For 10.25 Seconds the Band Drops Out and Only the Crowd Is Left

WOODZ sang twelve songs at Nanji Hangang Park this evening.

ATA Festival, in Its Second Year

The ATA Festival, hosted by the Hankyung Media Group, runs 19~20 September at Nanji Hangang Park. This is its second edition. A free shuttle runs from DMC Station from 9am to 10pm.

Today's line-up was ten acts — Hi-Fi Un!corn, Kim Suyoung, Moon Sang-min, Car the garden, Lee Oh Wook, LUCY, &TEAM, WOODZ, Dynamicduo and CNBLUE. Hi-Fi Un!corn opened at noon and CNBLUE closed.

WOODZ took the stage around 7pm.

"You Really Don't Know How Things Go"

Something WOODZ said on stage.

"Things started going well in my twelfth, thirteenth year, and I thought — you really don't know how things go. I experienced for myself that if you hold on and keep enjoying it, one day it shows."

What makes that line hold up is 'Drowning'.

The song is not the title track but an album cut from 'Oo-Li', WOODZ's fifth EP, released on 26 April 2023. Yet two years after release, in May 2025, it reached number one on the Circle digital chart. There is no music video on the official channel, only a live clip — and that live clip sits at 70.79 million views, far above the videos for the title tracks.

Cho Seung-youn debuted with UNIQ in 2014, and has worked solo since X1 disbanded in 2020. When 'Drowning' came out in 2023 it was the ninth or tenth year since debut; the year it hit number one, 2025, was the twelfth.

On choosing the opening song, WOODZ said:

"It's the song I usually close with, but I wanted to connect with everyone from the start, with something upbeat."

The singer also announced concerts at the Olympic Gymnastics Arena on 31 October and 1 November.

From 3:28, for 10.25 Seconds, the Band Drops Out Entirely

I measured the audio of the 'Drowning' live clip in 0.25-second windows. Four minutes six.

There's a deliberate silence in the opening. Across 0:15.50~0:16.25 the level, running in the −14dB range, switches off by 31.3dB within a second to −45.7dB, then returns by 28.4dB over the next second. At 0:17.50 the 20~150Hz band momentarily fills to 96.3% as a low hit brings the song properly in.

The body (0:20~4:02) has a median of −7.7dB with 92.6% of windows between −12 and −4dB — a heavily compressed live mix about 8dB wide.

The clearest event begins at 3:28.00.

For 10.25 seconds, until 3:38.25, the 20~150Hz band falls below 2% of total energy. Most of that stretch runs at 0.01~0.08%, with 500~3000Hz filling the space at 86~93%. The level sinks from −8.0dB at 3:27.50 into the −11~−12dB range, and reaches −18.6dB at 3:37.00.

That's where the band's low end drops out entirely and only the voice and the crowd singing are left.

The same gap continues for another 5.5 seconds across 3:39.50~3:45.00. Then at 3:45.00 the 20~150Hz band returns at 50.4% and the level is back at −6.2dB. That second is where the band gets slammed back in.

6000~11000Hz never exceeds 7.1% anywhere (mostly 0~5%) — a dark live mix with thin cymbal decay and mids pushed forward. That's why the crowd reads so clearly: the band left the register where human voices live.

It fades from −4.6dB at 4:02.00 and ends at 4:06.

It Runs Again Tomorrow

The ATA Festival continues at Nanji Hangang Park tomorrow, 20 September, with the shuttle on the same hours. My bag's already packed.

If you're going back to 'Drowning', just the thirty seconds from 3:20 to 3:50. Ten and a quarter seconds emptying, five and a half more, and everything returning at once — it's all in there.