Alien Life Exists if you’re ONEWE, in Rock Ballads and Poetic Lyrics
Photo: RBW Entertainment
Five member K-Rock band ONEWE returns in MAZE: AD ASTRA, a rock seven-track EP teeming with luck, life, and color. Weaving through crop circles, the members search for alien life, discovering friendship and fun along the way in jazz-rock-fusion and rock ballads.
Bright jazz-funk brass pairs with ONEWE’s resonant vocals and characteristic instrumental solos (both bass and guitar) in “MAZE” – a track that is as happy-go-lucky as it is harmonious. With all the members participating in composition and lyrics across the EP, MAZE: AD ASTRA enriches the band’s already expansive catalog with jazz, funk, and seven new extraterrestrial songs.
TRACKLIST:
“Lucky 12”
“MAZE”
“UFO”
“Hide & Seek”
“Trace”
“Diary”
“Beyond the Storm”
“Lucky 12,” true to its name, soars with whimsy and discovery, an opener to the album that’s as clear as the bluest sky. Accompanying B-sides “UFO” and “Hide & Seek” venture into new sounds and genres for the band, with “UFO” offering a wandering piano line against an almost afro-beats adjacent percussive line. “Hide & Seek” would fit right in headlining an anime soundtrack, devious and dynamic, with its shifting tempos.
“Trace” shimmers in piano arpeggios. Exploring past and present, the me of the past and the you of the future, “Trace” shines. The chorus, laden with yearning, features that poetic, storied lyricism ONEWE does best, penned (in this case) by members Harin and Giuk:
“Hello. I’m the child from the future. [...] An engraved Sign (Look closely, You see me?). Here, here! And over there, and there. Because I’ve left traces”
MAZE: AD ASTRA concludes with two dual ballads: “Diary” and “Beyond the Storm.” Featuring string accompaniment, “Diary” is an archetypal ONEWE rock-ballad, cosmic and soaring.
There is no clearer way to phrase it: “Beyond the Storm” is gorgeous. A journey as much as it is the destination of the album (the maze in question), the song is painstakingly crafted, with a bridge that this author is, quite frankly, envious of. The song layers in and over itself, building from a simple piano vocal pairing to a racing, voyaging orchestral anthem, repeating like a prayer: “Can’t Stop, We rise again and again.” A tear-jerker and a song flooded in its own inspiration, “Beyond the Storm” bookends another wondrous, delightful run for ONEWE.