BoA, the undisputed SM queen is back with her tenth album ‘BETTER’ to celebrate her twenty years in the industry. It’s kind of crazy, but let’s dive into the music because my expectations are sky high.
BETTER
We start off with the title track ‘BETTER’ which is an R&B bop. The song used samples from the fantastic song ‘Like I Do’ by AWA, so if it sounds familiar it’s because of that. There are also traces of BoA’s debut song ‘ID’ in the single. This song is SO good!
‘Temptations’ follows that and is co-composed and arranged by Moonshine. This track is groovy and has this incredibly smooth build-up. I dig the autotune in some parts, it adds that extra bit of spice.
The next single ‘Cloud’ was written and co-composed by BoA herself. We stan talent y’all. I really like the jazzy R&B vibe with the synths. It reminds me a bit of 90s ballads.
Next up
‘All That Jazz’ starts with some amazing bossa nova influences. The song, again written and co-composed by the queen herself. BoA’s vocals really fit this genre so well, like WHEW. If you want to read the translated lyrics for this one (which I really recommend), you can find them here.
We’re going the disco route with ‘L.O.V.E.’, the thing is I don’t mind because that bass is so GREAT. Also I need this song to play when I’m going out with the girls. This is fun y’all.
‘Cut Me Off’ follows that with a very minimalistic sound in the first verse. I’m sensing vengeance vibes. ‘Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned’, that kind of style. The instrumentation does fill out a bit more after the chorus, which is good. This is the Korean equivalent of ‘Two Black Cadillacs’ by Carrie Underwood.
After that we have ‘Got Me Good’. We’re back with the exquisite bass and UGH I love this. BoA’s vocal line goes everywhere and I would love to see this live because those high notes are everything. The queen can belt.
We’re on track eight with ‘Honey and Diamonds’. This song feels so funky and in general just really happy vibes.
‘Start Over’ has this very rich layering that adds to the emotional feeling of the song. The harmonies are beautiful and really, I can’t get enough of it. Brilliant.
Next up is ‘Gravity’ and it’s the first proper ballad. I was kind of expecting more ballads throughout the album. This track is beautiful. We get harmonies, a beautiful piano melody and I can’t tell you how desperately I need an acoustic version of this.
The last track on the album is ‘Little Bird’. This is another track that was written and co-composed by BoA. The brass in this is amazing though I wish they had used real brass instruments instead of samples. ‘Little Bird’ feels so uplifting, it’s the perfect track to close a quite frankly amazing album.
Go ahead and listen to ‘BETTER’ by BoA on Spotify here.
If you want to read about BoA’s previous comeback, click here.
