사랑했나봐

Regret often arrives belatedly. What "I Must Have Loved You" captures is precisely that time lag. Only after love has ended, or after the person you loved has left, do you realize that it was love. Lim Jae-beom processes this paradox in his own way — the uncertainty is already revealed in the hesitant title "I Must Have Loved You," and the vocals proceed not by declaring definitively but by asking and asking again. The arrangement follows Lim Jae-beom's signature rock ballad idiom while opening a lyrical space unique to this song — the guitar maintains a warm rather than sharp texture, and strings round the edges of emotion. When the vocals rise high at the climax, it's not a point of conviction reached but the pain of realization translated into sound. This song pierces most precisely not right after a breakup, but after some time has passed — when some smell, some song, some season summons that person while you're just living your daily life. It's the song where the sensibility of "belated realization" deeply embedded in the emotional DNA of Korean ballads is expressed in the most Lim Jae-beom way possible.