Anna S. brings us another League of Legends tie-in…

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Katherine St Asaph: Given that each ephemeral member of this hypothetical boy band corresponds to a League of Legends champion, “they’re praying for the death of a rockstar” is indeed an accurate description of the gameplay. Somehow that literal meaning makes the song’s meaning — fame can suck, haters are known to hate — even less compelling.
[4]

Anna Katrina Lockwood: To what do we owe the joy of hearing Baekhyun fuckin’ SING like this–perhaps his freedom from SM’s vocal strictures? His chorus on Heartsteel’s “Paranoia” is a gear I don’t think he’s used before, an effective confidence. The song is totally fun–they’ve competently executed a gleeful K-pop himbo vibe despite Baekhyun being the only actual K-pop person involved. Riot Games nailed the casting as well, with a great interplay between Baekhyun’s anchor chorus and the verses–especially Cal Scruby’s lackadaisical drawl on the first, a great foil to Baekhyun’s tension. The whole thing gives the effect of barreling precariously around a cartoon racetrack with your bros, which is surely intentional. Anyway, “Paranoia” is basically a [7], but I’m adding a discretionary parasocial point. 
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Anna Suiter: Aphelios and Yone were robbed, and doesn’t Kayn’s voice have a little too much editing on it? I think it would’ve been nice if they had given Ezreal a high note, but I’m glad they gave K’sane the bridge. Hope Riot doesn’t keep them in the dungeon for three years like they’re doing with K/DA right now!
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Jacob Sujin Kuppermann: At least K/DA had hooks! 
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Will Adams: Pop stars > rock stars. We’ve been over this.
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Taylor Alatorre: Props to the producers for not simply churning out the MGK/Mod Sun/Yungblud type beat that the “death of a rock star” lyricism was screaming for. They also understand the importance of proportion and negative space in making big sounds sound big and not just cluttered. Even more so than the fictional boy band in Pixar’s Turning Red, the cast members of Heartsteel could not possibly cohere as a group in real life, which ironically gives the proceedings an air of whimsy and even relative freedom that belie the song’s origins in demographic dial-turning. Baudrillard be praised — hyperreality still has its uses.
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Michael Hong: Not sure anyone here qualifies for “rockstar” status, but sure, go ahead.
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Nortey Dowuona: Telling this is a virtual boyband animated properly with actual different members. They think I’ll fall for Gorillaz but good because Tobi Lou is in it. They’re right. It’s a problem.
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Ian Mathers: The odd joke I’ve made over the years notwithstanding, I genuinely haven’t encountered much of anything in music that makes me feel like I Don’t Understand the Kids These Days. That’s true of the actual *music*, at least. The increasingly common move, post-Gorillaz/Studio Killers/etc., of having that music represented by animations does feel like there’s a generation gap of some kind there (especially and specifically in the form of video game characters, even more so than the whole VTuber thing). I just can’t find anything to get a grasp on, and while I’m not fully a “digital native” (sigh), I say that as someone who’s had online personas since I was prepubescent. From the perspective of the artists, I do understand how you might want to avoid the downsides of fame and fandom in our current era; from the bosses’ side, I get that increased fungibility and brand loyalty are their own rewards. But even if I liked the song a lot more, even if it was a lot less generic, even if “ft. BAEKHYUN, tobi lou, ØZI, and Cal Scruby” meant something more to me than “this could be a throwaway joke from Popstar: Never Stop Never Stopping,” I just don’t think I could ever be interested in the music-video exploits of a bunch of Fortnite skins. And if that’s just one more demarcating line where I’m sitting on the Old side, well, death comes to us all eventually.
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