The picture stretches wide the moment the drums come in: MEOVV's 'GO HARD'

This is the music video for the title track of 'GO HARD', the single album MEOVV released at 6 p.m. on October 12. The Bugs album notes introduce the song through 'a powerful beat set against a lyrical melody' and a 'GO HARD' chant murmured over and over. We split the sound into parts such as vocals, drums and bass, measured how loud each one was, and stepped through the picture one frame (1/24 of a second) at a time. The moment the drums first come in turned out to be the first time the shape of the picture changes, too. Times follow the official music video (3:12).

0:00 · Everyone in school uniform for 28 seconds

The video opens on a member slumped over a library desk. On the soundtrack, a voice saying 'Yeah' comes in 0.4 seconds ahead, and the bass follows. The look is a beret (a few add a mesh veil), a black jacket and a tie, and through a library, a spiral staircase, lockers and a bathroom with blue tiles, everyone, down to the extras, is in school uniform. Black bars on the left and right keep the picture narrow, only 1.47 times as wide as it is tall. The first clothes that aren't a school uniform show up at 0:28. Right as the bass, which dropped out for a little over a second on '해가 진다면' (if the sun goes down), comes back with 'then we're going all night', the scene changes to a riverside where swans float and lights are reflected in the water, and a member in a green jacket and a black hat stands there.

0:46 · Up onto the desk on 'take it too far'

At 0:45.8, as '깨진대도 부딪쳐봐 yeah we'll take it too far' (even if it breaks, crash right into it) carries on, the picture switches to a low view at the height of a library desk. At 0:46.6, a black heeled shoe with a ribbon steps up onto the desk and keeps walking, right past a sheet of paper lying there. This passage began with '방해된다면 뛰어 넘어가 담' (if it gets in the way, jump over the wall).

0:48 · After 1.2 seconds of voice alone

From 0:48.8 until just before 0:50.0, there are no drums and no bass, only the voice singing 'always go hard', and the picture stays on a single close-up of one member. The drums come in at 0:50.0 and the bass at 0:50.2, and the overall sound gets about 11 decibels louder. Decibels are a scale for how strong a sound is, and a rise of just 10 sounds roughly twice as loud to the ear. The picture changes at 0:50.08. The bars on the left and right disappear and bars appear at the top and bottom instead, turning it into a long picture 2.12 times as wide as it is tall. These are the first drums in the video, and the first time the picture changes shape. Before the second chorus, at 1:54.6, the voice is left on its own again, and at 1:55.9 the picture stretches wide as the drums come in. In the second verse, on '방해된다면 뛰어 넘어가 담' (if it gets in the way, jump over the wall), the drums come in around '뛰어' (jump) at 1:44.9 and the picture stretches wide, but the same line in the first verse had no drums.

1:00 · After 'Break', a run in school uniforms

At 1:00.96, right after 'Break' is shouted in the middle of the first chorus, the group dance cuts to a long school hallway. Members in berets and school uniforms run toward the camera laughing, while the line '틀에 박힌 chain' (a cookie-cutter chain) goes by over them. It's a scene that seems to overlap with a phrase from the album notes: 'breaking down the right answers that others set'. In the same spot in the second chorus (2:06.8), the school uniforms give way to the five dancing together in a dark hall.

2:05 · Colors that flip for a single frame

The second chorus hides a scene that lasts 1/24 of a second. At 2:05.17, the group dance in pink smoke flips to green for exactly one frame. For 0.3 seconds from 2:06.1, the screen blinks black every other frame. At 2:17.46 and 2:17.54, a color-inverted frame slips in each time, turning the sky-blue lasers into red lines and the members into sky-blue shapes, and the one frame between them, at 2:17.50, keeps its original colors. Right after, when the bridge opens at 2:18 with '두려움은 그저 한순간' (fear is only a moment), the picture goes back to a narrow close-up boxed in on both sides.

2:37 · Through the skylight's glow to a full screen

At 2:35, the camera looking up an arched staircase rises toward the skylight and washes out in white light. At 2:37.96, for the first time, the picture fills a full 16:9 frame with no bars at the top, bottom or sides (16 wide by 9 tall, the usual screen shape when you turn a phone sideways). Sparks pour down like a wall behind a member with pink hair, and at 2:39.8, just as the member's head tilts far back, the drums and bass burst in together and the final chorus begins. In this chorus, the bass part is about 7 decibels louder than in the two choruses before it. Apart from a little over a second at 2:53, the picture stays full to the end.

3:00 · The drums drop out first, in front of the 'GO HARD' lettering

In the final chorus, 'GO HARD' is written in huge letters on the wall behind the stage. At 3:00.4, the moment the drums alone drop out first, the picture cuts to the five gathered in front of those letters. From 3:01.8 the sound fades, and at 3:02.4 the five strike a final pose in a spot where small, candle-like lights fill the floor. This is the scene in the lead photo. At 3:07, where the sound cuts out completely, the 'GO HARD' logo appears, followed in turn by 'MEOVV' and 'THEBLACKLABEL'. Apple Music

The Bugs credits list NARIN, TEDDY, GAWON, ELLA, ANNA, DCF and 24 for the lyrics, DCF, Dominsuk and 24 for the music, and Dominsuk, 24 and KUSH for the arrangement. The single holds two songs, 'Indestructible' included. From the debut song 'MEOW' to June's 'DDI RO RI', we went through the songs one at a time in our MEOVV starter guide.