BoA 1.5
© Susan Johnson-Roehr
What's happening in the world of Korean pop music these days? Earlier this month, the new teen star BoA made her "come back" with a 1.5 special album. She's only been gone for a few months, so it's hard to get too excited, but her fans are surely happy to buy more of her music. Who is BoA? BoA is SM Entertainment's solution to the dissolution of their top pop group H.O.T. As a pre-teen, she was handpicked by the talent spotters at SM, groomed, and then released out into the pop world last summer to make the entertainment company a lot of money. BoA's new 1.5 CD is called Jumping Into this World, and it was deliberately designed to appeal to a more global market than her first (SM Entertainment doesn't miss a marketing opportunity, ever). As part of BoA's intensive pre-release training/education, she was sent off to intensive language school before producing her music. That calculated move is paying off for the music moguls: BoA performs in English, Korean and Chinese on this album. The making of the album was also international in scope. The "title" song was written by Peter Rafelson (he wrote at least one song for Madonna) and Jeff Vincent. Four of the songs on the CD were written by Harada Ken (Japanese music fans will recognize this name). Jung Jae Yoon, member of the k-pop group Solid, also contributed a song to this 1.5 album. So, SM is making good on its promise (threat?) to dominate the world music market with BoA's music. My take on this album is thus: if you liked the big hit off BoA's debut album, ID; Peace B [RealAudio], you should have no trouble listening to this. At the time of her debut, I wrote elsewhere that I thought BoA's best chance for survival was to get a new management company. She's got a good voice, but maybe she would grow more as a singer with better music selections. Vincent and Rafelson's Don't Start Now [RealAudio] is actually a decent song, and Again [RealAudio] (the second track on the album) is catchy but drags a bit. I just really think her potential will be wasted on the type of generic pop SM groups generally produce.
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