2015 In Review: Day 17 – Concluding Remarks

[The 2015 in Review Series]

1. Prelude (Best Album Art)
2. R&B and Soul
3. Rock and Alternative
4. Rap and Hip-hop
5. Dance and Electronic
6. Pop and Ballad
7. Folk and Country
8. Jazz and Blues
9. Crossover and Other
10. Best Collaborative Work
11. Rookie Artist of the Year
12. Artist of the Year
13. Song of the Year
14. Album of the Year
15. Staff Picks
16. Other Recognition
17. Concluding Remarks

And that’s a wrap, folks. We hope you enjoyed this review of some of 2015’s best, and maybe getting to leave with a new favorite or two. And with the Korean Music Awards just having announced their nominees for their 2016 ceremony, the awards season isn’t over.

Of course, the year-end project never ends at Hellokpop: a month into 2016, we’re already seeing tons to be excited about. Psy returned on the day of our December cutoff, and Roy Kim, OTAR, GFriend, The Black Skirts, and more provided strong showings in subsequent weeks. Look for them in our roundup next year!

The last honorable mentions

As we emphasize all the time, our series is not comprehensive – some works are always going to fall through the cracks. Listed below are 2015 releases that appeared in other publications’ year-end lists, but not here. (The Album Art and Other Recognition categories don’t count, as those weren’t picked based on musical merit.) Outlets surveyed are IZM, Weiv, MusicY, Naver Music, Bugs Music, and Diffsound, with the Korean Music Awards nominees added in. Many of the below from our series were omitted due to differing opinions, but others were simply missed in the reviews. Be sure to check some of these out as well.

Multipliers inside parentheses denote the number of publications nominating each piece, in the case of multiple nominations. So roughly speaking, the higher the multiplier, the harder we whiffed!

Albums

Abyss – Enemy Inside
Ankle Attack – The Silent Syllable (x2)
Avant Trio – Blue Suns
Bulsechul – Bulsechul
Buyoung Lee – Little Star
Cogason – 오늘부터 (From Today)
Cream Villa – In The Village (x2)
Dirty Blend – Sonatinen Lessons
ECE – 무방비 상태의 연인 (Unprotected Lover)
Electron Sheep – 소음의 왕 (King of Noise) (x3)
Eungmin Cho – Oriental Fairy Tale
Fecundation – Cadaveric Rigidity + From Grave To Cradle
Ga-In – Hawwah
Galaxy Express – Walking on Empty
Genius Nochang – My New Instagram: Mesurechiffon
Giant Bear – Man Without A Dog
Gonguri, Sithter – Split EP
Handol – Handoltarae 571 가면 갈수록 (The Further You Go)
Hong Haelim – Hong Haelim
Howaho – Unknown Origin
Idiotape – Tours The Remixes
Im In-gun – All That Jeju
Isahi – Thanatos
Juju Song – Reflection
Jung Won-young – 사람 (Person)
Kay P – i
Kim Doo-soo – 곱사무 (Dance of Hunchback)
Kim Hae-won – Socialphobia Original Soundtrack
Kkotjam Project – Look Inside
Lee Sung-chan – Actress
Lee Young-hoon – 내가 부른 그림 (The Picture I Sung) 2
Mamamoo – Pink Funky
Mayson The Soul – Photographer (x2)
November – Though The Sun Is Gone
Parasol – 언젠가 그 날이 오면 (Someday) (x2)
Peejay – Walkin’ Vol. 1
Pope X Pope – The Divinity and the Flames of Furious Desires
PPUL – Midnight Love Trip
Red Velvet – The Red
RoaR – Scarlet
Ruvin – 하늘과 닿은 마을 (The Village That Touched the Sky)
Sai – 화전민의 노래 (Song of the Hwajeon Farmer)
The South Korean Rhythm Kings – 뿌린대로 거두리 (Reap What You Sow)
Sunkyeol – 급진은 상대적 개념 (Radicalism Is A Relative Concept)
Telefonist – Another Day
The Veggers – Jazz Master (x2)
Young, Gifted & Wack – 3 Little Wacks (x3)
Young Vinyls – Too Young
Wavisabiroom – 물질보다정신 (Mind Over Matter) (x3)
Zeemen – Sixteen Days

