Musicboard Review: Gateway (EP)

Astro’s Gateway (EP) (2020) — 4/18/2025

★ ★ ★ ★ ★

If I could give this 6 stars, I would do it 100 times and more. This album, the title track 'Knock', everything about the promotions leading up to the release, will always have me welling at the eyes because of how excited I was for it. It’s an even heavier, emotional weight to listen to this close to Moonbin's death anniversary with him being my first favorite in Astro, as well as being such a standout individual in the group, an incredibly huge loss of life for a promising career, Moonbin, had ahead of him.

It makes me so sad to think about the impact he had on me first getting into K-Pop. I remember so well being at a boba shop with my two college best friends and looking over and seeing the 'All Night' music video playing and spotting Moonbin and wanting to know exactly who he was. I made it my mission to know everything about Astro after that day. I reached out to so many people on twitter that knew of them. Since that day, I’ve followed all of their releases as an active group and even now with 4 members, I will do so for all of them, for Moonbin.

As devastating as it is to look back on the day Moonbin passed, I’m so comforted knowing how much he is still loved by my friends, the public, his group members, and it feels like the world purely based on how vast the love feels, combined across so many KPOP fans I know. I hope everyone that comes across Moonbin’s projects and involvement in the group, including this EP, sees just how much of a star he was and still is. The lyrics to ‘Knock’ stick out to me the most and I cried so hard the first time I listened to it bravely, the day the news broke. Now it brings me so much comfort since it's among my favorite Astro songs, and favorite K-Pop songs of all time.