5-Star (Stray Kids album)

5-Star (stylized as ★★★★★) is the third Korean-language studio album (fourth overall) by South Korean boy band Stray Kids. It was released on June 2, 2023, through JYP Entertainment and Republic Records, following their seventh EP Maxident (2022). A combination of hip hop, pop, and electronica elements, 5-Star lyrically addresses themes of uniqueness, confidence, and aspirations.

On the album, 3Racha worked with songwriters and producers Versachoi, Chae Kang-hae, Restart, Zack Djurich, Millionboy, Trippy, Nickko Young, Kyle Reynolds, Chris LaRocca, and Jun2, as well as member Felix. It comprises twelve tracks, including the lead single "S-Class", the Korean version of "The Sound", originally from the group's Japanese album of the same name and "Mixtape: Time Out" from the Mixtape Project, and features a guest appearance from Tiger JK on the track "Topline".

5-Star generally received generally positive reviews from music critics. Commercially, the album peaked at number one in South Korea, Austria, Belgium, France, Greece, Hungary, Poland, Portugal, and the United States. It was certified quintuple million by Korea Music Content Association (KMCA), and gold in France, Poland, and the United States, and became the second global best-selling album in 2023, according to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI). The album won Top K-Pop Album at the 2023 Billboard Music Awards, Artist of the Year – Album from 13th Circle Chart Music Awards, and Best Album (Bonsang) at the 38th Golden Disc Awards.

Background
Stray Kids' follow-up Korean-language album to Maxident was first mentioned in an interview with the news outlet The Fact in October 2022, after the group won the Artist of the Year (Bonsang) and Fan N Star Four Star Award at The Fact Music Awards in 2022. Member Seungmin stated that they would return with an "amazing" album the following year, possibly including new sub-unit combinations and exploring new music genres. On New Year's Day in 2023, the group uploaded the video "Step Out 2023" to their social media, outlining their accomplishments in 2022 and plans for the new year, including two album releases.

In early March 2023, Hankook Ilbo first reported that Stray Kids had already finished filming a music video for the new album's lead single and that it was scheduled for release in April. On the same day, JYP Entertainment subsequently confirmed the music video filming, although not the release date. Financial analysts and researchers also estimated that the group's new album would come in the second quarter of 2023. In late April, after the group concluded their Maniac World Tour, SpoTV News reported that the group would release a new album in early June. JYP Entertainment confirmed the news. Titled 5-Star, the album was formally announced via a trailer on April 28, set to be released on June 2. The title refers to the lead single "S-Class", playing around two words "special" and "star".

Music and lyrics


5-Star is 36 minutes and 35 seconds long, consisting of twelve tracks in the genres of hip hop, pop, and electronica. 3Racha—an in-house production team of Stray Kids members Bang Chan, Changbin, and Han—wrote and produced all songs on the album. Other contributors include Versachoi, Chae Kang-hae, Restart, Zack Djurich, Millionboy, Trippy, Nickko Young, Kyle Reynolds, Chris LaRocca, and Jun2, as well as member Felix who participated in two tracks, "Super Bowl" and "FNF". Korean-American rapper Tiger JK features on and co-wrote the fifth track "Topline". A "strange yet special" release, the album centered on the theme of the group's uniqueness, confidence, aspirations, and achieving their goal, based on their discourse of growth and identity.

Songs
The opening track, "Hall of Fame", is a fusion of R&B and trap metal, expressing Stray Kids' ambition to make their own history and engrave their names on the hall of fame. It includes lyrical references to American inventor and businessman Thomas Edison and astronaut Neil Armstrong, English playwright and poet William Shakespeare and theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking, Italian astronomer and physicist Galileo Galilei, and South Korean professional League of Legends player Faker. "S-Class" is a hip-hop track with elements of boom bap, old school, and pop, expressing Stray Kids' confidence and "emphasiz[ing] their specialness", and containing a message of being "the most eccentric among the unusual kids, and the brightest among the special kids". "Item", a video game-themed hip hop track, displays their confidence of synergy and ability on [their] own without any special items.

Originally titled "God's Menu" as their lead single from the first studio album Go Live (2020) and showed homage to the American football championship game of the same name, "Super Bowl" compares Stray Kids' music as cooking and a food dish, driven by techno sound, and including whispering in a manner similar to ASMR. "Topline" is a minimalistic boom bap, old-school and East-Coast hip-hop track, comparing their ambition to drawing a line on the top, while "DLC", short for "Dance Like Crazy", is a moombahton, deep house, and tropical house song with Eurodance influences, driven by piano, flute-like synth, and brass. The song expresses a feeling of leaving any worries behind and dancing like crazy. "Get Lit", a mix of moombahton and bounce EDM, depicts an "escape from cramped daily life and dying today", while "Collision" is a jazzy R&B track featuring saxophone sample, conveying the theme of relationship conflict as the collision of two planets.

