The last time I had a deep listen to Airy was her 2018 EP SEEDS. Over the years, she’s released singles and collaborative works, but I’ve been waiting for a longer release. And I thought that maybe she decided to retire after 2023. Then B,U.D seemed to appear out of nowhere. If you compare SEEDS to B,U.D, it’s an evolution that you hear from singles, but this 16-song album is a dense and heavy listen.
B,U.D is interesting because it’s a strange and organic mixture of styles and ideas. Airy still uses freakfolk, dreampop, and psychedelic styles in her music. But this time, you also get hip-hop, triphop, and ambient music. “Look, Bora is Dizzy” reminds me of Cibo Matto and HALCALI – two Japanese duos in different genres but harnessing the same energy.
And what’s also interesting is the number of collaborators who backed up Airy. Pishu, Livigesh, some mixing by eAeon, and more appear in the liner notes. This is definitely a presentation of a singular vision. Airy is pulling, combining, and remixing genres.
There’s never a lost moment. Airy is constantly pushing forward and dragging you along. It’s also clear that B,U.D is meant to follow the track order because there’s a definite narrative that flows from each song. Even when things are a little weird, like on “Stéphanie Stéphane,” you can still get addicted to the music.
This album requires you to invest the time, but none of the songs lose momentum. “+inder” is in the same realm as “Bipolar Meet,” but it invokes different emotions. Even the sparse instrumentation is different, but it flows within the universe that Airy created,
I can imagine some people coming away from B,U.D and saying that it’s too weird to fail. 16 songs is a gamble. It’s not only a lot of music to create, arrange, and record, but also the potential to slow down increases. Airy presented a set of songs that all flow and follow each other. You can never get bored.
Songs like “Heavy HH Heaven,” “brightnesseeking,” and “HDML” all exist in the same wavelength, but they are saying different things. Also, I can’t leave out how good the composition of “Ganjo Zaxo” is. Basically perfection.
B,U.D is one of the best albums of 2025, without a doubt.
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Written by Chris P for Korean Indie.
