CLOSE YOUR EYES channels jazz-fueled swagger on '256th Note'

CLOSE YOUR EYES released its fourth EP, 256th Note, in Seoul on Wednesday, a jazz-inflected record arriving five months after its last release. The seven-member group said it wanted to show a side fans had not seen before and to avoid being boxed into one genre. The album includes seven tracks, with Drop That! sampling Yoon Si-nae’s 1979 song Enjoy This Night and reworking it into 1990s street hip-hop.

The group debuted in April 2025 through JTBC’s audition show Project 7.

CLOSE YOUR EYES has been taking its BEYOND YOUR EYES world tour on the road since January.

The album has seven tracks, including Open Your Eyes, Drop That!, Vibe Check, Slowly Bleed, Fool For You, Baby Bossa Nova and Eternity.

Jeon Min-wook has lyric credits on Open Your Eyes, Fool For You, Baby Bossa Nova and Drop That!, while Song Seung-ho co-wrote Drop That! and Fool For You.

The closer Eternity includes lyrics written by all seven members about their thoughts returning to their fandom, known as CLOSER.

Published Sep 30, 2026 8:38 pm KST

Members of K-pop boy band CLOSE YOUR EYES, from left, Kenshin, Song Seung-ho, Jeon Min-wook, Ma Jingxiang, Kim Sung-min, Jang Yeo-jun and Seo Kyoung-bae, pose during a press conference at a hotel in Seoul's Seocho District, Wednesday. Courtesy of UNCORE

Multinational K-pop boy band CLOSE YOUR EYES has released its fourth EP, "256th Note," a jazz-inflected record that comes just five months after the group's last release.

The seven-member act — Jeon Min-wook, Ma Jingxiang, Jang Yeo-jun, Kim Sung-min, Song Seung-ho, Kenshin and Seo Kyoung-bae — debuted in April 2025 through JTBC's audition show "Project 7." In the year and a half since, the group has steadily raised its international profile, collecting awards at home and abroad and taking its "BEYOND YOUR EYES" world tour on the road since January.

Hours before the album dropped on Wednesday, the members sat down with reporters at a hotel in Seocho District, southern Seoul, to walk through how the record came together.

"We wanted to make good memories with our fans, so we went into this with a lot of excitement," Jeon said. "Because the album draws on jazz, we set out to show a side of us people haven't seen before."

K-pop boy band CLOSE YOUR EYES / Courtesy of UNCORE

The album takes its spirit from jazz improvisation, the members explained, where each instrument's spontaneous turns produce split-second moments that pull both players and listeners deeper into the music.

That idea comes into sharpest focus on the track "Drop That!" which samples "Enjoy This Night" (1979) by Yoon Si-nae, widely credited as a pioneer of Korean jazz funk, and recasts it as 1990s street hip-hop.

"Jazz funk isn't a genre we'd come across much, so it felt both unfamiliar and refreshing," Song said. "Sampling a song by such a revered veteran was a lot of pressure, but that only made us more determined to get it right."

Asked why a group with members in their 20s would reach for music that predates them, Jeon said the choice was a deliberate change of pace.

"We've put out a lot of lyrical songs since our debut, but we felt the improvisational nature of jazz really suits us, and we wanted to show we can't be pinned to a single genre," he said. "Since it's music from before our time, we had to study it, listening together and talking through how to understand it and make it our own."

If the prerelease single "Open Your Eyes" was the album's gentler introduction, filtering the loose, searching feel of jazz piano through hip-hop and R&B, "Drop That!" turns that same impulse into something more direct and powerful.

"Our goal was to make good music that isn't boxed in by genre," Jang said, "and to make every style on the album easy to listen to."

Rounding out the seven tracks are "Vibe Check," "Slowly Bleed," "Fool For You," "Baby Bossa Nova" and "Eternity," which roam across different instruments and styles.

The members' fingerprints are all over the record. Jeon has lyric credits on "Open Your Eyes," "Fool For You," "Baby Bossa Nova" and "Drop That!"; Song co-wrote "Drop That!" and "Fool For You"; and Kenshin and Kim contributed to "Open Your Eyes" and "Vibe Check," respectively.

The closer, "Eternity," is the most personal of all, with all seven members writing lyrics about how their thoughts keep returning to their fandom, known as CLOSER.

Asked what they hoped to achieve with the album, Kenshin from Japan brought the room to laughter with a candid answer delivered in still-halting Korean — he wanted to shed the group's "bookish boy" image for more of a "runaway teen" vibe.

Jang quickly stepped in to steer things back on course.

"People often tell us our music is good, so we want the jazz concept to showcase what we do best," he said. "If we could earn one new nickname this time, it would be 'music matjip,'" he added, using Korean slang for a restaurant worth lining up for.

