magic island — a self-indulgent analysis

Magic Island.

The story of a promise, a magic island, and dwindling hope.

A song which feels exactly like entering a magic island. Crossing the grey and dull city, crossing a familiarity that is slowly becoming a stranger and reaching an unfamiliar but comforting island. A place which can only possibly to exist in dreams, in the wildest, most ideal dreams of some soul hoping for a day of contentment. A day which leaves one with only a warm smile and nothing else.

Magic Island: a song that wraps around you completely, in an embrace that practically lulls you to sleep. An embrace that understands you and accepts you for who you are. An embrace that reminds you kindly to breathe.

But, it’s also a promise kept after it was forgotten within the tides of time, a promise long overdue. A place that is unknown, and will remain unknown. A secret haven, a warmth that does not want to be shared.

It is also a song of reminiscence: a song that was shared between the best of friends, now forgotten and lost within the time they spent apart, coming back to memory in bits and pieces. A new vow, a new promise: to never forget. To never leave each other.

Alas, this is a dream-like place. Too good to be true. It is with this awareness under the mask of a pleasant feeling that the song progresses.

It might sound happy, giddy even, but the lyrics hide a dwindling hope. Like the waning moon, the place is also temporary. Beautiful at first, but gone the next second. A bubble ready to burst any time, a fantasy breaking down to show the crude reality.

The smile that the island brings is genuine, but slowly becomes a forced one. It's the last bits of hope, to hang on to something and be in this magic-like place.

It's a memory that will dissipate once you close your eyes. A vivid time, dulling down to nothing.

The song continues, inching towards the end. A hope to not sleep, to not faint and forget this place again clings onto the heart. Alas...

Alas, the place is just that. A Magic Island. Just like how magic is temporary and fleeting, this one has to go too.

As a tiredness creeps up the edges of the vision, there is only one wish made: to not forget their start line, the star light, that night and this place.

With a longing that will linger in the heart even after this memory is forgotten, even after the magic breaks, darkness pulls in.

There is a warm smile at the end of the day, but at what cost?

The song is a happiness that slowly turns into a mute fear, into a desperation to hold on; to not forget. A promise made so long ago, bound to be forgotten, but there is a hope: a sliver of it, but hope it is. A happiness so fleeting that it gives joy at first, and only develops into a fear that feels like a deja vu.

It starts with the mention of crossing a familiar city that now feels unfamiliar, of a question of ‘did you wait alone for me?’ and of a clumsy promise that started a secret. Little kids make promises all the time, but they also break it as they grow up. This one, however, crosses the time of growth and stands strong, tying them all together.

The second verse, however, crawls into a doubtfulness that can only come to people who have always been suspicious of happiness; who believe that some things are too good to be true, not just in the words. The line “결국 물거품이 될까?” can be better translated as ‘Will everything be in vain?’, but a transliteration would be ‘Will everything become a bubble?’, which tell us how fragile it is, this magic island, and this promise of theirs. The verse progress to the lines “꿈도 다 추억이 될까? 표류가 되버린 이 항해", roughly translated as ‘Will all the dreams become memories too? This sail which has gone adrift'. Something about these lines have the power to put you through a trance of thoughts (at least for me it does). This is one reason why it is my favorite verse out of the whole song, but it's not the only one. The vocals, of course, play a considerable part; it is what makes the song calming, after all. They aren't loud, but they aren't fading away in the background either. The instrumentals and the vocals almost merge together, creating a beautiful harmony. It gives the song the feeling of hope; a hope that is slowly slipping away, but hope nonetheless.

The song holds dreams, hopes and promises, but also watches as it all turns into a grey nothing. A dull throb, left unseen and forgotten. A sheer desperation to hold on to at least some of the magic.

It plays well into the story of TXT universe as well: the universe begins with ‘Nap Of A Star', the most innocent of hopes that a kid would hold on to. The wish to just be someone's small sleep, a dream within it, just to make them feel safe. Magic Island, like Nap Of A Star, succeeds in extending the feeling of innocent hope, but it also shows growth. If Nap Of A Star were a kid at the verge of being a teenager, Magic Island is the part of life where the teenager misses childhood. It’s looking back with a bitter smile, it's holding onto an invisible hand that is all but fading away, but also knowing that it will fully disappear eventually; that one day, the teenager will have to look back at one’s childhood and only smile, knowing he can never get it back, but the little voice in the heart keeps wanting to.

This is Magic Island, and this is the story of hope shifting and melding into an inevitable fear: of growing up. Of losing, of loving and losing and never being able to get it back. Of memories that fade into a shade of vignette, never able to shine like it did before, but coloured with a pleasant nostalgia that makes one smile regardless