Seoul punk band Fail Fast releases new EP

The four members of Fail Fast / Courtesy of @dorde.jpg

By Jon Dunbar

• Published Jul 25, 2025 12:10 PM KST

They promised failure, but the Seoul-based punk band Fail Fast is still going, one year later.

Things have been moving fast for the band, which announced last month it was joining local punk label World Domination, Inc. (WDI). Now it's set to release its second mini-album, featuring seven tracks.

When the band got its start last year, they wrote 10 initial songs, three of which went on their first recording, "The Prepared Not Scared EP." That album was recorded at Binary Studios by Jeff Moses, one of the two heads of WDI. For their next album, despite joining Moses' label, they went with a different producer.

"Jeff is a great engineer and polished up the songs really well, and feedback was positive," Fail Fast front man Kevin Loesken told The Korea Times.

"At one point, we decided that it'd be interesting to just record the rest of the songs we had written as well, but to record them intentionally grittier and rougher, to kind of show both sides of what the songs can sound like."

So they went to Slant drummer Garrett, who has recorded a number of bands on the stage at his venue, Baby Doll, in western Seoul's Sinchon. Loesken said he was confident Garrett "could capture the energy that we wanted to get."

The new album is titled “Authorized to Intrude,” a name that guitarist Ryan chose for three reasons.

The first is that it sounds like a suitable follow-up to "Prepared Not Scared." Second, Loesken said that the band has become more accepted now.

"When we first started, people kind of knew us but were saying no to us a lot for various reasons," Loesken said. "As we've grown some as a band, some of the obstacles that we were up against first have been removed, so it feels like we have more permission to be included in things now."

Third, he said that while they were recording at Baby Doll, one of the other owners of the bar showed up drunk with a bunch of people and didn't want to leave. "He was the one authorized to intrude that day, so it was kind of paying homage to that part of the process," Loesken said.

Just like the last batch of songs, there's a thematic through line in these seven latest songs, which Loesken described as "not trying too hard to be perfect, especially since the idea of the perfect thing being chased is likely wrong, anyway."

This includes "Done," which is about not caring about fitting in anymore, "The Bar is Low," which is about police in the U.S. and "Nothing to Offer," which criticizes luxury goods and plastic surgery as a way to seem cooler.

Like last year, Loesken said that the band members' experiences in Korea helped influence the songs, especially "Nothing to Offer," but they also apply to the wider world.

"Like before, it's specific to people I've met and come across in Korea rather than speaking to the whole culture of the country, although cases sure do seem to be more extreme here," he said. "But I've also met these kinds of people everywhere."

The new album will be released Friday on music streaming platforms, and a release show is set for Saturday at Baby Doll. Also playing will be Duoxini, Turn For Our and turnyourbackonme.

"It's not a classic EP release show and is hardly even being advertised or highlighted as such, but was more just an excuse to put together a cheap bill with some of our favorite bands that we'd actually want to see anyway," Loesken said. "We aren't doing any physical release for this EP either, so no tapes, CDs or vinyl will be available."

Loesken added that Fail Fast will keep trying to fail fast, with a couple of Tokyo shows confirmed for mid-November as well as another 10 new songs they are beginning to rehearse and play live.

Visit linktr.ee/failfastreal for more information, or failfastreal.bandcamp.com to hear the new album.