EXO D.O.’s ‘Somebody’ Is Smooth, Soulful, and Satisfying

First things first: D.O.’s voice is luminous—it shines and reverberates—so long as you hear him sing, and once the song is over, it still lingers, sort of imprinting on your mind. He is, if you aren’t living under a rock, the very able and virtuosic member of the iconic EXO—one of the vocal powerhouses in K-pop music to date. D.O.’s singing, in my mind, is an eclectic kind in and of itself. There’s a specificity to how he flexes his voice, whatever the genre—whether he is performing folk-pop, R&B, any style in K-pop, or just about anything else. If you’re a follower of his music, you get the drift.

Reaffirming his innate flair, but of course, with renewed vigor comes “Somebody,” the lead single with a romantic K-drama-like music video from his second mini album Expectation. “Somebody” is a languid and supremely luxurious tune marked by sentimentality—straining to make a relationship work only ending up fatigued when it still doesn’t work. For a respite from such baggage, D.O. sings in the chorus: “I want somebody, even if it’d take long/I want somebody, even if passion’s not fiery…I want somebody to come into my heart again.” His vocals are embellished with greater depth and candor, together with the level of emotion that reinforces the ache for the one he’s looking for.

D.O. is playing a cameraperson in charge of filming a commercial in the music video. A mousy, cute female model—who is promptly booted from the campaign for a mistake but grabs his attention—is introduced to us. Spotting her sulking on the stairs, D.O. gives her an ice cream bar and later a marker pen with a request for her autograph on the back of his t-shirt, reassuring her in the act. Endearing scenes of the two hanging around interspersed with the moment at hand hint at a blossoming romance with the post-chorus refrain, “I love you, I love you,” underlining it. D.O.’s supple vibrato meshes naturally with the high registers in full throttle, still perfectly regulated in his never-failing sense of pitch.

Though the song is slow-paced, the beats and acoustic sounds let the song’s grabbing rhythm ring up more. The song’s bridge is one of my favorites since the lines discuss the “somebody” we all wish for—somebody who can see past our imperfections, circumstances, and true selves and yet love us. “I want somebody, somebody who loves me/Even the darkest depths of my mind and the way I love/Just as I am/I want somebody, somebody who loves me/Even the shadows in my mind/And the ways I express my love/Somebody who’d understand them all.”

D.O. delivers the folk-pop song with his trademark expressiveness, both in his acting and his vocal presentation, giving way to this beautifully refined music—very sensitive and seemingly intimate.