Jun. K makes statement as solo artist
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Jun. K performs on stage at YES24 Live Hall in Gwangjin-gu, eastern Seoul, as he promotes his mini solo album “Mr. No♡.” / Courtesy of JYP Entertainment
By Kim Ji-soo
As the Seoul summer heat soared to the temperature of a barbecue grill, Jun. K showed his fiery passion as a solo artist on stage at YES24 Live Hall in eastern Seoul on Monday
Jun. K? Yes, Jun. K, the main vocalist of the six-member idol group 2PM.
Twelve years after entering JYP Entertainment, and after eight years as 2PM’s lead singer, Jun. K has a mini solo album, “Mr. No♡” featuring eight songs in Korean. A few are remakes of singles he introduced several years earlier, but he wrote some new songs, sometimes working with such well-known writers as BoyToy, as he did with the title song, “Think About You.” The other songs are “Mr. No♡,” “Better Man,” “Young Forever,” “Surfing,” “Don’t Go,” “Our House” and “No Love Part2.”
Album jacket image of Jun. K
Jun. K has written many songs for both himself and the group such as “Alive” in 2011 and “Go Crazy” in 2014. Like the other five members, he delved into individual activities such as musicals. But he also had an active solo career in Japan, and this week, he joined the array of his K-pop group members who are occasionally breaking out as solo artists even as they remain in the group.
The 28-year-old first performed “Don’t Go” with fellow JYP artist Baek A-yeon. At the showcase, he also performed parts of “Think About You,” showing that he can seize the stage with his dance and songs.
While 2PM was always known as a “beastly” idol group that performed acrobatic moves on stage, Jun. K as a solo artist is still powerful but with a certain groove and expressiveness. The audio for the YES24 Live Hall was a bit loud but Jun. K kept his movements and performance toned down to the essentials.
“I have learned a lot from producer Park Jin-young of JYP, and I tried to express my experience and my music with the album,” said Jun. K after the performance. Jun. K who was formerly known as Junsu changed his real name to Min-jun for family reasons.
For the new mini-album in Korea, there was a lot of 1990s R&B, he said. In the song “Think About You” for instance, he and BoyToy worked to infuse Future music, which is also known as Flume style. As a result, the outcome is a sophisticated urban-sounding R&B ballad.
He said his solo stint in Japan taught him more about the stage and how to interact with the audience. In Japan, he made his reputation as a solo artist. He dropped two solo albums in Japan, with the 2014 mini-album “Love & Hate” and the 2015 mini-album “Love Letter”topping the Japanese Oricon chart. He then set out on solo tours for two years.
With the electronic keyboard and the back-up dancers phased out, he sat down with fellow 2PM member Wooyoung to talk about how each of the songs could come to life.
“At JYP, songs have to pass through about 20 monitors, and I have had some songs rejected,” Jun. K said. But this time, he was and is determined to convey what the artist Jun. K is all about. He said that he is deeply into R&B and a fan of such artists as R. Kelly and D’Angelo.
“You can say that this is a debut in Korea for Jun. K,” said Jun. K. He said he won’t obsess about how the album does chart-wise; he is out there to get his music across.
Thanking his fans, Jun. K said that he will promote his solo album for several weeks and his return to 2PM will bring the release of another album in September or October.