Good day, humans, and welcome back to my introduction to Loona! This is the last part, and it will cover Loona’s promotions as a full group. This will include information about the Loona project that was not stated in the previous parts and will cover (++), (XX), and the recent (#) teaser with all of the songs Loona have released as a full group linked. You can find the 1st part (Loona’s members) here and the second part (sub-units) here
Basics about Loona as a full group:
After completing the final part of their pre-debut project with yyxy promotions for Love4eva, Loona finally came out with their mini album (++) and their debut track Hi High. This was the culmination of a 9.9 Billion Won project including fantastic music videos and songs created with some of the best talents in the industry. After Hi High promotions ended, Loona dropped the teaser for (XX), which was just the (++) teaser in reverse. Then they disappeared. The first appearance of Loona after this teaser was on January 1 of 2019 with the second teaser for (XX), X1X. After teasing all month, Loona dropped the repackage to their first mini album. After their second set of promotions for Butterfly ended, they dropped the teaser for (#) and supposed title track Burn. This brings us to now, waiting for the next (#) teaser for their already confirmed comeback in May. They also have held two concerts, Loonabirth before the release of (++) and Loonaverse before the release of (XX). At the end of this, I will talk about the theories that connect their music videos as part of the Loonaverse, but I won’t be able to cover all of that here.
Full Group Stuff:
favOriTe
Hi High
(++)
Loonabirth
XX
XIX
XIIX
XIIIX
XIVX
For all LOOΠΔs around the world
Butterfly
(XX)
Loonaverse
# and Burn
Loonaverse Theories
favOriTe
favOriTe was Loona’s only pre-debut single as a full group. The song comes off of their first mini album (++). It’s messy, energetic, and doesn’t give you a chance to think. The music video simply features the dance and doesn’t play a big part in the Loonaverse. favOriTe shows another side to Loona than Hi High, so it made a lot of sense to promote it alongside Hi High.
Hi High
Hi High was Loona’s upbeat and bright debut song. The song is about saying hello to the world as a full group (Hi) and going higher and higher as Loona (High). Hi High disappointed many because of the simple outfits and cutesy concept, but I believe it was a good move on the part of BBC, as the concept is loved in Korea and Loona have a much bigger international fanbase, so the song was meant to build a Korean fanbase. It also feels like a very genuine debut, reminiscent of IOI’s Dream Girls.
(++)
(++) is Loona’s first mini album. The mini album has 6 tracks, including both favOriTe and Hi High. The intro, ++, is a combination of the first intros for all of the subunits (Into the New World for Loona 1/3, Odd for Odd Eye Circle, and Dal Segno for yyxy). It is well rounded and all of the songs are fantastic, as many have come to expect from Loona.
Tracklist:
Favorite Song: Perfect Love
Release Date: August 20, 2018
Title Track: Hi High
Loonabirth
Loonabirth was Loona’s first concert, preceding the release of their debut with (++). Loonabirth featured performances of some of the members’ solos, songs from (++), and sub-unit songs. Some of the girls performed other solo songs, such as when Heejin, Haseul, and Hyunjin performed Jinsoul and Kim Lip’s Love Letter. Not all of the solos were performed, but all of the girls performed in a group of 3 or less. The concert was performed on August 19, 2018, at the Olympic Hall in Seoul, South Korea, with an attendance of about 3000 people.
Favorite Loonabirth performances:
Heejin, Hyunjin, and Haseul – Love Letter
Vivi ft. Yeojin – Everyday I Love You
Odd Eye Circle (Kim Lip, Jinsoul, Choerry) – Rosy
XX
XX was a teaser video released just after promotions for Hi High ended. The teaser was one of the music video teasers for Hi High played in reverse. XX was released on October 14, 2019, only hours after Loona’s goodbye stage for Hi High.
XIX
XIX was technically Loona’s second teaser for their first comeback and first repackage, (XX). The teaser was released at midnight, Korean time, on January 1, 2019, after a drought of Loona content. It was later theorized that the release of the comeback teasers was centered around the blood moon on January 20-21. XIX showed all of the girls in a much darker styling than their previous release. The teaser is in black and white with the only colors being a flash of Choerry’s purple and Yeojin’s orange over some of their shots (their representative colors).
XIIX
XIIX was Loona’s third teaser for (XX). The teaser only features Go Won, with no other members appearing. It was shot in Iceland at the same location as Haseul’s video, with the famous crashed DC 3 plane appearing in both the video and the teaser. Loona has always been known to shoot their videos in many locations (China, France, Japan, Iceland, Hungary, etc.), and even their teasers are no exception.
XIIIX
XIIIX was Loona’s fourth (XX) teaser. The teaser features Olivia Hye and many unnamed extras. Olivia is shown running, as always (running is a common theme in a lot of Loona’s videos). This teaser is thought to represent Olivia falling from Eden and finding girls that look like Yves, Chuu, and Go Won (her yyxy members).
