TOP STAR NEWS Writes About JYJ (The Light & Shadow Surrounding JYJ)

As we know, JYJ has been facing a lot of difficulties especially being unable to perform in their own country due to some controversial issues. The group’s strong determination to continue their career as singers has received much attention from the media. They have been holding their world tours and traveling around the world for their concerts since that is the only way for them to perform on the stage and to promote their albums. Korean Media, TOP STAR NEWS recently reported and shared their thoughts regarding JYJ’s situation in Korea and also discussed about their growing popularity in the worldwide despite the controversial issues with their previous agency.

Check out the article written by TOP STAR NEWS reporter, Park Ji Hyuk and the original article with pictures here

The group JYJ put a period on their one year-long World Tour after visiting Chile and Peru. They held the World Tour, which is true to the name, by visiting 15 countries beginning with Thailand in last April, to Asia, North America, Europe and South America, and by mobilizing around 210 thousand people. JYJ was the ‘first’ singers who ‘exclusively’ succeeded to make a journey that even supposedly, internationally famous singers, commonly called as K-pop singers, have not made.

Group JYJ, photo = C-JES Entertainment 

About 1~2 years ago, the television and newspapers rapidly started to use the words related to ‘K-pop fever.’ The public heard and saw these kinds of words especially after SMTOWN Live in Paris. It was still insufficient because it was their first time; however, one must pay attention that JYJ did not perform as part of some production company’s joint concert but held their exclusive concerts filled with ‘only JYJ’s songs.’

Recently in Japan, majority of idol groups went to Japan through Korean wave by KARA, Girl’s Generation and others. Naturally, there are more joint concerts by Korean singers. Some concerts, however, only used the value of ‘K-pop’ and singer who are not popular in either Korea or Japan while requesting high prices for tickets, 7000Yen~9000Yen. Of course, they were empty. Seeing those sights through SNS was even ashamed to be called as ‘Hallyu.’ JYJ did not get on the bandwagon; however, they became the first Korean group to perform in North America, Spain and Germany and South America only using their own music and name. After their South America Tour was confirmed, there was a demonstration to hold JYJ’s concert in Mexico.

But in reality, we cannot see JYJ and their performances in their country and places they should be mainly active: Korea and Japan. This is because their ex-company SM Entertainment and Japanese AVEX are implicitly (although it is too obvious) interrupting their activities. During a recent fan meeting, JYJ members stated “although we want to hold a concert right now, there are too many restrictions from renting the place, employing staffs, and etc. to hold concert in Korea.” In addition, they had many incidents and delays with releasing their albums because there was no distribution company, which readily accepted them.

Furthermore, JYJ had to run the concert by hiding the place of concert venue and only announcing to the audience who would attend the concert like a ‘007 mission’ because another Japanese concert venue suddenly notified the cancelation of rental. For example, the ‘JYJ Unforgettable Live Concert’ in Japan last fall had many twists and turns even during the preparation. Many incidents like the website of ticket sale being hacked, and the sudden cancelation by the bus Rental Company and etc. had occurred and some people even doubted if AVEX was interfering. (After the concert, there had been many postscripts that they lobbied mayor and government officials of Ibaraki, and police and threatened the companies of sound equipment and concert equipment.) As they realized it is extremely difficult to hold concerts in Korea and Japan, the used-to-be main places, JYJ turned toward the places others did not even look at.

JYJ performing at Ibaraki, photo = C-JES Entertainment 

Thus, they held concerts in North America, Europe and South America. In reality, JYJ had a free showcase in the U.S.A after releasing ‘The Beginning’ in 2010. After confirming the great attentions toward JYJ in the USA, they chose North America as the second place to hold World Tour after Asia.

All the concert venues were and the tour was held with AEG live, an international promotion company, and was mainly sponsored by Samsung. After I received this news, I thought these were really different from the concerts in Korea and Japan because no large company readily sponsors for concerts in these countries. JYJ who gained confidence through concerts in North America, held concerts in Korea in June. But the locations were not in Seoul but in Busan and Gwangju.

