After School's Good Year (Top Singles And Albums Through The Third Quarter Of 2013)

Second year running I've entitled a post "After School's Good Year." Last time, I was urging myself to get to know the group better, find out who writes the songs,* who makes the decisions, what's going on with After School's images and "concepts," whether or not personalities are spotlighted and what the personalities are, what After School's overall musical arc is, if any. Yet I've done almost none of this. Still haven't learned all their names, even. "Heaven" is just the latest in a steady stream of interesting music: it's got a riff in James Brown's mid '70s style, when James was taking in what he'd heard from Africans who'd learned from him but were stretching out even farther than he had; so James began stretching more too while not losing the obsessive tenseness he got by jamming the funk into single measures.** But "Heaven" basically flees the James Brown challenge,*** avoids the ongoing demand of the riff by simply stopping the riff and replacing it with a disco quasi-funk, going from tense to relaxed, and atop the relaxation orchestral riffs arise and After School go into their sumptuous mood (whereas James Brown riffs never allow for something to simply arise above them). Then the riff returns as a challenge, and is left behind once again.

(Um. Might the riff be a sample? It feels familiar.)

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( footnotes )

SINGLES:
1. Crayon Pop "Bar Bar Bar"
2. Baauer "Harlem Shake"
3. Gaeko & Choiza & Simon D & Primary "난리good!!! (AIR)"
4. GLAM "I Like That"
5. MBLAQ "Smoky Girl."
6. will.i.am ft. Britney Spears "Scream & Shout"
7. Evol "Get Up"
8. Cassie ft. Rick Ross "Numb"
9. Tiny-G "Minimanimo"
10. Qri "Do We Do We"

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( 11 (Z.Hera) through 30 (Baek Ji Young) )

( 31 (T-ara) through 63 (Busy Signal) )

ALBUMS:
1. After School First Love EP (Pledis Entertainment)

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2. Orange Caramel Orange Caramel (Avex)
3. D-Unit Affirmative Chapter.1 EP (D-Business Entertainment/Windmill Media)
4. Kitty D.A.I.S.Y. rage (self-released)
5. Cassie RockaByeBaby (self-released)
6. Sturgill Simpson High Top Mountain (High Top Mountain/Relativity)
7. will.i.am #willpower Deluxe Edition (will.i.am/Interscope)
8. Delight Mega Yak EP (BrosMedia Entertainment)
9. Kate Nash Girl Talk (Have 10p Records)
10. Ashley Monroe Like A Rose (Warner Brothers Nashville)
( 11 (Tom Keifer) through 17 (Kacey Musgraves) )

( SNSD and EXO )