Songs

75A – Taipei
Asian Chairshot – 소나기속에서 (In the Rain Shower)
Big Bang – Loser
Billy Carter – 침묵 (Silence)
BTS – Run
Byeolyang – 가족 (Family) (x2)
Cho Dong-jin – 강의 노래 (Song of the River)
Code Kunst – Parachute
Cogason – 비하인드 (B-hind)
Cranfield – 파이로 (Pyro)
Dal Johnbam – 별 헤는 밤 (A Night Counting Stars)
Daybreak – 마법처럼 (Like Magic)
Dean – I’m Not Sorry (Featuring Eric Bellinger)
Dean – Put My Hands On You (Featuring Anderson Paak)
Deepflow – 작두 (Cut Cut Cut) (Featuring Nucksal, Huckleberry P) (x2)
Doma – 초록빛 바다 (Green Ocean)
Electron Sheep – 멸망이라는 이름의 파도/캠프파이어 (A Wave Called Extinction/Campfire) (x2)
Electron Sheep – 소음의 왕 (King of Noise)
Electron Sheep – 쿵쿵 (Thump Thump)
Eungmin Cho – New Beginning
Firefly Star Sausage Club – 뻘밭에서 (In the Mud Field)
F(x) – Rude Love
Giant Bear – Work For USA
Goldendoodle – 스크류드라이버 (Screwdriver)
Goonamguayeoridingstella – 젊은이 (Youth)
GooseBumps – UNGGM UNGGM (Feat. Jericho, PNSB)
Green Dolphin Street – Where Am I?
Heavy Mental – Super Fly
Hong Haelim – 초록땅 (Green Land) Horizon
iamnot – Psycho
Im In-gun – 피아노가 된 나무 (The Tree That Became a Piano)
I.Na – Samba De Voce
Jang Kiha and the Faces – 새해 복 (New Year’s Blessings)
Jay Park – 몸매 (Mommae) (Featuring Ugly Duck)
Jonghyun – Deja-Boo (Feat. Zion.T)
Jonghyun – Neon
Jung Mina – 지나가는 사람 (The Passerby)
JYP – 어머님이 누구니 (Who’s Your Mama?) (Featuring Jessi) (x3)
Kang Huh Dalrim – 외로운 사람들 (Lonely People)
Keith Ape – It G Ma
Kim Chang-wan Band – 아직은 (Yet)
Kim Chung-man & Park Je-chun – RECORDs & RECORDINGs
Kim Sa-wol – 머리맡 (Bedside)
Kwon Namu – 이천십사년사월 (April Two Thousand and Fourteen)
Lee Min-hwi – 한여름의 판타지아 (A Midsummer’s Fantasia)
Lee Seung-hwan – 가만히 있으라 (Be Still)
Life And Time – 빛 (Light)
Loopy – Gear 2
Lovelyz – Ah-Choo
Lovelyz – 안녕 (Hi~)
Mamamoo – 음오아예 (Um Oh Ah Yeh)
Park Je-chun – Park Je Chun’s Korean Grip
Pavlov – 이럴 때가 아냐 (No Time For This)
PPUL – 동그라미세모네모 (Circle, Square, and Triangle)
Sai – 총파업지지가 (Full Strike Support Song)
Red Velvet – Automatic
Red Velvet – Cool World
Rico – Special
Room 306 – Tomorrow (Bacty Remix)
Sentimental Scenery – 가혹한 계절 (Cruel Season)
Second Moon – 사랑가 (Love Song) (Featuring Lee Bong-geun)
Seventeen – 만세 (Mansae)
SHINee – Love Sick
Shin Hae-chul – Welcome to the Real World
Sine – Oblivion
The Solutions – Stage
Teen Top – 아침부터 아침까지 (Ah-Ah)
Trampauline – Boxer’s Wife
Trampauline – Polygamy
Twice – Ooh-Ahh하게 (Like Ooh-Ahh)
Virgo – Drive (Featuring Sorri)
Wavisabiroom – 밥말리 (Bob Marley)
Wonder Girls – I Feel You
You Are Amanda – 밤걸음 (Night Walk)
Yozoh – 푸른 자켓 (Blue Jacket)

See you in 2017 for the next Year In Review series!

(Editing by Adrian Cheng)