with a big guitar solo, only to come off strangely bloodless. Even the ballads—“they don’t know about us,” “One More Night,” “Please,” “Into The Sun”—have their moments, but none of them stick.
What’s most surprising is how little chemistry there is. Seven singers, a platoon of producers, and a small army of co-writers—and still, almost no harmonies worth noting. The whole thing feels like a playlist designed by committee.
And that’s the real problem with ARIRANG: it doesn’t sound bad so much as it sounds familiar and unexciting. Every piece is polished, every beat calibrated, every hook focus-grouped within an inch of its life. But it never comes together into anything that feels urgent, or dangerous, or even particularly fun.
For a band this massive, that’s the biggest letdown of all.
BTS are back. But if you’re wondering whether they’ve got anything new to say—or any new way to say it—you might want to look elsewhere.