REVIEW: MONSTA X THE CLAN PT.2 < GUILTY >

Alright, time for part 2.

It’s strange because I think pt 1 is my favorite of the two overall, but I love the b-sides of pt.2 more. I also was a bigger fan of the visuals and styling for pt.2 more. Wonho’s sliver hair with him standing partially in that black car, Minhyuk’s blowing a bubble in his yellow sweater, and I.M in the crown with a bag of tortilla chips, live rent-free in my mind.

I managed to misremember my physical album collection while working on the last article. I thought I had a copy of pt.1 in my collection, but I don’t. I do have both guilty and innocent version of pt.2 and 2 of the 3 versions of Beautiful album, but we’ll talk about that later.

I think I still have my Shownu and Wonho (? I think that Wonho pc I have with the sunglasses is from this era) photocards I got with Guilty. I must have decided that pt.2 had visuals I liked more, so I just bought those. Gotta support those album sales, lol.

MX was really the only group I was buying multiple copies of albums like that. I haven’t really had that urge to do that anymore. I’m barely buying the albums I do want full price as soon as they release. Let alone buying 2 or 3 at the same time from the same group/soloist. If I like multiple version of an album, I’ll look at buying them through a GOM on Insta or something.

Anyway, let’s get on with the review!

Fighter

I still have mixed feelings about “Fighter” as a song. I love the music video. There’s so much going on. But the song itself is fine. Lyrically it’s great. I love the message of resilience and being the very best, like no one ever was. But when it comes to songs I go back to listen to or have strong memories of while jamming, this one is probably one of my least favorite MX songs and title tracks.

I was talking about Wonho’s hair like this a few articles ago. I forgot the exact context. But I loved this blue and silver hair on him. Man, I remember everyone going wild over those welding scenes. He really just turned into a muscle man overnight.

Kihyun’s pink hair!!! I forgot about that look. It was so cute on him. Jooheon’s… everything in this video. Him dressed as the doctor STILL takes me out. And we love a good break out plot based music video. This video held up surprisingly well in my memory.

Seo Jieum is back on lyrics for “Fighter”. I.M and Jooheon both have credits on all the songs again (love to see it). Park Geuntae, Choi Jinseok, and Martin Hoberg Hedegaard are also on here. Martin Hoberg Hedegaard on Wiki says he’s worked with Girls’ Generation and EXO when it comes to other Kpop acts.

Be Quiet

Oh, I love love love “Be Quiet”. “Be Quiet” and “Stuck” are two sides of the same coin, in my book. They’re both so in your face and high energy. I think the climax is Jooheon’s “bitch please.” This is another song that I think is best experienced in a live format.

I think this is my favorite song from Guilty, next to “Blind” and “Queen”. We got Mafly (also known as Kim Yechae, worked on TTS’ “Whisper” omgg, along with other Girls’ Generation, GFRIEND, Teen Top, VIXX, and B.A.P tracks. We’ll see her again soon), Keyfly (also known as Pi Kyungjin, worked on similar projects as Mafly), Hyuk Shin (Growl by EXO, and apparently discovered Dean, what a legend), 999 (I think they’re different from 9999 who worked on Rush?), Jayrah Gibson (Also worked on EXO and Dean tracks. We’ll be seeing more of him later), Davey Nate (another familiar name, worked on SHINee’s “Don’t Let Me Go” as well).

What a line-up. Once I started looking at some of these artists on discogs.com, I was starting to see a ton of overlap. It’s incredibly interesting to me seeing the same people work on the same songs I love, lol. I just love that these people come from all these different backgrounds and musical skills, and somehow all ended up at the same place(s). *Marge Simpson voice* I just think that’s neat.

Blind

This chunk of Guilty where we have “Be Quiet”, “Blind” and “Queen” is my favorite section of the album. It’s flows sooo well. Banger after banger after banger. Of course, it’s always a good sign where you hear Giriboy’s audio tag/signature at the start of a song. You can’t help but body roll to this one. It’s a slightly slower pace song. But the instrumentals are all over the place. Your ears are never bored.

It reminds me a bit of “Perfect Girl” with the slight sampling of Jon B’s “They Don’t Know” in the strings. And I went back to look to see if Giriboy worked on “Perfect Girl”, but he didn’t. But Esbee did, so maybe it was them that included that in as a call back. Idk, I don’t have much else to go on, lol.

I know producers and composers have access to different audio databases and people work on tracks at different times, and it could have been a coincidence. Idk, but I love this song. It’s a nice break from all the dancing during “Be Quiet”.

