Jennie tapping Peggy Gou to careen through her playground isn’t something I knew I needed, but oh man, did I.
Their linking is both a welcome surprise and a perfectly sensible match: both Korean queens that (typically sexist) terminally online wierdos feel the need to despise, the “but do you even know me?” energy of “Like Jennie” no doubt speaks to Gou as much as its author: “Haters, they don’t really like… / ’cause they could never, ever be…” could be a missile fired from either artist. The official visualizer depicting them as boxing glove-donning combatants in some by-gone arcade game feels like no accident.
As for the song itself, the original was already so frantic and in-your-face that Gou opts to fragment it into jagged, intoxicating pieces, with only Jennie’s chest-thumping rap remaining more or less intact. The producer/DJ employs all the rapper/singer’s whispers, vocal tics, scathing barbs, and one liners into a swirling, delirious maze of danceable sound.
Is a full-length collaboration too much to hope for? Even just an EP? Please? Probably, but hey, we can savor this moment having happened at all. Check it out below.
