SEOUL, Jul. 15 (Korea Bizwire) — K-pop super band BTS will perform solo concert in Saudi Arabia in October, becoming the first non-Saudi Arabian artists to perform at a stadium in the country, its management agency has said. BTS announced the Saudi Arabian leg of their ongoing “Love Yourself: Speak Yourself” world tour on Sunday, [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 15 (Korea Bizwire) — K-pop super band BTS’ four concerts in Japan this month drew a total of 210,000 fans, making the Japanese leg of the band’s world tour a solid success despite worsening trade and diplomatic rows between South Korea and Japan. On Saturday and Sunday, the Korean septet rocked Shizuoka’s 50,000-seat [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 11 (Korea Bizwire) — Mina, a Japanese member of K-pop girl band TWICE, will not be part of the band’s ongoing world tour from this week due to health issues, the band’s management agency said Thursday. “Mina is suddenly feeling extreme psychological tension and enormous anxieties about being on stage,” JYP Entertainment said [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 11 (Korea Bizwire) — Kangin, a scandal-ridden member of long-running K-pop boy band Super Junior, said Thursday he will leave the team, ending his 14-year membership. The 34-year-old, whose real name is Kim Young-woon, broke the news on his Instagram account. “I decided to leave behind the title, Super Junior, with which I [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 6 (Korea Bizwire) — T.O.P of South Korean boy band BIGBANG was released Saturday from his alternative military service, which had turns and twists due to a marijuana conviction. BIGBANG’s main rapper, whose real name is Choi Seung-hyun, started his two-year mandatory military service as a conscripted police officer in February 2017. But [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 4 (Korea Bizwire) — South Korea-Japan relations are deteriorating as the countries’ history-driven diplomatic row is widening to imperil their economic ties. Still, the neighbors’ cultural ties remain mostly unscathed, with K-pop artists accomplishing unprecedented feats in the Japanese pop market. On Thursday, “Lights/Boy With Luv,” the new Japanese single album by globally-loved [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 2 (Korea Bizwire) — A recent series of scandals and gossip involving Korean Wave stars has dealt a heavy blow to provincial governments trying to utilize their associations with entertainers to attract tourists. Most recently, the Taebaek city government in Gangwon Province became an unlikely victim when celebrity couple Song Joong-ki and Song [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 2 (Korea Bizwire) — As American pop icon Lady Gaga once inspired the U.S. pop scene to follow her example and find copycats, K-pop boy band BTS stands now as a force that changes the contours of the American pop industry, an American columnist specializing in K-pop said Tuesday. “In the grand scheme [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 1 (Korea Bizwire) — Roaring K-pop boy band BTS launched Monday an official mobile application channel to connect with fans around the world. The septet announced the opening of BTS Weverse, an official fan community based on the application Weverse. Through the channel, BTS will communicate with fans using text messages as well [...]
SEOUL, Jul. 1 (Korea Bizwire) — The formerly 11-piece girl band I.O.I will be reinstated as a nine-member group to release a new album in October, a music label said Monday. The new album, set for release in October, will be the first music release by I.O.I since the project group’s official disbandment two and [...]