Song Review: Wonho – Better Than Me

Since returning from the military, Wonho’s music seems targeted toward an international market with English-language lyrics and an overall trendy sound. For about two years from 2020 to 2022 he stood as one of the industry’s most reliable artists, releasing a string of bangers. I wish he’d return to that pattern.

There’s something deflating about a subpar track built around the lyric “no one does it better than me.” If you’re going to repeat that statement multiple times, you better have the goods to back it up. Better Than Me is a threadbare, 2:24 song that becomes the latest in a very long line of material borrowing from an early-2000’s Justin Timberlake/Timbaland sound. While I enjoy this era quite a bit, we’ve gotten to the point where the style has become oversaturated and requires a truly excellent song to stand out. Better Than Me may not be a long song, but it’s so repetitive and flat that its meager running time seems to stretch forever. Pick any ten-second segment from this track and you’ve pretty much heard all its tricks. I don’t mind anything about Better Than Me, but it’s completely extraneous within the larger K-pop landscape.

Grade: C