“Exist” by Eric Nam + Top 23 of '23: Songs 14-11, Sunday, January 28, 2024

I took a week off from my countdown. I’ve been spending the week planning the direction of my blog for this year, and it always seems like a miracle when I get a chance to write! Today, I’m counting down songs 14 to 11 that were recorded and released in 2023. Not many of these songs were actual hits on the Billboard Hot 100, and all of them were released in 2023. For songs that just missed the top ten, I think that these songs have better lyrics than the top 20, but there is something dynamic missing from making the song a more impactful song on me. Of course, this is completely subjective, and time may prove differently. Still, as of writing this post, I’m going to say that these songs are in the right order. 

14. “Exist” by Eric Nam. In 2019, Eric Nam began primarily writing songs in English after half a decade in K-pop. But it wasn’t until last year’s House on a Hill that the lyrics and music seemed to sync up. “Exist” is my favorite track from the album. It’s simple but beautiful. The idea of the song is perhaps better expressed in other existential songs, but I feel like comparing them is like comparing yesterday’s sunset to last week’s. All sunsets can be beautiful and so can all songs about existence. But I have a few predictions: 1) Eric Nam’s songwriting is going to get better than this. 2) Nam or another Asian American solo artist will break through into mainstream pop stardom in the next five years in America. I bet against BTS; I’m not going to make that mistake again!

13. “I Should Just Go to Bed” by Rosie. I found this song on a new music discovery playlist on Spotify. This song actually stands in the place of several songs from the last few years that have blown up on TikTok. Todd in the Shadows even added one of these TikTok songs in his “Best Songs of 2023,” which crossed over on the charts to become a hit this year-- “Ceilings” by Lizzy McAlpine. That song would have scored higher than Rosie’s song, except it was released last year. “I Should Just Go to Bed” is a storytelling track that gets at an underlying emotion that felt a little too much like I was in a time machine back to my twenties. Plus, the girl is a great singer. I’m looking forward to seeing what kind of music Gen Z will give us.

12. “Cotton Candy” by Jinyoung. Somehow K-pop didn’t connect with me much last year. I also took a year off from studying the language so maybe that had something to do with it. NewJeans’ breakout success was fun. And “Cupid” was catchy, and Fifty Fifty was an interesting story about the group vs. record label. But one song I thought was great was Jinyoung’s “Cotton Candy.” Acoustic ballads by solo K-pop singers rarely get large followings. GOT7’s Jinyeoung hasn’t released much music, just a handful of singles and an EP titled CHAPTER 0: WITH. “Cotton Candy” is a little bit funky and very smooth. The song was a minor hit during cherry blossom season. Of course, there are good feelings associated with this song.

11. “Super Mall Mannequin” by Quotes from Movies. When I heard this song many times in my Spotify algorithm, I thought it was a big song, or at least going to be a big song. But in 2024 it only has just over 66,000 streams on Spotify. It reminds me of the MySpace era of band promotion, and the song reminds me of my anxiety from my 20s making the anxiety in my 30s seem like it will pass. “Super Mall Mannequin” is about waiting for life to happen before you realize that you have to make it happen. And I think that all of us in our post-pandemic slump of 2023 could relate to this song in one way or another.