Member Since: 11/4/2010
Posts: 34,287
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Vice's 20 best K-pop songs of 2013
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20. Sunmi - “24 Hours”
19. Lim Kim - “컬러링 (Coloring)”
18. Royal Pirates - “Shout Out”
17. IU - “Monday Afternoon”
16. Smells - “Listen To Your Heart (feat. Neon Bunny)”
15. EXO - “Baby, Don’t Cry (인어의 눈물)”
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EXO was Korea’s massivest young export in 2013, this deep cut being the best reason why. The 12-member, bipartite boy band (six sing in Mandarin and tour China, six sing in Korean and tour at home) helped fill K-pop’s minor key netherworld while former kings B2ST had a slack year.
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14. INFINITE - “Destiny”
13. Miss A - “남자 없이 잘 살아 (I Don’t Need A Man)”
12. After School - “Heaven"
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After School has never been the same since leader Kahi left in 2012 (and vice versa), but this Japanese single was a strong reminder of what they can do. Following Daft Punk’s recent turn towards rockism, the octet girl group grabbed the hyper-compressed disco baton and ran with it. The awesome G-funk strip club beat that opens the video is a nice bonus, replete with crazy impressive pole-dancing -- skills for which the girls suffered quite a bit.
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11. 4Minute - “물 좋아? (Is It Poppin’?)”
10. WINNER - “Smile Again”
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K-pop stars’ creative involvement in their own careers are usually perfunctory at best, but YG Entertainment’s upcoming new boy band boasts three fully-fledged songwriters and a brilliant choreographer in Lee Seunghoon, one of two rappers. Frontman Kang Seungyoon wrote “Smile Again” in a single night, managing to imbue this future K-pop hit with his distinctive ear for melody and chord progressions.
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9. G-Dragon - “Window”
8. Brown Eyed Girls - “레시피 (Recipe)”
7. Busker Busker - “밤 (Night)”
6. Rainbow - “Kiss Me”
5. KARA - “둘 중에 하나 (Runaway)”
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This unassuming gem makes brilliant use of many things K-pop usually doesn’t: a masterful live band, melodies and harmonies that choose class over commerce, a rap bridge that actually works, a climactic modulation that does one better...hell, even a double-bass kick out of the metal playbook for the breakdown. With “Runaway,” KARA beat Brown Eyed Girls at their own game -- pop sensuality for grown folks.
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4. f(x) - “첫 사랑니 (Rum Pum Pum Pum)”
3. SHINee - “상사병 (Symptoms)”
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SHINee’s tearful “Artist of the Year” win at MelOn Music Awards was no mistake -- their three recent studio albums had something to do with it, but for my money, the Everybody EP is all that matters. Pop dubstep banger “Everybody” and the FutureSex-prog masterpiece “One Minute Back” could’ve claimed this spot too, but the RnB wooze of “Symptoms” feels especially right for 2013. Play it loud.
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2. Younha - “우리가 헤어진 진짜 이유"
1. Girl’s Day - “기대해”
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This song’s title translates roughly to “Expect It,” and that’s exactly what you should do. Like Girl’s Day’s other masterpiece, “Nothing Lasts Forever” (2011), “기대해” is a great pop song that beautifully loses its mind somewhere after the two-minute mark. In this case, that entails the single greatest key change climax I’ve ever heard in a pop song. Maybe in any kind of song at all. Last.fm tells me I’ve listened to this song over 250 times since finding it in June, and every time, that key change does something to me. Usually I just kind of laugh a little, to myself, at how good it is. Great K-pop is a feeling somewhere between falling in love and sunshine, and the last minute of this song is one of the purest shots I’ve found yet.
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A refreshingly varied list.
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but OMG Hush is ****ing slaying me from left to right. Seriously one of the best K-Pop songs of the year, if not the best... holy ****!
