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| Jun Hyo-seong sings during a press conference to present her new album "Colored," Monday. / Courtesy of TS Entertainment |
Jun Hyo-seong releases ‘Colored'
By Kim Jae-heun
Leader of K-pop girl group Secret Jun Hyo-seong released her second solo mini-album "Colored" in 10 months at YES24 Muv Hall in the Hongdae area of western Seoul on Monday. Jun said she hopes her new six-song album brings happiness to audiences.
"These days I think about happiness often," said Jun during a press meeting. "I decided to make my second solo album in pursuit of happiness and I talked to the producers a lot. But I realized that I will never be happy if becoming successful is the standard of my happiness.
"I can lose many small things such as eating a delicious breakfast or basking in the warm sunshine in the morning. All these stories are contained in my music," she said.
The lead track "Find Me" is a house-beat dance song arranged with acoustic piano. Singer-songwriter Startrack composed the music and Jun wrote the lyrics. Rapper D.Action of Untouchable, who is Jun's labelmate on TS Entertainment, is featured in the singer's lead song.
Jun also sang "Dear Moon" at the end of the press meeting, which she introduced as the first ballad on her solo album.
"I wrote the song because it helped immerse me in the lyrics better while recording it," she added. "I realized that I improved a lot musically as I can manage to sing comfortably throughout the whole song."
Jun debuted as a member of the four-member girl group Secret under the management of TS Entertainment in 2009. However, she first gained attention in 2005 on music channel Mnet's "Battle Shinhwa" as a finalist and came near to joining girl group Five Girls with G.NA, Yubin of Wonder Girls, After School's Uee and former T-ara member Yang Jiwon, but the group disbanded because of the company's financial problems.
Secret's debut single "I Want You Back" wasn't a big success but the band's lead single "Magic" on their first mini-album "Secret Time" released after six months and second release "Madonna" put out only two months later put the girl band on track to stardom. Secret did not stop there and returned with another hit title "Shy Boy" in Jan. 2011, which gave the girl group a fresh sexy idol image. Secret won multiple trophies at TV music shows with the song "Shy Boy."
The same year, Secret entered the Japanese market with their previous hit songs including "Madonna" and "Shy Boy." The Japanese version of "Madonna" ranked ninth on the Oricon singles chart and Secret became the third K-pop girl group to debut on the chart in the top 10, along with other popular groups like Girls Generation of S.M. Entertainment and Kara of DSP Entertainment.
In 2014, Jun released her first three-song solo album "Top Secet."
About her future career with Secret, Jun said the group has no concrete plans as they haven't found any good songs.
"We were supposed to make a comeback earlier this year but we still haven't found any good songs," Jun said. "Fans have high expectations of us and we don't want to disappoint them."
