Shedding their past lives and idol facade, the five-member multinational girl group X:IN is back with a brand-new dose of music. The latest offering from Korean bandmates E.sha, Nizz, and Hannah, Russian member Nova, and finally Aria, who is the second K-pop star from India and the first from Kerala, marks their fresh beginning under their new agency, BeBy Entertainment.
The rising K-pop rookies completely flip the script with their May 2025 comeback, which became a medium of their most vulnerable expression yet. The South Korean music industry is frequently associated with “manufactured” glamorous identities. However, XIN’s tuneful outpour in “Defend Myself” is seen as a bold sign of the group distancing itself from the image the members have had to construct and uphold so far to stick the landing in a professional landscape defined by cut-throat competition and idealised perfection.
XIN comeback tracklist
Positioning itself as an autobiographic narrative of the girl group’s inner emotional conflict, the self-explanatory album title establishes the quintet’s goal this time around: “to protect me.” Penning different aspects of the same hard-to-have conversation in an industry that strives for perfection, X:IN’s third mini-album features four songs: “Attention Seeker,” “수리수리마하수리 수수리 사바하 (SABAHA),” “Bitter Love,” and “Almost Done.”
What does the new XIN K-pop album mean to the girl group?
Cutting off ties from their former playful musical identity that sought the approval of the masses, X:IN members dig deeper within to play out an honestly raw story closer to their own experiences and heart. Through “Defend Myself,” E.sha, Nizz, Hannah, Nova and Aria put across their aspirations of earning the titles of real artists whose music speaks to diverse audiences. Consolidating their latest album as a testament to their struggle of navigating self-identity while juggling the baggage of fame, X:IN leader, E.sha dove further into the split meaning of “Defend Myself.”
“It’s an album about the feelings behind the glamorous appearance and our story of trying to protect ourselves in the confusion. As you listen to the four songs in the album, you’ll notice the atmosphere continuously shifts,” she says of the album, according to the official press release. Meanwhile, Aria, who is from India’s Kerala, hoped that their musical project conveyed their true emotions and experiences, while encouraging “the audience to express themselves honestly and be unapologetically themselves.”
From May 17 onwards, “Defend Myself” was available on digital platforms for streaming. Its physical counterpart will be out on May 22, 2025. X:IN’s third mini-album comes over a year after their second EP, “THE REAL.” In November 2023, the quintet made their first-ever collective visit to India for a performance at the K-Wave Festival in Bengaluru.