JYJ having tour in North America. photo = C-JES Entertainment 

In reality, most singers do not hold concerts in the provinces unless it is a nationwide tour. Even during the period when JYJ were part of TVXQ, they have never had concert in the provinces other than in Seoul. Whenever they held concerts, fans from different provinces rented buses to come to Seoul and went back. But this time, fans from whole nation went to Busan and Gwangju. This showed there is no venue in Seoul and the metropolitan area that would let JYJ rent. JYJ, however, held three countries although it was in other provinces and gathered up around 24,000 fans.

JYJ at Busan concert, photo = C-JES Entertainment 

After the World Tour finished with the concerts in Korea, other news of new album surprised fans. The news was about the concerts in Spain and Germany. The level of awareness of Korean singers in Europe is still insignificant. Until then, only idol singers who performed in Europe were from SMTOWN. Their concerts were well-wrapped ‘vain efforts’ by government, which sponsored them, and by Korean media, which reported using phrase like ‘K-pop fever. Korean residents abroad stated most of the concert venues were filled by Asian and Hispanic audience. [TN: Korean presses reported 80% of the audience was non-Asian or Hispanic]

JYJ did not begin with large concert with tens of thousands people but started with small concerts. They held the first exclusive concerts in Spain and Germany with around 3,000 seats for each concert. These concerts might have been small stages to JYJ who had even performed on the stage of Tokyo Dome with around 50,000 people. However, these small stages were special to JYJ right now. While JYJ was performing in Europe, there was a controversy that the concert venues of JYJ were empty in Korea. However, those pictures were either taken before the concert or after the concert when most of the audience has left. Anyways, JYJ, who successfully held the first exclusive concerts in Spain and Germany among Korean idols, came back to Korea and prepared for individual activity like musical and drama.

poster of JYJ’s concert in Europe, photo = C-JES Entertainment 

After few months, there has been surprising news that they will hold concerts in South America. Only BEAST and 4minute and other Cube Entertainment artists had a joint concert in Brazil before JYJ in South America. JYJ, again, blazed the trail that other singers have not done. After fans, JYJ members and staffs left to South America with great expectations, the Korean presses revealed the videos and audios from 2-3 years ago instead of reporting JYJ going to South America. That was the controversy of Saseng.

This matter popped up right after they left to South America. Although the majority of the media reported as saseng fans about the controversy with as large battering as the name value of JYJ, what sasengs did to JYJ members unbelievable and they should rather be called as ‘criminals’ instead of ‘fans.’ Hitting members and taking picture of a member sleeping in a man-only sauna were basics. They even purposely caused car accidents. The pus, which has been festered in the fandom since their debut until now, just erupted. JYJ’s fandom even created a word ‘sasengbum’ (compound word of ‘saseng’ and ‘criminal’/ ‘saseng criminal’) and informed to use ‘saseng criminal’ instead of using ‘saseng fan’ and the brutality of ‘saseng criminals’ through SNS and blogs and other places.

a picture reported by JYJ fans showing damage done by saseng: The picture was taken in a man-only sauna and a saseng posted on the blog about the behind story that she asked the taxi driver to take the picture 

a picture reported by JYJ fans showing damage done by saseng: The captures above are from JYJ’s private DVD, which were shoot secretly according to fans. The capture below is about the story of personal experience with saseng by Jisung who acted together with Kim Jaejoong on “Protect the Boss.” 