CLOSE YOUR EYES 于周三在首尔发行了第四张迷你专辑《256th Note》，这张融合了爵士乐元素的专辑距离他们上一张专辑发行已有五个月之久。这支七人组合表示，他们希望展现歌迷们从未见过的一面，并避免被单一的音乐风格所束缚。专辑共收录七首歌曲，其中《Drop That!》采样了尹诗奈1979年的歌曲《Enjoy This Night》，并将其改编成90年代街头嘻哈风格。

该组合于 2025 年 4 月通过 JTBC 的选秀节目 Project 7 出道。

自一月份以来，CLOSE YOUR EYES 乐队一直在进行他们的 BEYOND YOUR EYES 世界巡回演唱会。

这张专辑共有七首歌曲，包括《睁开你的双眼》、《放下它！》、《氛围检查》、《慢慢流血》、《为你痴狂》、《宝贝波萨诺瓦》和《永恒》。

全珉旭参与了《Open Your Eyes》、《Fool For You》、《Baby Bossa Nova》和《Drop That!》的作词，而宋承浩参与了《Drop That!》和《Fool For You》的作词。

结尾曲《Eternity》的歌词由七位成员共同创作，表达了他们对粉丝群体（即 CLOSER）的思念之情。

发布于2026年9月30日晚上8:38（韩国标准时间）

韩国男子组合 CLOSE YOUR EYES 的成员，从左至右依次为：Kenshin、宋承浩、全珉旭、马景祥、金圣珉、张汝俊和徐京培，周三在首尔瑞草区一家酒店举行的新闻发布会上合影。图片由 UNCORE 提供。

跨国 K-pop 男子组合 CLOSE YOUR EYES 发行了第四张迷你专辑《256th Note》，这是一张带有爵士乐元素的唱片，距离该组合上一张专辑发行仅五个月。

这个由七名成员组成的组合——全珉旭、马景祥、张汝俊、金圣珉、宋承浩、Kenshin和徐京培——于2025年4月通过JTBC的选秀节目《Project 7》出道。在出道一年半的时间里，该组合稳步提升了国际知名度，在国内外斩获多项奖项，并于今年1月开启了名为“BEYOND YOUR EYES”的世界巡回演唱会。

专辑于周三发行前几个小时，成员们在首尔南部瑞草区的一家酒店与记者们坐下来，详细介绍了这张专辑的制作过程。

“我们想和粉丝们一起创造美好的回忆，所以我们带着极大的热情投入到这张专辑的制作中，”全先生说。“因为这张专辑融合了爵士乐元素，我们希望展现大家以前从未见过的我们。”

韩国流行男团 CLOSE YOUR EYES / 由 UNCORE 提供

乐队成员解释说，这张专辑的精神源自爵士即兴演奏，其中每种乐器的即兴演奏都会产生瞬间的精彩，将演奏者和听众更深地带入音乐之中。

这个想法在歌曲“Drop That!”中体现得最为明显，这首歌采样了被广泛认为是韩国爵士放克先驱尹诗奈的“Enjoy This Night”（1979），并将其重新演绎为 20 世纪 90 年代的街头嘻哈。

宋说：“爵士放克这种音乐类型我们以前很少接触，所以感觉既陌生又新鲜。采样这样一位备受尊敬的前辈的作品压力很大，但这反而让我们更加坚定了要做好的决心。”

当被问及为什么一个成员都只有二十多岁的组合会选择比他们年龄更老的音乐时，全表示，这是有意改变节奏。

“自出道以来，我们创作了很多抒情歌曲，但我们觉得爵士乐的即兴性非常适合我们，我们也想证明我们无法被单一的音乐类型所束缚，”他说。“由于爵士乐是早于我们时代的音乐，我们必须研究它，一起聆听，一起探讨如何理解它，并将其融入我们自己的音乐风格。”

如果说先行单曲《睁开你的双眼》是这张专辑较为柔和的开场，将爵士钢琴的自由探索感融入嘻哈和 R&B 音乐中，那么《放下它！》则将同样的冲动转化为更加直接和有力的东西。

张说：“我们的目标是创作不受流派限制的好音乐，并让专辑中的每一种风格都易于聆听。”

其余七首曲目分别是《Vibe Check》、《Slowly Bleed》、《Fool For You》、《Baby Bossa Nova》和《Eternity》，这些曲目融合了不同的乐器和风格。

这张专辑处处都体现了成员们的创作风格。全智贤参与了《Open Your Eyes》、《Fool For You》、《Baby Bossa Nova》和《Drop That!》的作词；宋承宪参与了《Drop That!》和《Fool For You》的创作；健信和金健信分别参与了《Open Your Eyes》和《Vibe Check》的创作。

收尾曲《Eternity》是所有歌曲中最私人的一首，七位成员共同创作了歌词，表达了他们对粉丝群体（即 CLOSER）的思念之情。

当被问及他们希望通过这张专辑达到什么目标时，来自日本的 Kenshin 用仍然磕磕绊绊的韩语坦率地回答，引得全场哄堂大笑——他想摆脱组合“书呆子”的形象，转而营造一种“离家出走的青少年”的氛围。

张迅速介入，使事情重回正轨。

“人们经常夸我们的音乐好听，所以我们希望通过爵士乐的概念来展现我们最擅长的东西，”他说。“如果这次我们能获得一个新的绰号，那就是‘音乐马特吉’，”他补充道，这里用了韩语俚语，指那种值得排队的餐厅。