I first heard of BoA when I was a kid. She debuted at a tender age of 13 in 2000, and gained massive popularity in Japan, Korea and even Asia when she was still in her teens. I clearly remember in 2006, when she released her Made In Twenty album, I was exclaiming to my brother 'What?! She's only 20 years old?! But she's been around FOREVER!!' Because of her insane success in the early 00s, she remains a household name here.
When I started to stan Kahi, I started watching a lot of old BoA videos, especially during the My Name period as Kahi was one of the main backup dancers. And in 2010, BoA released her 6th album, Hurricane Venus. I enjoyed it, especially the repackage, Copy & Paste, but treated it as just another good song.
It wasn't until the Only One era in 2012 that I became a BoA stan. Only One was perfect in every way. The dance was choreographed by Nappytabs, one of the most famous lyrical hiphop choreographers in the world and whom I'm familiar with through So You Think You Can Dance, while the song was composed by BoA herself. BoA is known for being an excellent dancer AND singer, and Only One was a brilliant display of her abilities.
The rest of the Only One album also had wonderful songs like Not Over U, Hope and Mayday, Mayday. I ended up getting both the regular version and the (humongous) limited edition version because I loved it so much.
But the tipping point for me was this heartfelt, gorgeous performance of Moon & Sunrise.
She is not a fantastic singer - very good, but not Ailee level. But this performance managed to touch me in a way not many songs can. It is this emotional delivery of songs that I really love about her.....in addition to her fantastic dance skills, insane stage presence, cute personality among other qualities.
And after that, it was 6 months of watching 12 years of BoA videos and listening to her songs. Up till today, I still have not listened to every single song of hers, but I have listened to most of them. And I'm glad to say she has a wonderful and extensive discography.
She just released her self-produced 8th album, Kiss My Lips, with 12 tracks composed and written by her. The pre-release, Who Are You featuring Gaeko and the title track, Kiss My Lips, are both wonderful songs in their own right. But I think the other songs in the album are even better and this just became my favourite album of the year so far. Honestly, I was quite worried it wouldn't live up to my expectations, especially after the really high bar set by Only One, but I'm happy to say Kiss My Lips met and even exceeded them. With this, BoA has cemented herself as not only a multi-talented performer but also a credible songwriter.
A few (or rather a lot) of my favourite BoA songs are.....
Starting with the Japanese songs:
Possibility duet by Miura Daichi & BoA. One of my favourite songs EVER. I can have this on loop for the entire day and not get bored of it.
EIEN. I actually heard this when it was just released (before I became a fan) and liked it. The dance to this song is one of her best.
The ballad trio of Winter Love, Everlasting & Meri Kuri. These 3 are just iconic. Especially Meri Kuri, which she tends to cry a lot when singing. This performance is from BoA The Live Kikase Kei in 2006 (the same as the Moon & Sunrise performance) and is one of my favourite concerts of hers because this was pure vocals.
Jewel Song. In particular, the performance of it at her Made In Twenty Tour in 2007.
Quincy. An absolutely fun song to jam to.
Kiseki.
Universe featuring Verbal from m-flo & Crystal Kay. Love this super entertaining performance of this at the 2009 Best & USA Release Party, my favourite concert of hers.
She has soooo many amazing Japanese songs in addition to these. Others I really love are The Love Bug (with m-flo), and some post-2010 songs like Mamoritai, Bump Bump, First Time, Call My Name and Close To Me.
Her title track for the US debut album is called Eat You Up. The dance in the MV is also one of her best choreos.
I Did It For Love, especially the performance at the Best & USA Release party is awesome too. As well as Energetic.
Her older Korean songs (pre-2010):
Spark. The dance for this is amazing. Though I think she lipsynced a lot in this era haha.
Valenti. Check out Kahi backup dancing too!
No.1, her most iconic song
Also worth checking out are her songs from Anyband to promote a Samsung phone, which also consists of Tablo, Xiah Junsu and Jin Bora.
Her newer Korean songs (post-2010):
Implode, composed by Nell's Kim Jong Wan. Absolutely beautiful.
Not Over U, my favourite off Only One album. But really, the entire album is FANTASTIC.
Shattered, from her latest album Kiss My Lips.
Home, also from Kiss My Lips.
All 3 Korean albums post-2010 are just amazing.
3 months after I became a fan of her, on 23Nov2012, I had the opportunity to see her perform live at SMTown World Tour 3 in Singapore, at the Marina Bay Floating Platform.
When the tickets first went on sale, I couldn't get tickets since I was competing with the fans of the biggest idol groups in K-Pop. I was about to give up on seeing her live but the day before the concert, I managed to find sellers of the moshpit tickets and ended up buying 2 tickets for moshpit A from separate sellers, paying 30bucks more than the normal price. $271 for 4 songs from BoA.....the things I do.