A tribute to the bushfire season from 2019 to 2020 in Australia, "FNF", shortened for "flora and fauna", expresses a feeling of regret and longing felt by seeing animals and plants lose their lives due to the wildfire with EDM sound. The piano-and-guitar ballad, "Youtiful", a portmanteau of "you" and "beautiful", talks about self-esteem, intending to show "warm and comfortable support and consolation" of how everyone is beautiful and amazing as they are. "The Sound" is an electronic rock track, depicting the group's confidence and attitude toward their music. The album closes with "Mixtape: Time Out", a punk—pop rock track, reminiscing about Stray Kids' trip to Gangwon-do before beginning the promotion of their EP Oddinary.

Release and promotion
On April 28, 2023, Stray Kids uploaded a three-minute trailer to announce 5-Star. Based on Korean game I Am Ground, the trailer sees the members each introducing themselves with their chosen nickname in individual shots before uniting in the same scene. Pre-orders of album opened on the same day as the trailer's release, being made available in five versions with 12 different covers: limited, standard A, B and C, and eight digipacks. The album's Solar System-styled track listing, constellation-styled scheduler, and digital cover artwork were posted to social media on April 30. The track listing confirmed "S-Class" as the lead single, and included the Korean version of "The Sound", originally from their Japanese album of the same name and the 2022 single "Mixtape: Time Out" from the Mixtape Project as part of the album.

Prior to the release, the group teased snippets of five tracks of 5-Star via the series "Unveil: Track": "DLC", "FNF", "Get Lit", "Topline", and "Youtiful", as well as the other tracks via the live action-and-comics-fusion mashup video. The album's teaser photos were revealed in four sets. The first depicts the members wearing colorful outfits and posing in front of 1980s-styled backgrounds combining Korean traditional art and everyday life items. The second, alongside accompanying mood films, shows the melancholy-eyed members, wearing "mix-and-matched" outfits, posting on the street at night illuminated by street light. The third expresses the members, wearing the same outfits as the trailer, posting with various music instruments and loudspeakers, while the fourth shows the members in black clothes with the vintage cars background, adding oriental-styled "kitsch" illustrations of pine trees, clouds, tigers, and cranes.

5-Star was released on June 2, 2023, in conjunction with the music video for "S-Class", preceded by two music video teasers. The documentary series Intro "5-Star", consisting of three episodes, was released between June 1 and 11. Starting on the release date, Stray Kids promoted the album and performed the lead single at several music programs, such as Music Bank, Show! Music Core,  Inkigayo,  and M Countdown. To commemorate the release, Stray Kids partnered with Soundwave for launching a pop-up store from June 3 to 18 at Seongdong-gu, Seoul, as well as launching SKZoo characters' sticker set for KakaoTalk on June 27. Stray Kids' space-themed third fan meeting Pilot: For 5-Star supported the album, held at KSPO Dome from July 1 to 2, which they previously specified as a mysterious "What's Next" on the promotional scheduler, and debuted the performance of "Item". The group headlined the Lollapalooza music festival in Paris on July 21, performing songs from 5-Star: "S-Class", "Topline", "Item", and "Super Bowl", and embarked on their all-dome concert tour 5-Star Dome Tour in South Korea and Japan from August to October.

Critical reception
South Korean music critic Kim Do-heon praised the album as "a clever piece of work" and "a well-thought-out K-pop blockbuster", because of "the performance shown by the members who claim to be madmen, the spectacular production, and the mature narrative of growth." Crystal Bell from NME awarded the album five out of five stars, writing that it "will make you feel like you arrived at a party that's already in full-swing. [...] 5-Star is disorienting in that way. But once your senses adapt to the frenzy and your body syncs to the rhythm, you lose yourself in its luminescence."

Writing for Ize, Kim Sung-dae revealed that he "does not want to give [5-Star] five stars as the title", and questioned, "Isn't it a blessing in some way that incompleteness can be a compliment?" He summarized that "to critics, five stars mean a perfect score, but to Stray Kids, 5-Star just means 'weird and brilliant.'" Lee Jae-hoon of Newsis dubbed the album as a "K-pop adventure". AllMusic's Neil Z. Young described that the album "wild ride[s] through genres and emotions," and "playing out like a hit to the head with a dozen anthems that only briefly allow for a breather." Jeong Da-yeol from IZM commented the album "although the instrumental source and composition of each section with irregularities in the genre may take on a crude appearance, it took a familiar ride, arranged addictive repetitions, and hit the listeners' brains safely."

Commercial performance
On May 30, 2023, two days before the release, JYP Entertainment reported that 5-Star had exceeded 4.93 million pre-orders, and 5.13 million two days later. It became the most pre-ordered release in K-pop history, breaking the record of Seventeen's FML (2023) with 4.64 million copies. Later, it was surpassed by Seventeen's EP Seventeenth Heaven in October. According to the Hanteo Chart, the album sold 2,392,666 copies on its first day of release, and later 4,617,499 in its first week, becoming the fastest first-week selling album in South Korea, besting FML. 5-Star debuted at number one on the Circle Album Chart for the issue dated May 28 – June 3, 2023, and topped for two consecutive weeks. It sold 4,330,039 copies in its first week, and 5,242,486 copies in June, certified quintuple million by Korea Music Content Association (KMCA).

