NewYearsDayProject | a song a day blog

It’s time to check in with NewJeans . On August 27th, Min Hee-Jin was dismissed as the CEO of NewJeans’ label ADOR , a sub-label of Hybe Corporation . The corporate intrigue has left one of Hybe’s most internationally and financially successful acts in limbo. NewJeans is like the victim of a divorce in which the custody lies legally with their father label. NewJeans, however, expressed their loyalty to Min Hee-Jin, who formed the group and managed every step in their process toward global ubiquity. But NewJeans aren’t completely helpless. As one of the biggest K-pop acts, the group has an active fanbase. On September 11, NewJeans hosted a livestream on YouTube and demanded that Min be reinstated as CEO of ADOR by September 25th. This statement by the group was believed to be responsible for Hybe’s 3% dip in value of the company’s shares .  WE ARE BOUND TO EACH OTHER. With the turmoil at ADOR, NewJeans’ releases this year have lagged compared to the last two years. The group has releas

  Shakatak  formed in 1980 in London. The jazz-funk has consisted of several changing members in their over forty-year career, but three of the key members— Jill Saward ,  Bill Sharpe , and  Roger Odel —have remained in the band throughout its run, and bassist  George Anderson  joined the band in their first year. After a few minor hits in 1980, the band scored their first major hit in the U.K., “ Easier Said than Done ,” which featured the band singing in unison with an easy instrumental line. The single also helped the group achieve international success in Australia and Europe. Subsequent releases would bring the band success in Japan and the United States as well.  YOU CAN TAKE YOUR LOVE AWAY. “Easier Said than Done” is a very simple song with a repeating verse throughout the song. After each verse there is an instrumental break featuring a funky bass and piano improvisation. It’s a song that I could imagine being played at a grocery store back when I was young and grocery stores p

It shouldn’t work. But it does. We seem to be in a maximalist era of pop music. Big club sounds drowned out the folky acoustic songs that we were listening to during lockdown. I can’t explain it. But somehow the producers behind a K-pop group NewJeans has made simple ‘90s-styled adult contemporary extremely catchy. Relying on subdued instrumentation but never skimping on the beat, the group also offers solid vocal performances but never do the singers belt above loudly above the song’s instrumentation. The group has followed a kind of chill disco since their inception in 2022 over the course of some 20+ songs. This year, the Ador girl group has released two singles and two B-sides and are said to be releasing an album later this year, though whether it is an LP or an EP, we have yet to find out.    IT’S LIKE BITING AN APPLE. Of course, we’ve discussed how the squeaky-clean “ Bubble Gum ” pop singers NewJeans are not without controversy. Not only are the girls the center of a corporat

Today it’s back to the world of the Hybe Corporation . In 2019, Hybe hired Min Hee-jin (민희진) as the company’s chief brand designer. She worked as the company began a transitional phase when BigHit Entertainment took on several subsidiary record labels. Min had worked for SM Entertainment , one of the big three K-pop labels in the ‘90s to early ‘10s, and had been the creative director behind some of the label’s biggest acts such as Exo , SHINee , (f)x , and Girls' Generation. She then worked developing other K-pop acts on every label for Hybe except for BigHit because that label had its own specialized brand designer. But upon being hired at BigHit (later Hybe), Min demanded her own subsidiary, Ador , of which the brand designer became CEO. Ador was formed in 2021 and signed their first act in 2022.   WANNA BE A WINNER. Min Hee-jin planned to release a girl group in 2022. Hybe Corporation was known for its boy bands and rappers. Still, with SM, YG , and JYP releasing successful f

I’ll-It, later known as ILLIT , was formed with the winning members of the 2023 South Korean survival competition show R U Next ? The show was broadcast JTBC and streamed on Netflix and Wavve beginning June 30, 2023. Along with JTBC, the show was created by Belift Lab , a sublabel of Hybe , the label responsible for introducing the world to BTS and NewJeans . Six winners were selected by the end of the show and those members became ILLIT, a K-pop girl group who just scored a Billboard Hot 100 entry on their first single--an accomplish-ment, a first of its kind. “ Magnetic ” is one of the biggest K-pop songs now, and other songs from Hybe Corporation are charting high in Korea and other countries. But as the label has brought K-pop to its imperial phase, ILLIT has come under fire as an imitation of the label’s other successful girl group, NewJeans. I DON’T NEED ANY GOLDEN TICKET. Hybe Corporation began as Big Hit Entertainment in 2005. The label signed their first act, 8Eight in

Around 2015, I started hearing an answer to “What do you want to be when you grow up?” that would have made the same teachers that I told “I want to be a rock guitarist” come out of retirement and give my current students detention. These students didn’t want to grow up and be musicians or professional athletes. They told me that they wanted to be a “pro-gamer.” It took me a while to realize that a pro-gamer wasn’t a mispronunciation of a programmer . A pro-gamer is a professional game player. And while there are pro-gamers who play card and in-person role-playing games, and sometimes professional gamblers are also categorized as progamers, my students were only concerned with video games. Beginning around 2000, electronic sport, or esport, competitions became a global phenomenon. No longer were video games something to play with friends after school; they had become a billion dollar industry, and winning an esports competition could be a profitable career.  ONE MORE STEP; YOU’RE IMM

In 2020, amid America’s racial reckoning following the brutal murder of George Floyd, many artists of color came to prominence. Jon Batiste had been playing drums and percussion from the age of 8 and classical piano from the age of 11. Influenced by classical, jazz, R&B, and pop, Batiste released his first album, Times in New Orleans , at 17 and was accepted to study music at Juilliard. After earning his bachelor’s degree, Baptiste went on to earn a master’s degree also from Julliard. In 2004, while studying at Julliard, Batiste formed the jazz band Stay Human . In 2015, Steven Colbert hired Batiste and Stay Human as his house band for The Late Show with Colbert . Batiste’s career has been characterized with prestige, collaboration, activism, and gradual name recognition. THAT’S JUST WHO I AM, THAT’S JUST MY RADIO. I first heard of Jon Batiste from his contribution to the Soul original soundtrack. Batiste composed original jazz pieces for the 2020 Pixar film . Along with co-comp