GDragon Gets Personal With Eponymous 'Kwon Ji Yong' EP

publish date: 2017-06-09
source: billboard

K-pop’s most out-of-the-box icon gets up close and personal with Kwon Ji Yong, G-Dragon’s first solo album in four years.
The BIGBANG member, whose given name forms the EP's title, dropped the album on Thursday (June 8), offering up part of his soul through the five tracks. Beginning with lead single “Untitled 2014,” Kwon Ji Yong is G-Dragon at his most vulnerable as he reflects on his career, successes, and regrets through a variety of sonic styles.
Renowned for his avant-garde approach to music, art, and fashion, G-Dragon tones things down for the lead track. For a single from one of K-pop’s most colorful artists, “Untitled 2014” comes as a bit of a shock. The evocative, simple piano ballad has the K-pop icon singing -- not rapping, as he tends to do on singles -- mournfully about a long-ended romance (presumably from 2014). “If I can see you one more time, I can give up everything,” he croons, not as the stage persona G-Dragon but as Kwon Ji Yong, the more private, intimate side of the 28-year-old Korean superstar who has been in the limelight since childhood.