5-Star debuted at number one on the Billboard 200 for the issue dated June 17, 2023, becoming the group's third entry and third consecutive number-one album in the United States. With 249,500 equivalent album units, it marks the fourth-largest week by any album released in 2023, including 235,000 pure album sales—231,000 CDs and 4,000 digital albums—the biggest sales week of 2023 and since Taylor Swift's Midnights (2022), opened with over 1.1 million units. 5-Star is also the 19th overall non-English-language number-one album, and the third of 2023, following Karol G's Mañana Será Bonito, and Tomorrow X Together's The Name Chapter: Temptation. It also topped the specific-genre World Albums. The album reached number 82 on the 2023 Billboard 200 year-end chart, the highest charted K-pop album in the year. 5-Star received gold certification from Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) on October 27, their first album to do so.

In Japan, 5-Star peaked at number two on the Oricon Albums Chart, and number six on the Billboard Japan Hot Albums. The album also topped in several national charts in Europe: Australia, Belgium (both Flanders and Wallonia regions), France, Greece, Hungary, Poland, and Portugal, as well as peaking at number two in Germany, and Switzerland, and top ten in Denmark, Finland, Italy, Lithuania, and the Netherlands. For the UK Albums Chart, it became their first top-40 album in the country, debuted at number 40. In Australia, the album peaked at number two on the ARIA Albums Chart; it is the group's highest peak and their third top-50 entry after Noeasy (2021), and Maxident (2022),

According to the International Federation of the Phonographic Industry (IFPI)'s Global Music Report for 2023, 5-Star was the second most-consumed album across all formats, and the second best-selling album worldwide, having sold 5.3 million units.

Credits and personnel
Musicians


 * Stray Kids – vocals (all), background vocals (2, 4, 11)
 * Bang Chan (3Racha) – background vocals (1, 3, 5–6, 9–10, 12), all instruments (2, 4, 10), computer programming (1–4, 9–10), bass (9), synthesizer (9), drum (9), vocal directing (10)
 * Changbin (3Racha) – background vocals (1, 3, 5–6), vocal directing (10)
 * Han (3Racha) – background vocals (1, 3, 5–8), vocal directing (10)
 * Felix – background vocals (5, 9)
 * Seungmin – background vocals (6)
 * Versachoi – synthesizer (1, 3, 5), drum (1, 3, 5, 12), bass (1, 3, 5), computer programming (1, 3, 5, 12)
 * Chae Kang-hae – all instruments (2, 7), computer programming (2, 7)
 * Restart – all instruments (2, 5, 7), computer programming (2, 5, 7)
 * Zack Djurich – all instruments (4, 10), computer programming (4, 10)
 * Millionboy – all instruments (8)
 * Trippy – bass (9), synthesizer (9), drum (9), piano (9), computer programming (9)
 * Nickko Young – guitar (10, 12), piano (10), drum (10)
 * Kim Hong-seo – bass (10)
 * Lee Jae-myung – bass (12)

Technical


 * Lee Kyeong-won – digital editing (1, 3–5, 8–12)
 * Restart – digital editing (2, 6–7)
 * Bang Chan (3Racha) – digital editing (2, 11), recording (12)
 * Lee Sang-yeop – recording (1, 10)
 * Goo Hye-jin – recording (2–3, 5–7, 9, 11)
 * Lim Chan-mi – recording (4, 7–8)
 * Park Jae-seon – recording (5)
 * Yoon Won-kwon – mixing (1, 3–5, 7–9)
 * Manny Marroquin – mixing (2)
 * Jay-P Gu – mixing (6, 10)
 * Curtis Douglas – mixing (11)
 * MasterKey – mixing (12)
 * Chris Galland – mix engineering (2)
 * Ramiro Fernandez-Seoane – assistant
 * Kwon Nam-woo – mastering (1, 3–10, 12)
 * Dave Kutch – mastering (2, 11)
 * Shin Bong-won – Dolby Atmos mixing (all)
 * Park Nam-joon – assistant

Locations


 * JYP Publishing (KOMCA) – original publishing (all), sub-publishing (all)
 * Copyright Control – original publishing (2, 4, 6–7, 10–11), sub-publishing (2, 4, 6–7, 10–11)
 * Feel Ghood Music (KOMCA) – original publishing (5), sub-publishing (5)
 * Mixed Metaphor Music (BMI) – original publishing (11)
 * Kyle Reynolds Music (BMI) – original publishing (11)
 * Kilometre Music Group B / Little Italy Music Inc. (SOCAN) – original publishing (11)
 * JYPE Studios – recording (1–11)
 * Feel Ghood Studio – recording (5)
 * Channie's "Room" – recording (12)
 * Studio DDeepKick – mixing (1, 3–5, 7–9)
 * Larrabee Studios – mixing (2)
 * Klang Studio – mixing (6, 10)
 * 821 Sound – mixing (12), mastering (1, 3–10, 12)
 * The Mastering Palace – mastering (2, 11)
 * Glab Studios – Dolby Atmos mixing (all)