Hey, K-pop students! 👋
I’m Student1, just another student who loves K-pop and wants to learn and enjoy it together with you.
Today, I’m going back to IVE “Kitsch,” the pre-release single from their first full album I’ve IVE.
My first reaction to this song was basically, “Wait… IVE is doing this?”
“Kitsch” felt surprisingly stripped back. Instead of a huge melody constantly pushing the song forward, there was this restrained hip-hop beat and a chorus that just kept repeating:
Kitsch, kitsch, kitsch, kitsch…
I remember the song being pretty divisive when it came out, and honestly, I could understand why. It wasn’t necessarily what everyone expected from IVE.
But something funny happened over time. I started appreciating it more, not less.
If you asked me now which IVE song still sounds stylish and somehow never really gets old, I’d probably pick “Kitsch.”
🎀 What Does IVE “Kitsch” Mean?
Kitsch is already a real English word, and its usual meaning isn’t exactly flattering. It can describe art or style that’s overly flashy, sentimental, tacky, or considered to be in questionable taste.
But obviously IVE aren’t singing:
“Hey, we have terrible taste.”
The lyric that really matters here is:
우리만의 자유로운 nineteen’s kitsch
The key part for me is 우리만의, meaning something that is our own.
Their style, their feed, their dance, their choices — they don’t have to fit somebody else’s definition of good taste or the “right” way to do things.
If someone else thinks it’s weird?
Fine.
It’s ours.
So in this song, I don’t think “Kitsch” works if you only stick to its dictionary definition. It feels more like owning your personal taste and doing things your way even when other people don’t quite get it.
🧊 Why Does “Kitsch” Sound So Different?
“Kitsch” feels like a song that knows how to leave space.
The hip-hop-influenced beat is relatively restrained, the vocals and rap don’t constantly fight for attention, and then the chorus drops into that extremely simple repetition of “Kitsch.”
At first, that simplicity felt a little strange to me.
But the more I listened, the more it became the point.
Instead of adding more and more sounds to make everything feel huge, the production leaves room for the members’ voices and rhythmic delivery to stand out. The rap sections especially benefit from that because there isn’t a crowded instrumental sitting underneath every word.
And maybe that restraint is part of why the song has aged so well for me. Even now, it still has this cold, clean feeling that doesn’t seem too attached to one specific trend.
📱 Your Feed, Your Algorithm, Your Rules
You can definitely tell “Kitsch” comes from the social media era.
The lyrics casually bring in:
feed
like
and even:
알고리즘 — algorithm
There’s a line about constantly posting to a feed, people hitting like almost as if they’re hypnotized, and IVE showing up in someone’s algorithm every day.
What I like is that they don’t sound like they’re changing themselves to get those likes.
The attitude is closer to:
“I’m doing what I want, and somehow you’re all watching anyway.”
That makes the whole thing a little more playful.
They say they’re unpredictable and doing things their own way, while everyone else is copying the dance and seeing them all over their feeds.
They don’t care what everyone thinks…
but they definitely know everyone is looking. 😂
🎤 “Kitsch” Korean Pronunciation
There’s a fun mix of Korean and English in “Kitsch,” and knowing a few of the Korean lines makes the attitude of the song much easier to catch.
If you can’t read Hangul yet, here are some key lines in Roman letters.
💡 Student1 Tip:
These are written for singing along rather than as a strict Korean romanization lesson, so I sometimes prioritize a spelling that feels easier to follow with the actual track.
