Throwback Thursday: Stuck in Your Head

From beautiful ballads to dance hall anthems, K-Pop has an extremely broad spectrum, but there’s one thing almost every quintessential K-Pop song has in common: the ability to get stuck in your head.

“Very Very Very” - I.O.I

One easy way to make a song the catchiest of all time? Have a repetitive chorus, of course! And I.O.I did just that in 2016 with their track “Very Very Very.” The peppy song served as the Produce group’s final official comeback, but the lasting effects of the song are still with us—we’re still “neomu neomu neomu”-ing four years later.

“Power Up” - Red Velvet

One aspect that sets Red Velvet apart from their contemporaries is their duality. The group is known to have two sides (appropriately named “red” and “velvet”) and in the summer of 2018, the girls embraced their “red” side once again with the incredibly upbeat “Power Up.” Opening up the song is an infectious chorus of “ba-banana-ba-ba-banana-nana” that almost serves more as an instrumental than actual lyrics. Pair the repetitive line with adorable choreography—made even better when Seulgi taught the dance to nearly every SM Entertainment labelmate—and you have an easy summer hit.

“CHEER UP” - TWICE

If there’s one thing you can count on in a TWICE release, it’s that it’ll be stuck in your head after just one listen. Never has this been held more true than with their 2016 break-out hit “CHEER UP.” Though the girls had a wildly successful debut with “LIKE OOH-AHH,” “CHEER UP” truly put them on the map. This song was everywhere in 2016, so it’s no wonder it won “Song of the Year” at both the MelOn Music Awards and the Mnet Asian Music Awards and nearly every other award for which it was nominated.

“U R Man” - SS501

In 2008, SS501’s Hyunjoong was cast as Jihoo in the now classic K-Drama, Boys Over Flowers. That same year, the group released their fifth mini-album U R Man and its title song of the same name which they performed as a cameo in the drama. Though it may be a little hard to whistle the tune due to its abundant key changes, there’s no mistaking the chorus. It’s for this reason that the song was chosen as the most addictive song by Korean netizens.