Dreamcatcher’s Week Before Apocalypse Filled With Revelations And Reveals

K-Pop — Dreamcatcher Recall

K-Pop’s resident rock/pop girl group spent the week preparing and exciting fans with incremental details about their upcoming new full album release.

Pre-comeback time is always an exciting time for both a K-Pop group and for fans of said group. The lead-up to a release is filled with the sort of gradual, slow reveals that whet the appetite of the fandom and build excitement for new music. In this regard, Dreamcatcher is for the most part no different than any other K-Pop group out there, spinning and building hype for their new music in the never-ending quest of garnering more attention, sales, and, of course, expression of themselves through their songs. This is, of course, much more relevant this time around, due to the fact that Dreamcatcher’s 2nd Full Album release will have seven solos, one for each member.

This past week we were treated to the majority of the reveals that would accompany Dreamcatcher’s version of the Apocalypse, and they showed off a ton of new detail but still kept things close to the chest for the eventual release in some of the most tantalizing ways. Along with a couple of vLives and the confirmation of a few appearances for promotions, Dreamcatcher fans were treated to all kinds of exciting new content — so let’s get right to all the details!

[embed]https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-28632849[/embed][embed]https://www.vlive.tv/post/1-28632849[/embed]

Both members of Dreamcatcher who had to self-isolate due to COVID-19 infections wasted no time in getting back on the comeback promotions horse by dropping vLives on fans. SuA, along with Handong, dropped a couple of subtle spoilers for the album, talked about favorite tracks (Locked Inside A Door appears to be quite popular with the members), and generally was happy to get to be near her fellow Dreamcatcher members once again, while Yoohyeon chilled out with fans and talked about how she relieved her boredom during her quarantine, talked in English for global fans, and about her hopes for the new album. Since vLives can get a bit few and far between during promotion time, this was definitely a nice treat for fans, especially to be reassured that both Dreamcatcher members that had contracted the coronavirus were doing well and recovering.

Speaking of full group Dreamcatcher, that’s exactly what we got when the Group Teaser images dropped this past week. While fans have seen the styling from the Individual Teaser images, seeing everyone together in the same settings certainly hit different, with every set of images providing a different vibe. Whether it was in elegantly-styled brown, ethereal white, or practical and professional black, Dreamcatcher made each distinct set of fashion pop. We should be used to this by now as Dreamcatcher fans, but the styling always seems to surprise folks nonetheless.

The surprises didn’t stop coming when the Lyrics Spoiler for “Maison” dropped, revealing a slow, inevitable beat that built to a drop that immediately faded out. Fans would come to see this as a running trend for Dreamcatcher’s audio-based reveals for the week, as parts and pieces of the title track would come together. Based on translation threads, the lyrics appeared to say:

It all seeps in, riding the rough winds

All the seasons return to that vivid moment

My already shed tears

Eyes already submerged in water

With the story of the album seemingly having to do with climate change ravaging the planet, this sort of heavy tone to the lyrics along with the barren desert background and slow beat conveyed a serious, dark tone to the setting and song. This is, of course, appropriate to an album with “Apocalypse” in the name, but it was good to hear a bit of this confirmed in the snippet of the track itself.

That said, the real first look at the title track, as well as all of the other fourteen tracks of the album, came with the Highlight Medley. Of all of the things that come out before comeback, this is usually the one I’m looking most forward to, even more so since this would be a full album release and not a mini or single. The medleys are longer than most of the other teaser content, contain just enough of the songs to generate interest, and are a good way to gauge what type of musical genres would be present. While some impressions from some fans appeared to point to less harder rock, my response to that is to basically wait and see — medleys typically don’t give out a huge amount of detail, and arguably Dreamcatcher’s sound has been a hybrid rock/pop or rock/other genres since 2019’s “Deja Vu”. There’s also the fact that a good half of this album is dedicated to member solos, all of which were chosen and partially composed by the members themselves.