So on the day itself, we went around 1pm to queue, which is considered pretty late and we ended up in moshpit A2, further away from the main stage :( This hindered my enjoyment of the concert a little since we were quite far and I'm really short. Also, while waiting in the moshpit, I overheard someone saying that during BoA's performance, people will just enjoy but not scream for her and I was like glaring at her haha. BoA has fans, okay!!
Anyway, the whole concert was a pretty great experience. So yes I've seen f(x), EXO, TVXQ, SHINee, SNSD and Kangta live! I'm lazy to go into details but the highlights for me were:
TVXQ's Humanoids performance. I was so impressed by Yunho's dancing! Such clean and sharp moves.
Donghae & Eunhyuk's Oppa Oppa. Oh I love how fun this song is - perfect for a concert.
Taeyeon's Devil's Cry. Amazing vocals.
Super Junior's Superman & Don't Don - I'm a mini Ryeowook fan and I got a great view of him here!
Sometimes the idols will take those moving carts around the arena, which gave me a super good, close up view of them. The ones that came to my side of the moshpit were Yunho, Sooyoung (omg so pretty), Taeyeon, Ryeowook, Donghae, Kyuhyun, Minho, Kangta, Victoria. Unfortunately, no cameras were allowed so I didn't take any pictures. When it started raining and the security loosened up, I did take a picture of BoA at the ending stage but that ONE picture got deleted by my sister before I transferred it to my computer :(
And yes, it was raining so it made for a very exciting and different experience haha. Though I was really freezing. Quite a few people slipped while performing though, so it's quite dangerous.
Anyway, seeing BoA live was....exhilarating. She was the last performer to come out (everyone else had performed at least 1 song by then) so I was super excited and jittery from all that waiting. After Younique's Maxstep, BOA CAME OUT!!!! I was screaming my head off. And I'm happy the rest of the crowd cheered for her too. I was so worried I'd be the only person cheering there!
Her first song was Hurricane Venus. I didn't get a particularly good view of this, but I'm not THAT fond of this song so it's fine. I was singing along really loudly though hehe.
And then MY NAME! This is one of the first songs from her I've heard from stanning Kahi. It's one of her most famous songs in Korea but not that known internationally. I was straining to see her since she's really tiny. But yes, I saw that iconic shaking move live!!!
Then she did her introduction and she was SO CUTE and I just spazzed and died. I can't really remember what she said but she spoke in English and about 'having fun together tonight' and I just screamed like crazy. The girl standing in front of me kept staring at me (since I was practically screaming in her ear) so I apologised haha. But she very graciously allowed me to take her place, so thank you! BoA then asked us to guess her next song, and of course everyone only knows Only One and she said 'Only One will be later!'
AND THEN SHE PERFORMED NO.1. No.1 is the song which made BoA into who she is today. And it means a lot to BoA and her fans because it's her representative song. So I was singing along/screaming 'YOU STILL MY NO.1' and more people stared at me haha. I couldn't see very well, but during the dance break where her tiny arms were waving in the air, I totally died. And was tearing up from all the emotions. I've rewatched her performances of No.1 many many times, and seeing it live was just.....unbelievable. She went off stage after this and I was so drained by then haha. But there was still the highlight!!
BoA came out again after Super Junior's Dancing Out performance for Only One. She did this in the main stage so I didn't have a great view of it and missed some seconds. I didn't even pay attention to her partner for the couple dance because I was so focused on her. I knew he had silver hair though haha. (It was Sehun btw.) Fastest 3 minutes of my life ever. Before I knew it, it was over and I just...died from the perfection of her dancing and vocals. I ceased to pay attention to the performances after this haha.
She came out one last time for the ending stage, Hope. It was drizzling so this was when I snapped my pics. I was trying to capture the super cute ribbon hairband she was wearing. She's so adorable!!!! I mostly saw her back view though since they were on the front stage. She left pretty early though. And that was the end of my awesome first time seeing BoA live. BoA is known to be an excellent live performer, and it is my wish to attend a full BoA concert one day.
BoA is an absolute inspiration not just to me but many other people as well. So many idols in K-Pop now attribute their desire of becoming singers to BoA. Read about them here.
BoA also saved SM from bankruptcy, allowing them to debut their massive stable of idols and lead the Hallyu wave now.
I love and support her so much because she is such a rare gem of an artist and performer, mastering both dance and singing, and now even taking on songwriting with much success. It is incredible how far she has come, from being called a product of a factory to a true artist. At this point in her career, it is really not necessary to win music show prizes and daesangs anymore. She has gone past that stage and I just hope that she continues to surpass herself as an artist now.
And if she wants to go into acting, small roles first. As a kdrama lover, I also dislike it when unworthy people get lead roles due to their fame. I'm glad that she started small, as a lead in a drama special and a supporting role in a movie.
Thank you BoA, for being a worthy Queen of K-Pop, or as I like to call her, my Kween.