🎧 Pronunciation Highlights
Korean:
이제 그만 peace out
Pronunciation:
Ije geuman, peace out
Korean:
우리만의 자유로운 nineteen’s kitsch
Pronunciation:
Urimanui jayurowoon nineteen’s kitsch
Korean:
지금까지 한 적 없는 custom fit
Pronunciation:
Jigeumkkaji han jeok eomneun custom fit
Korean:
올려대는 나의 feed엔 like it
Pronunciation:
Ollyeodaeneun naui feed-en like it
Korean:
홀린 듯이 눌러 모두 다 like it
Pronunciation:
Hollin deusi nulleo modu da like it
Korean:
내가 추는 춤을 다들 따라 춰
Pronunciation:
Naega chuneun chumeul dadeul ttara chwo
Korean:
매일 너의 알고리즘에 난 떠
Pronunciation:
Maeil neoui algorijeume nan tteo
Korean:
걷잡을 수 없이 올라 미친 score
Pronunciation:
Geotjabeul su eopsi olla michin score
Korean:
그 누구도 예상 못 할 nineteen’s kitsch
Pronunciation:
Geu nugudo yesang mot hal nineteen’s kitsch
💡 Korean Tip with Student1
Rather than explaining English words like feed and like back to English-speaking readers, there are a few Korean expressions here that are way more interesting.
💕 우리만의 (Urimanui)
우리 (uri) means “we/us,” and -만의 (-manui) gives the sense that something belongs specifically or uniquely to someone.
So:
우리만의
means:
“our own”
or
“uniquely ours.”
That makes 우리만의 자유로운 nineteen’s kitsch pretty important to the song.
It isn’t just kitsch.
It’s our kitsch.
That tiny piece of Korean changes the whole attitude of the title for me.
😵 홀린 듯이 (Hollin Deusi)
홀리다 (hollida) can describe being enchanted, captivated, or almost bewitched by something.
Then -듯이 (-deusi) gives the meaning:
“as if”
or
“like.”
So:
홀린 듯이
has the feeling of:
“as if hypnotized.”
In the song, people are hitting like almost like they’re under a spell.
Honestly, that sounds a little too accurate for social media scrolling. 😭
📈 걷잡을 수 없이 (Geotjabeul Su Eopsi)
This expression is used when something becomes difficult or impossible to control.
걷잡을 수 없다
can mean:
“to be uncontrollable”
or:
“to get beyond control.”
So when the score is going up 걷잡을 수 없이, it isn’t just slowly increasing.
It’s taking off.
📲 뜨다 (Tteuda)
뜨다 is one of those Korean verbs that seems to show up everywhere with completely different meanings.
It can mean something floats. The sun can 뜨다 when it rises.
But in:
매일 너의 알고리즘에 난 떠
it means something more like:
“show up”
or
“appear.”
For example, someone might say:
이 영상이 계속 내 유튜브에 떠.
Meaning:
“This video keeps showing up on my YouTube.”
So IVE are basically saying they keep appearing in your algorithm every day.
You opened the app.
There they are again. 😂
✋ -한 적 없다 (-han Jeok Eopda)
The Korean pattern:
-ㄴ/은 적이 없다
is used when you’ve never had the experience of doing something.
For example:
가 본 적 없어
means:
“I’ve never been there.”
In “Kitsch,” we get:
지금까지 한 적 없는 custom fit
The feeling is something they haven’t done before, up until now.
And I like that line even more when I think about the song itself.
“Kitsch” really did feel like IVE trying something people weren’t necessarily expecting from them.
💭 Student1’s Take
“Kitsch” wasn’t instantly my favorite IVE song.
Honestly, I think the chorus felt almost too simple when I first heard it.
Kitsch, kitsch, kitsch…
That’s it? 😂
But somehow, I kept coming back to it.
And years later, it doesn’t feel dated to me at all. If anything, the empty space in the beat and that repetitive chorus are now part of why I don’t get tired of it.
I also keep coming back to 우리만의.
Our own.
The song is basically about not forcing yourself into somebody else’s idea of what your style should be, and the actual music kinda did the same thing. It took a direction that felt unexpected enough to divide listeners at the time instead of just playing everything safe.
There’s something pretty funny about a song saying “This is our thing, you don’t all have to get it” and then actually getting mixed reactions.
It almost proves its own point.
So if someone asked me today to pick one IVE song that still feels stylish and doesn’t really get old for me, I think I’d choose “Kitsch.”
I definitely like it more now than I did when I first heard it.
Maybe that’s a pretty Kitsch result too.