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Se So Neon “Go Back”

“Go Back” is a smooth R&B song filtered through a restless, genre-bouncing aesthetic that leaves it sounding like everything but also not quite like anything in particular. Their sound is immaculate and lightly funky, sorta like Phoenix in their underrated Alphabetical phase, but there’s a plaintive and sentimental quality that veers closer to mainstream pop. As always, I’m fascinated by the way Korean artists shift between Korean and English lyrics – in this case, the chorus is sung entirely in English but since it’s mostly just the guy singing “where should I go back if I go back?,” you only just get enough to pick up on the general emotional context. I bring this up over and over mainly because I feel like this strategy cuts to the core of how most people hear pop songs: Lyrics are useful for grounding the feeling of a song, but when it comes down to it people mostly just respond to purely musical elements.

Buy it from Amazon.