Jaehyun - Forever Only (SM Station: NCT Lab)

I. Introduction

"Forever Only" is a digital single from Jaehyun of the boy group NCT 127, a permanent sub-unit of the boy group NCT . It is the fourth single of SM Station NCT Lab and was released on August 18, 2022.

II. Background

SM announced a new project under SM Station to focus around the boy group NCT on January 30, 2022. NCT is unique among K-Pop groups due to the fact that the original concept of NCT is an ever expanding group with "unlimited" members and is comprised of several individual sub-units. There are currently four sub-units: NCT 127, NCT Dream, WayV and NCT U.

NCT Lab will include solo songs, self-composed tracks and sub-unit work outside of the group's albums. This song is the third song of the season and features Jaehyun, one of the main vocalists in NCT 127 and NCT U.

In July 2022, Jaehyun was announced as the next NCT Lab member. Jaehyun previously had a song, "Try Again" in SM Station Season 2, but had no other songs outside of NCT units. "Try Again" is the highest streamed Station song on Spotify and the highest of any NCT member. He also had an unreleased cover of "I Like Me Better" on YouTube that is SM's most viewed MV.

It was also revealed he co-wrote the song. He had written lyrics for two previous NCT songs, "Fire Truck" and "Dancing in the Rain." He also co-wrote the lyrics and composition for a solo song "Lost", which debuted during NCT 127's Neo City: The Link concert tour. Jaehyun described his NCT Lab song, "Forever Only" as "sexy lonely." The song is a guitar-driven mid-tempo R&B song.

He described his songwriting process in an interview with GQ by saying that he usually thinks of the theme, then melody and lyrics but for this song "this time I thought of the loneliness in the song first. I thought of the image first this time, and it becomes quite easy to write the lyrics once you have that image in your head."

He also said on an IG live ahead of the song's debut that he wanted to "release a song filled with my voice, with my feelings" and "share the true part of himself" through his music.

Dewain Whitmore has written a number of NCT songs, including notable NCT 127's "Limitless" and R&B b-sides "White Night" and "Magic Carpet Ride," as well as songs for SHINee, EXO and Kai. Ellie Suh has written NCT 127's "Road Trip" and NCT Dream's "Dive Into You," as well as aespa's "Lucid Dream." TIDO and Micah Premnath have not done any NCT songs.

This was Jaehyun's first solo song. His previous Station song was a duet.

III. Tracklist

IV. Spotify

V. Videos

Teaser:

MV:

VI. Concept Photos

VII. Reception

The song debuted at #1 in 30 countries and charted across all the Korean music platforms.