Tomorrow X Together’s ‘Minisode1: Blue Hour’ Connects By Capturing The Full 2020 Experience

To say 2020 has been an interruption of a year would be putting it mildly. In the music world, it’s taken form in artists changing full creative directions (Sam Smith’s To Die For album was reimagined as Love Goes to be more sensitive to the pandemic) while leading some acts to newfound inspiration (BTS shared that “Dynamite” wasn’t “part of the plan” pre-COVID even as it became their first-ever No. 1 on Billboard Hot 100). For Tomorrow X Together, this time brought the transitionary EP titled Minisode1: Blue Hour that the group has said acts as a “short transition” between their three-part Dream Chapter album series (that began in 2019 with their debut EP The Dream Chapter: Star that charted around the world) and the forthcoming series. Not only are TXT taking a moment to observe where the world finds itself in 2020, but this Minisode further cements the young K-pop boy band as representatives for their generation.

Lead single “Blue Hour” embraces a new ritual of 2020 in focusing our energy to what feels good in spite of hardship. Despite the hints of melancholy, the track itself is a bright disco gem on par with some of the year’s biggest pop hits from Dua Lipa, Lady Gaga and even label mates BTS. At a press conference ahead of the album’s release in Seoul, the members of TXT shared how they wanted to continue the sound embraced by their senior label mates, but noted that their take of “Blue Hour” is more about seeing and embracing both the dark and light.

Penultimate track “Wishlist” adds a similar dose of hopeful pep with the vibrant rock-pop telling a story of no longer waiting to share one’s feelings and instead encourages the listener to open up and tell them what would make the birthday gift. Members Yeonjun, Taehuyn and Huening Kai wrote on this track that in any other year might have felt too fluffy of a topic, but fits perfectly in Blue Hour when the smallest gestures can make all the difference for someone’s ability to fight on and support their mental health.

Tomorrow X Together isn’t acting overly optimistic to the current situation either. While looking to the positive is a healthy coping mechanism, the guys are fully aware of what’s been missing in 2020 as well. “We Lost Summer” is a tropical-tinged, dancehall-pop cut that details students’ summer vacation this year without casual hangouts with friends, now replaced by lockdowns and required mask wearing. At ages 18 through 21, the TXT members are still in their high school and college years and know precisely what their peers are feeling at this time. The sunny production with a melancholy subject makes this one of the most interestingly complex tracks TXT has recorded to date.

Meanwhile Minisode’s opening track “Ghosting” takes on an eerie new meaning in 2020. While “ghosting” has typically been reserved for someone too rude to text back a potential partner, a pandemic that brings struggles of both body and mind opens up its definition a bit to a bit more complexity. Seeing members Soobin, Huening Kai and Taehyun all write on the track (as well as 21-year-old indie-pop star Lennon Stella) helps connect the larger messages as does its indie-rock vibe to further see the group lean into its emo edge.

And perhaps more than ever in 2020, we also have an overabundance of technology at our hands and that seems to also find a place in Minisode. We know these guys can sing (just listen to this pitch-perfect performance of “20cm” from last year) and the group’s vocal color since debut single “Crown” has been one of its defining characteristics, but the band’s vocals verge on sounding overproduced at times. Turning the vocal effects slightly down will allow their stories to be heard as all the more genuine instead of filtered through too much tech.

But beyond the pandemic, disco and technology, Tomorrow X Together end the Minisode by returning their focus back to connection.

Album closer “Way Home” is a futuristic-yet-comforting R&B/pop cut discussing that, despite of everything that’s unfamiliar and dark now, it’s important to remember one another. With their fourth album release to date, this path should become familiar to the band but instead this 2020 release is different for a slew of reasons. With Taehyun and Huening Kai also writing on this track, TXT end the album on a reassuring note. All of this is may be unfamiliar at the moment, but staying together—as artists, as fans, as friends, as family, whatever the situation might be—will return us “Home” at some point.

With its the range of topics discussed and the members’ increasing involvement in songwriting, Minisode1: Blue Hour is a meditation through the high and low points this year is bringing us. But perhaps most importantly is that Tomorrow X Together’s core message of coming together to bring about a better tomorrow—as their name literally says—is fully kept intact by the album’s conclusion making this Minisode a welcome, robust addition to the group’s discography.