I also have to point out this song is 3:33 in length. That’s an angel number, 333. Quick search pulls a USA Today article saying, “The angel number 333 encourages to set plans into action and let your personal strength be the guide; to trust yourself and put thought into your choices. This angel number also is connected with optimism, creativity and intuition.” So there’s that. That I’m sure was a complete coincidence, lmao.

Queen

Another hype song. I haven’t really talked about Kihyun’s vocal performance on this album, but he goes innnn on “Queen”. I forgot to mention this in “Blind”, but Jooheon and I.M do this thing I love, where towards the end of a Monsta X song, they go back and forth between their lines with the song finally ending with one of them having the last word as the beat fades out in the background. Their tag team dynamic is onne of the best parts of how MX structures their songs.

Then you have Kihyun and Shownu like boxing it out vocally as the main and lead vocals respectfully. There’s something special about how Shownu’s range balances well with Kihyun’s higher tones.

I feel, as someone who has zero formal training in vocal performances, that Shownu’s ability to go lower when needed but also keep up with Kihyun’s higher notes is pretty amazing. They also take turns too. There will be times like in “Because of U” where it’s more of the Shownu show. Then times like in “Queen” when it’s the Kihyun show. But it all balances out.

I remember during this time we (Monbebes) wanted Minhyuk, Hyungwon (especially him) and Wonho to have more lines. And I feel like in hindsight, we just didn’t want them to fall behind and just be seen for solely their visuals only.

Because going back and listening to these albums, they had some decent line distributions and still do. Wait. Actually, I haven’t watched any Monsta X performances since Wonho’s departure. Who does his parts? I’m assuming Hyungwon and Minhyuk divided and conquered. That makes the most sense because they were centers in the choreography a lot anyway.

Getting back on topic, even just listening to random songs on shuffle, I can pick out every member’s vocals. I was listening to “Who Do You Love” this morning after my workout, which is arguably a Jooheon featuring French Montanta song, I was able to distinguish each member’s vocals, pretty easily. Except for I.M and I think that was because they needed space for what ever the fook French Montanta was saying. I think his rap is fine /srs. But we’ll talk about that at a later time. So I think we were pressed for no reason, lol.

We have the same exact team that worked on “Be Quiet” on “Queen” and that explains sooo much to me.

Anyway, the takeaway from all this is that “Queen” is a banger. 10/10 needs to be listened to at full volume for the correct listening experience.

White Love

When I say, I never listen to this song. I can not stress enough, how I NEVER listen to this song. I forgot it was even on this album. It’s not a bad song. I just erased it from my memory, lol. The special clip video for this is cute. I like the staging and styling. But I don’t have much to say about the song itself. It’s a boring ballad with cute lyrics.

I wanna spend the remaining time here talking about the production team duo, Ye-Yo! who worked on this track. Mostly what else they’ve worked on because I find it interesting. So Ye-Yo! (I love this name so much), is made up of Lee jinho and Ohk Jaewon. They’ve worked on a bunch of Starship Ent songs of course, but they have a lot of TS Entertainment (B.A.P, SONAMOO, and TRCNG) credits.

I remember back when I was a BABY (B.A.P’s fandom) a lot of them were salty about BTS and Monsta X stealing away the remaining fans B.A.P had left. Seeing that some producers who worked on B.A.P’s stuff and seeing them also on MX’s stuff is kinda funny because it confirms some of the salt. But also, as groups stop being as active, people just move on. It’s nothing personal. Idk when I saw that, I had to comment on it.

Other songs I saw Ye-Yo! work on that caught my interest is SF9’s “Watch Out” and “Love You More” by Kim Jaejoong (J-Jun). I love both of those songs. I see some similarity with “Love You More”. But “Watch Out” is a completely different vibe. Love the duality.

Roller Coaster

I completely forgot about this self cam video!! I used to reblog gifsets of this all the time. They looked so cute here. I listen to this song frequently still. It’s cute and fun. I’m surprised they ended the album with this song instead of “White Love”. I guess it does break things up a bit in pacing.

Trinity, 1Take, and Tak worked on “Roller Coaster” and I think it’s funny they all have the letter t in the front/beginning of their names. That’s all I got.

While working on pt.2, I was able to add more detail to pt.1. So if you’ve read that article, you may want to check it out again because I updated it while working on this article.

I did find 999 on discogs, but they only had like 2 songs (one was a MCMD song) and I think three pending submissions. I do think 9999 is a different person based on the difference between the length of discography credits. So that answers a question I had while working on Rush.

Anyway, I’ve been having a lot of fun researching and writing these articles. I’m sooo excited to talk about pt.2.5. That’s my favorite Monsta X still. I think that’s gonna be a long article. That’s gonna be the next in this series.

What are y’alls favorite songs from pt.2? Let me know in the comments.

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I’ll see y’all next post.

Take care!

Ash🦦