Speaking of those, the best impression I can give is that these truly are owned and characteristic of each member. To take two examples, “Cherry (Real Miracle)” by JiU shows off her cheerful, caring side, while SuA’s “No Dot” appears to be a hard-charging aggressive tune well-suited to her personality. Dami’s “Beauty Full” is also nice surprise going right into the punk pop rock stylings that you’d usually associate with Avril Lavigne, but who I think have more of an influence on Dami’s Girls’ Generation fan past with a song like “Way To Go”. Either way, the medley gave me a ton of things to look forward to and it’s been a frequent loop on my playlists this past week.

Those of you who have read my breakdowns of the Dystopia trilogy know that I have an interest in the world-building and messages Dreamcatcher sends with their songs. This album signifies the beginning of a new, separate story arc called “Apocalypse” and seeing what we were shown in the above video was of great interest to me. I was definitely thinking post-apocalypse, but did not think it was going to be as sci-fi as we saw. There appeared to be an element of otherworldliness to this video, and the all-English narration by Yoohyeon to try to set the context of this seemingly hopeless, ruined world added to that mystery. I’ll be looking at interviews and other material to see what Dreamcatcher is doing this time with their story for a future breakdown of the song, so look forward to that if you can!

Finally, the MV teaser dropped last Friday, with twenty-four seconds of Dreamcatcher visual and auditory goodness. While we did not get any lyrics or singing voices in this teaser, what we did see and hear was some amazing stuff. Musically, the electronic rock and hard-charging element many fans have come to love for Dreamcatcher’s recent work was present, hopefully alleviating some concerns that this title track seemed lighter than the others. But the talk of the town was definitely the visuals — a CGI-heavy video that seemed more out of a movie than a music video, and more interestingly, showed the members of Dreamcatcher in what might be super-powered roles in order to save the planet. Not just post-apocalyptic, or sci-fi, but superhero as well, complete with SuA-powered superhero landing? I’ll take it, and it was a great way to cap off the week of reveals.

As is custom during these comeback periods, Dreamcatcher began hitting up the variety show trail as well, any if any of the previews and videos are any indication, we may see some new appearances. The press photos shoot for Star Guerilla, for example, a long-lived interview show, was just one place that the group stopped to record or create content to be released after the album drop.

[embed]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYi3ZGinxOc[/embed]

Dreamcatcher is also due to make yet another appearance on Weekly Idol on April 13th, but before that they broadcast a little teaser to the ALL THE K-POP YouTube channel. Though missing Yoohyeon due to COVID-19 quarantine, the broadcast was nevertheless interesting and funny, and we got see a couple of mild choreography spoilers and an idea of what might be happening on the show (for example, will Handong lose her Dreamcatcher’s Strongest title to JiU in a wrestling match?). This plus the short episode preview showcased a Dreamcatcher that seemed to have yet another fun appearance on one of the most well-known regular idol shows out there.

Regular watchers of Kakao’s SSAP Possible interview/variety series were treated to a preview of the next episode featuring Dreamcatcher in the interviewee chair, to be aired sometime in the next week or so. As always, they seemed to bring their trademark energy and fun, so seeing them on a new show will certainly be interesting and entertaining.

[embed]https://twitter.com/_mymusictaste/status/1511690183883722756[/embed]

And frequent Dreamcatcher partner MyMusicTaste played up the group’s upcoming release day mini-concert with several tweets with fun games for drawn prizes, such as this emoji Dreamcatcher song game for a digital photo. The concert is happening at 19:30 KST on the day of release on April 12th, so if you haven’t gotten your tickets yet, you should if you can afford them, as this 100-minute set of performances that will be sure to include both new and old songs is going to be one not to be missed.

Dreamcatcher fans, we are only a couple of days away from a brand new album — and not just any album, but a full album filled with both solo and group content and a brand new story that was built around apparently saving the planet. It’s going to be pretty busy in Dreamcatcher land and you can bet that I’ll be here covering all of the fun Dreamcatcher news from the album’s release! Be sure to clap, subscribe, and signal boost if you like what you’re reading, and I’ll see you back here next week as usual!