This week, you’re freshly sixteen. The keys of your kinda-crappy car, which you bought for maybe $4,000, are clutched like the most precious diamond in your fist. This is your first day of freedom, and you’re gonna get what few friends you can squeeze into the backseat, no matter how illegal it is, because this is what teenage rebellion is. With everyone crammed in the backseat, you crank the car, and she purrs with all 130,000 miles she’s seen before you. And then you drive. To where? You have no idea, but this is what teenage freedom is.
With a blend of early 2000s rock aesthetics from a uniquely Gen-Z perspective and a “boy next door” concept, CORTIS breaks into the K-pop industry with a sound that is fresh and new, standing out among current releases that often consist of more electronic and dance albums. “COLOR OUTSIDE THE LINES” is the boys’ first EP, named after the unabbreviated version of their own group name. BIGHIT Entertainment, the masterminds behind groups like BTS, says on CORTIS’s artist page that their group name represents the boys as creatives and how they strive to bring their own ideas and authenticity to their work and content. With the early release of their music video for “GO!” and their prerelease song “What You Want,” netizens across the globe have been praising them for their messy and unpolished vibe, which diverges from the overly polished and produced groups prevalent in the industry. Released on September 8, 2025, this album is perfect for the weird and dramatic season change from Summer to Fall.
The group consists of five members: Martin, James, Juhoon, Seonghyeon, and Keonho. Their home countries span Canada, Taiwan, and South Korea, but they are all united by their love, desire, and drive to create music. Each member has a hand in the production and choreography of their albums, giving them full creative autonomy, a rare occurrence in the K-pop industry. The boys already have impressive credits under their belt, such as Martin, the leader. At 16 years old, he had two songs which he helped produce chart on Billboard, “Magnetic” by ILLIT, Billboard Hot 100 at 91, as well as “Deja Vu” by TOMORROW x TOGETHER, which appeared at 145 on Billboard’s Global 200.
The boys made this album using sounds that they have brought in from their own personal tastes. You can hear the early psychedelic rock influences brought in from Martin’s western childhood in “What You Want”, as well as the hip-hop and rap sound in “FaSHioN” — a popular sound amongst many South Korean K-pop trainees — where you can really hear the Playboy Carti and Kendrick Lamar influence. The wide range of energy in this album makes it perfect for any activity. From having your friends over in your dorm with “Lullaby” going softly in the background to blasting “FaSHioN” when you really need to hype yourself up at any point in the day, they really have something in this album for everyone.
More into the songs themselves because that’s where the true gems lie in wait for you, dear reader.
The first track that the listener is hit with is the pure energy ball that is “GO!”, and that is beyond purposeful. Juhoon said in an interview with Rolling Stone that “GO!” is the perfect song to introduce them, because it is them. This is the group’s theme song for their success. We are really watching them go, and this is only the starting line for them.
“우린 필요 없어 다른 sign /
“(We don’t need any other sign) /
Paint the town, 초록색의 lights /
(Paint the town with the green lights) /
페달에 발을 올려, 마치 bike”
(Pedal to the metal, like a bike) /”
CORTIS isn’t waiting on anyone else’s permission to burst ahead in this industry. They’re making their own path, with their own sound, and their own ideas. This also being the song that they released a music video and conceptual film for first got the world to become more familiar with the actual, authentic nature of the boys.
Every song on this album embodies the feeling of being a teenager, those fleeting moments of freedom before the real world starts to set in. Those pivotal years where you’re just learning who you truly are and what you want in life. In the title track “What You Want,” you can really feel this energy flowing through every single word. The lyrics say,
““나도 똑같아 십칠년 평생 /
“(Same here, all seventeen years of my life) /
쫓았었던 love, 쫓았었던 fame /
(Chased after love, chased after fame) /
So now, I want the whole world to know my name”
Martin expresses here that throughout seventeen years, he thought he wanted all of these different things and chased after them. Now, he says in his interview withWeverse Magazine that fame is people remembering your name, and making an impact is really what denotes true fame. During the last line, Martin borderline screams; his true desperation for this wish comes through beautifully. Being remembered gives them a goal to strive for, and they are hungry to achieve it. In this song, their vocals are purposefully raw and frayed, forgoing a polished feel to convey the message the boys want to send.
Starting off with a ripping synth, “FaSHioN” drags you straight into the boy’s five-dollar tee and ten thousand won jeans. Many K-pop artists boast about buying new designer clothes, cars, and basically new everything, thank you, oh so much to the late capitalist hellscape that we live in, CORTIS is bragging more about their thrift finds and how you don’t need new clothes to be and feel cool.
At one point in the song, Martin calls out his fellow member Keonho, saying that no matter what he says about his clothes, they’re his style, and he will stand his ground. No matter what anyone says about him or his clothes, he’s going to stay authentic to himself and not bend to societal pressure to be “trendy” or “new”. Sometimes the best fashion comes from thrift stores. They’re reviving old clothes like “Vintage Jesus,” which, by the way, is such a funny lyric to me. Beyond this, though, the boys really are expressing how much their hometowns and land inspire them, and how they want to influence the world around them.
“JoyRide” takes a break from the high-speed energy of the first three songs on the album and takes on a more laid-back vibe, and it’s a lot more raw for CORTIS personally. It’s a windows-down, wind through your hair type of song. When one thinks of a joyride, typically donuts in an abandoned parking lot, Kesha, reckless youth, types of songs, but CORTIS’s “JoyRide” takes a break from that narrative. It still has that young and free feeling, but it’s more mellow. Not every single second of your life is “get up and go,” and high-stakes adrenaline; sometimes you take a step back and just enjoy the company of friends. It’s less of a joyride and more of a joy ride.
With the final track on this album, CORTIS gently lays us down and gives us a nice little kiss on the forehead. Although it’s a short track (but not the shortest, that crown goes to “JoyRide”), it still holds meaning to the boys’ journeys. So often, we see young idols burying themselves in work or burning just as quickly as they came onto the scene. This song serves the purpose of reminding not only the members, but also all of us, to take a break. Now we are so focused on perfection, but as James and Martin said in the aforementioned Rolling Stone article, “the perfection is not to be perfect,” and not everything is meant to be perfect. As a headstrong college student hellbent on burying myself in work, it’s a friendly reminder to take a step back. Even if you have work, take a moment, appreciate the silence, enjoy the still.
CORTIS are really carrying large legacies on its back with groups from the same label such as BTS and Tomorrow x Together being such massive successes in Korea as well as globally. With the support of their elder groups, they also draw influence from older artists, such as Nirvana, as seen in the Weverse Magazine interview with Martin. These boys though, they have the hunger and the drive to make their vision a reality. This album is truly a beautiful collage of their life experiences, from their childhood music idols, to their idol training days, it’s the story of not just CORTIS but the boys as a whole.
