[INTERVIEW] 120605 - EXO-K "Our charm is that you can't escape it?"

[INTERVIEW] 120605 - EXO-K "Our charm is that you can't escape it?"

The 6 boys coming from outer space, EXO-K “We want to surpass SM seniors”

As SM’s new boygroup EXO’s debut became known, they were in the middle of hot reactions. The fans and of course the people working in the music industry had an explosive interest as to what kind of image will have the new idol group from

‘Idol House’ SM, 4 years after SHINee.

Even EXO’s appearance was uncommon. As opposed to the standard idol group’s promotions where the members are revealed gradually after revealing the group’s name, after announcing EXO’s debut, the members got revealed intermittently. After revealing first Kai’s picture, the members didn’t get revealed one by one, the EXO members’ solo and group pictures and teasers got released irregularly and variously. From the EXO members’ first appearance to their debut stage, the showcase, the debut countdown was exactly at 100 days. During the same length of time a bear becomes human by eating garlic and wormwood (T/N: Dangun myth), EXO grew fast while eating teasers and pictures. Following the teens’ heroes, the idols’ legend, the gods rising from the East, the music industry’s super boys and the shining boys, SM’s new future are these boys with superpowers coming from outer space. They divided into K and M to conquer the Earth.

We met first EXO-K who start the Earth conquering project by debuting in the Korean music industry. Kai, Suho, Baekhyun, Chanyeol, Sehun, D.O are the 6 members forming EXO-K who splendidly debuted with their debut song ‘MAMA’. The 6 boys from outer space each (believe that they) have superpowers. Kai has the teleportation, Sehun has the wind, Suho has the water, Baekhyun has the light, Chanyeol has the fire, D.O has the strength; these are their superpowers.

When we asked them if it was making them cringe, EXO stared at us with big eyes. Suho showed a leader-like mature attitude, “You can see it as childish and like a joke. But I’m proud of it”. Kai nodded “I’m really confident. You may not believe it but we really have superpowers”. As people who have superpowers too, aren’t they envious of other members’ superpower? Kai said “I like my superpower too but I’m envious of M’s Tao’s power to stop time. He can sleep at leisure and turn back time to do even better on music broadcast”, and Baekhyun laughed, “I want to have M’s Luhan’s telekinesis. Because everything is tiresome, I want to lay down and move things”.

SM’s new boygroup who is receiving attention, EXO, frankly confessed that they felt pressured at the thought of following in their seniors’ (DBSK, Super Junior, SHINee, etc) footsteps as they went passed Asia and dominate the world.

“Of course, we are pressured. Our seniors opened the path well, so we’re pressured about whether we’ll be able to live up to expectations. And I think that the expectations about us raised a lot due to the long period that was our 100 days promotion. It was of course very worrying. But I think that we really worked as hard as the expectations about us went high.”(Chanyeol)

“Of course we would have pressure. We were also worrying as the first rookies after a while from this company, about whether we would be able to do well like our other seniors. We hope we can become the best like our seniors (laughs). Since all of our seniors got the rookie award, we feel like we have to get it too… We want to surpass our seniors’ popularity(laughs).”(Sehun)

SM senior groups also have a big interest in the first junior group after a long time.On KBS 2TV ‘Music Bank”s location, we saw SHINee’s warm image, monitoring EXO-K members’ stage really carefully and giving them advices.

Chanyeol told us overwhelmingly, “After our first broadcast on ‘Inkigayo’, U-Know Yunho senior called us. At that time he was in Japan to do a concert at the Tokyo Dome, but he still monitored our first broadcast and even called us after” and “We put on the speaker phone in the practice room and listened to him all together. He gave advices to each member in detail, it was really touching”.

Right now they’re separated, but EXO-M who are promoting busily in China are like family to EXO-K, and are the same team as them. When we asked to EXO-K what meant EXO-M to them, they replied quite seriously.

“Brothers? We think of them as the other ‘us’. Since we’re originally one team. Should we say it as us reflected in the water or in a mirror? Right now we’re both doing our work in Korea and China but we think we can show an even better stage if we reunite all together.”

Aside from Chen and Xiumin, EXO-M is formed only by Chinese members, but EXO-K said they couldn’t even feel the language barrier at all. The members said, “Since there are Chinese members we have to improve our Chinese but they really speak Korean well” and burst in laughter adding “It’s to the extent that we are learning Korean (T/N: from them)”.

“K and M use different languages, but the visual and the feeling are different as well. The song’s tone and the performance are a bit different too. If you listen to K’s music and M’s music, even if it’s the same song, the feeling is really different. Even if we’re from the same team, we have totally different charms, I think this is the strength that only EXO has.” (Suho)

In 2012, there’s a flooding of boygroups appearing in the music industry. Among so many male idol group, we asked what was the weapon that only EXO had to aim for the #1 spot. Baekhyun explained “I think that our biggest strength is that K and M have one song and are promoting at the same time with different languages”. Chanyeol said “If you look at most of the idol groups, they just have one visual member, but our trap is that EXO-K’s 6 members are all visual members” and with a strong stare “It’s an ant lion’s pit. You can’t escape” making everyone laugh out loud on the interview set.

“Anyway, this year’s goal is to first win the rookie award. EXO-K will keep on working hard. We will show you an even better image to repay you for the great love you gave us. And we will become modest EXO-K. We will become a polite great group that won’t lose its main goal.”

The 6 boys who flew from outerspace are full of spirit and already started to conquer the Korean music industry. The fangirls fell in EXO-K’s 6 boys’ fatal trap. ‘The history that the 6 boys are going to make’ starts now on this ‘planet called Earth’.

source: joynewstranslation

cr; emilie @ exok-trans v.facebook