Soribada's “Best of the First Half of 2011“
For those who do not know, Soribada was created in 2000 and is called the "Korean Napstar." It is a legitimate music downloading site and they have collected the results for the first half of 2011 and have chosen the best so far.
They collected data from statistics, as well as the number of downloads, and the "Best Group" moniker was given to Big Bang who scored the highest. They have had consistent upper ranking success with hit songs,"Tonight," "Love Song," and others from their newest album. Depending on your opinion of Big Bang, this may or may not be a surprise.
However, from a chart perspective this was close to a given. When Big Bang released their new album, in some charts, every single of the album ranked in the top ten! The album has sold well and they have released a Japanese album making the group's sales rise even higher. Let's just hope that soon we will see them on stage again five. (How many times have Kpop fans said that before!)
However, despite their high position in downloads from Soribada, Big Bang did not receive the title of "Best song" for the first half of the year. The best song was ranked number one upon release and did not leave the top ten for five weeks. Can you guess what song it is? It was f(x)'s "Danger." Surprised? Due to the amount of songs Big Bang had on many charts I was expecting it to be them, but "Danger" was a very popular song so f(x) definitely deserve to get the title of "best song" for the first half of 2011 from Soribada.
Second on the chart was IU's "Good Day," an incredibly popular song from the young rising star. IU's popularity seems to do nothing but grow rapidly. Not only did she have success with her singles, but also with songs from KBS 2TV's Dream High, with the song "Someday," and "Take My Hand" from MBC's The Best Love soundtrack. It's amazing to think that IU is such a famous solo artist despite only being 18 and having debuted in the later half of 2008. Even more impressive is the fact she has become so famous in arguably such a short space of time considering her first award win was on Inkigayo on June 27, 2010! Her role in Dream High as Kim Pil Suk further brought her to the attention of Korea and the future looks even brighter for this young star.
The best solo male singer was given to Kim Bum Soo who had three songs ranked within the top ten, with song "Please" reaching forth. Kim Bum Soo may not be a name that is currently as big in the Kpop world as say, Big Bang, but his talent is no less impressive. Not only is he an emotive singer, doing well in charts seems to be second nature to him. Fun fact, his song 'Hello Goodbye Hello' ranked 51st on the US Billboard Hot 100 in 2001. The significance? This supposedly ranks him as the first Korean artist to make it onto a North American music chart!
What did you think of the results? Were you surprised to see Big Bang as the top group on Soribada? What about f(x)'s "Danger" getting the best song result? Is Kim Bum Soo going to make a huge rise in popularity? All I can say for sure is these are only the results for the first half of 2011, who knows what is going to happen in the second half!
Credits & Translations: Hanna at Korea.com