XIVX
XIVX was the last teaser of it’s kind (the Butterfly music video teasers came after, but do not contribute to Loona’s lore at all, and All the Loonas Around the World isn’t a teaser). XIVX features Yves and Chuu. This means every yyxy member was in one of the more individualized teasers for (XX). The video shows Yves dancing in the streets of Beijing, with Chuu jumping in to join her later in the teaser. XIVX is my personal favorite Loona teaser because it’s shot beautifully and the colors are fabulous.
For all LOOΠΔs around the world
For all LOOΠΔs around the world was a video released on the official Loonatheworld youtube channel on Feb. 15, 2019, leading up to the release of Loona’s Butterfly comeback. I consider the video to be more than a teaser, although I suppose it could be counted in that category. The video features all of the women featured in Loona’s Butterfly music video as well as individual shots of Yves and Olivia Hye, and some full group shots showing the choreography of Butterfly. It’s kind of hard to explain what For all LOOΠΔs around the world is; I consider it to be a tribute to Orbits—Loona fans—around the world, which I think is a relatively widespread interpretation.
Butterfly
Butterfly was Loona’s first comeback song. The concept is completely different from their debut with Hi High and Favorite. The music video for Butterfly was praised for being inclusive of kpop fans and women from around the globe, including people of many different ethnicities. Some of the women featured (or at least the ones I have social media for) are Larsen Thompson, Sydney Bourne, and Renelle Muñoz, and that doesn’t even begin the cover the number of people featured. Another thing to mention is the fact that the only part of the video that features the Loona members is the dance portion; the entire rest of the video is dedicated to showing these amazing, diverse women (as Yves said in a recent interview, “we want to go beyond gender, race, and nationality”). The song is, according to BBC and Loona, meant to be something “never before seen in kpop,” and they seem to have succeeded. I could go on about Butterfly for a really long time, but I’m just going to let the music video speak for itself 🙂
(XX)
(XX) is Loona’s first repackage, which functionally adds another mini album too (++) by doubling the length. All of the songs are fantastic, and the choreographies are amazing, especially the Butterfly and Colors choreos. The songs were first revealed at their Loonaverse concert, which occurred a day or so before their comeback. There is also a really sweet video of Ashley Yoon, the writer of Satellite and Curiosity, reacting to their performances here (her reaction starts about 2:04 in), and both songs are fantastic (Curiosity especially, in my opinion, deserves a lot more recognition).
Tracklist:
Favorite Song: Where you at
Release date: Feb. 19, 2019
Title Track: Butterfly
Loonaverse
Loonaverse was Loona’s second concert. The concert was held on Feb. 16-17, 2019, at the Olympic Hall in Seoul. The concert was the first reveal of the songs on (XX), as well as the performance of many more Loona solo and sub-unit songs. There were also many other song switches, such as Loona 1/3 and yyxy switching title tracks. Sadly, Yeojin and Yves collided during the performance of favOriTe on the first day, making Yeojin unable to dance the second day (Haseul substituted for Yves on the first day, but she was able to dance on the second; they both sang both days even when they couldn’t dance).
Favorite Loonaverse performances:
Olivia Hye – Egoist
Kim Lip – Twilight
Loona – Curiosity
# and Burn
# is the newest Loona teaser, presumably teasing their confirmed comeback in May with a possible mini album or full-length album (#). Based on the teaser, it can be assumed that Burn will be their next title track. The whole video is very interesting, and, being released only hours after the final Butterfly stage, follows the pattern of the first (XX) teaser. There isn’t much to say about this at the moment, but it is interesting nonetheless.
Loonaverse Theories
The Loonaverse is the name used to refer to the large and intricate world in which Loona’s music videos are set. I really don’t have time to talk about very much of this, simply because of how much material and how many theories there are, but I highly recommend watching Twinfish’s “The COMPLETE Loona Theory,” or at least the first episode, which is just a (long) general overview of the Loonaverse. Also, keep in mind that these are just my personally accepted theories, and while the theories are very interesting (in my opinion), they are still just theories and they are also by no means required to be a fan of Loona.
One of the most widely recognized Loona theories is the Möbius Strip theory. The picture, made from something that showed up on the dlrowehtanool (loonatheworld backward) website after Yves’ teasers with a mirrored URL were revealed, showcases this, although this was made before yyxy had been revealed so it says “Unit 3” instead. This shows where all the girls would be (although it doesn’t show Yeojin, although in this case, I consider her to be with 1/3). Loona 1/3 is on Earth, on the first front of the Möbius strip. Odd Eye Circle aren’t on Earth, although I forget what name is used to refer to where they are. yyxy is in Eden, on the last front. They are all a part of the same universe, but only the Choerry can travel between the fronts. This is a very basic introduction, and there is a lot of reasoning behind this, but I might do some separate posts about the Loonaverse to go into more depth.
Thank you for reading however much of this you actually read (if you read all three parts, or even just all of this part, you get a gold star. ⭐.) I hope you enjoyed it and found some good music, and will continue to support—or at least check out—Loona’s future releases!
See you later!