Because Jisung mentioned Kim Jaejoong during his birthday party, we expected a warm story. But, he said saseng taxis blocked Kim Jaejoong’s car including cars of Jisung and those of other staffs. They requested to open the way. Those taxis opened the road to let other cars pass and blocked the road again in front of Kim Jaejoong’s car.

a picture reported by JYJ fans showing damage done by saseng: The picture was taken by saseng at the funeral of the late Park Yongha 

a picture reported by JYJ fans showing damage done by saseng: Captures from CCTV installed by saseng at the parking lot of Park Yoochun

a picture reported by JYJ fans showing damage done by saseng: Saseng took pictures from a hotel across the house of Park Yoochun 

The media, which first reported, probably wanted to bury the success of JYJ from South America by deteriorating the image of JYJ; however, the majority of the media presses gave prominent coverage on the problem of ‘saseng’ instead of reporting it was JYJ’s fault. A press media even used ‘sasengbum’ (saseng criminal).

JYJ members, who arrived at Peru after twists and turns, entered the press conference hall with heavy expressions instead of excited expression with anticipation for the concerts, and talked about the controversy of ‘saseng’ in Korea after talking about their concerts. Members expressed as ‘living in a prison without bars’ about actions done by sasengs. JYJ members said “Although we tried to avoid and get away from sasengs, we were stuck in the place and received more tremendous mental stresses. In the beginning, we tried to endure as a celebrity because we receive love from fans. These repeated incidents by some saseng fans caused our daily lives to collapse down. These torments are inexpressible.” They lowered their heads with an apology “We would like to apologize for our wrongful actions in the past.” The press conference, which JYJ should have expressed their expectations and aspirations about concerts in South America that they have never visited in their lives, became the place to explain and apologize for the controversy in Korea.

JYJ’s concert in South America, photo = C-JES Entertainment 

JYJ successfully finished the concerts in Chile and Peru under this controversy and criticisms. They gathered around 9,000 people with concerts in Peru and Chile. Especially in Peru, the airport helped JYJ to leave through V.I.P gateway because so many fans came to see JYJ at the airport. Local terrestrial televisions aired special broadcasts, which JYJ cannot even dream about in Korea, and even Reuter and CNN Chile gave prominent coverage. JYJ did their best in concerts in South America by even singing ‘Intoxication,’ Kim Junsu’s solo single released in Japan.

As the result, local fans went extremely excited and many fans fainted during the concert. Some fans even asked reporters who went to cover the concert in Peru, and to fans in South America, meeting JYJ and their party was ‘the event of a lifetime.’ Their first World Tour came to an end leaving many stories.

Finishing this World Tour, the director Baek Changjoo from C-JES Entertainment, the agency of JYJ, stated “Because it is JYJ, they could have done World Tour. They are really popular that they can hold an exclusive concert in any country around the world. We gained confidence and know-how. This is the reason why we are expecting the tour next year.”

Korean presses reported their successes using phrases like ‘K-pop fever’ and tried to get ‘K-pop’ on the JYJ’s bandwagon. They should, however, regard it as meaningful that JYJ’s World Tour has been done using only ‘JYJ’s music’ unlike ‘joint concerts with music programs’ held in many places around the world. The World Tour was the outcome of ‘JYJ-pop’ instead of ‘K-pop’ as many fans describe.

However, Korean broadcasting industries are still frigid to JYJ who was the first Korean artists to complete the World Tour. Even their names cannot be mentioned due to the pressure of large production company. This is the reality of JYJ, who is like ‘Voldemort’ from ‘Harry Potter.’ It has been over a year since the court has granted an injunction allowing JYJ to freely take part in the entertainment business. JYJ, however, only appeared as singers in the celebration stages for the Drama Award and IAAF World Championships in Daegu, which were not directed by entertainment department.

Although JYJ are extremely popular that they are even treated as state guests in other countries, they are more recognized with their individual activity as actors or musical actor than as singers in Korea. It is very unfortunate that they cannot freely release albums or dream to appear in music programs although they are extremely popular singer group JYJ. Although one does not know how long the lawsuit against the ex-company SM Entertainment will take, one hopes the day when they can freely sing on television will arrive soon.

source: 14March2012 Top Star News + gokpop

Translated by: dlwpdldhkdlwp

shared: ourJYJ (@our_JYJ)