A longtime image of affection, magnificence and longevity, the camellia has made its mark on popular culture as Coco Chanel’s signature flower, educating an essential lesson about prejudice in To Kill a Mockingbird and, for MIN and her grandmother, the floral represents the Okay-pop star herself.
“Every time it blooms, she all the time will get so excited,” MIN says of the sometimes-fickle flowers her grandma grows. “She says, ‘Min-young, you’re going to be just like the flower that has bloomed! You’re going to take action effectively.’ She all the time tells me that.”
As July marks 14 years since she and her lady group miss A debuted with the moment Okay-pop chart-topper “Unhealthy Woman Good Woman,” MIN may appear previous the purpose of needing such encouragement (regardless of how lovely). However on her thirty third birthday as we speak, June 21, the Seoul native is releasing her first-ever full venture with Prime Time. The four-track EP doesn’t simply take its title from the genre-shifting title monitor however acts as a layered mantra.
“On the floor degree, it’s saying that is my ‘Prime Time’ and also you don’t get to decide on when my prime time is — nobody will get to inform me when my prime time is,” she explains in her longest-ranging interview in years. “Internally, I’ve felt like I used to be very repressed in a method that I didn’t actually know I used to be repressed: I didn’t converse my thoughts, give an opinion or say my fact. I all the time felt like I needed to take heed to my elders and business higher-up individuals who received to choose my time or select what I do.”
Dressed as we speak in cozy, outsized sweats contained in the consolation of I LOVE DANCE‘s Manhattan studio the place she incessantly rehearses, guest-teaches courses, and, ultimately, discovered a music and manufacturing crew within the newly shaped Monstar Leisure, MIN (born Lee Minyoung) has a delicate, humble quietness to her regardless of spending most of her life entertaining. After engaged on South Korean youngsters’s tv and becoming a member of Okay-pop company JYP Leisure in center faculty, a teenage MIN moved to New York for an meant worldwide solo profession that included mentorship from Lil Jon. After years of prep, inside plans on the firm modified and she or he was launched to her future band mates Fei, Jia and Suzy months earlier than they’d debut as miss A, the primary lady group to return from JYP after its Marvel Ladies grew to become the primary Okay-pop act to interrupt into the Sizzling 100.
“I met Jia and Fei as soon as once I got here to Korea from America, however that was it,” MIN remembers. “After three months, we have been collectively 24-7. It was exhausting, very exhausting…I used to be underneath a whole lot of stress to achieve success and be on the identical degree in the case of music and publicity as your rivals; I needed to hit the highest spot each time.”
Whereas “Unhealthy Woman Good Woman” kicked off the quartet’s five-year string of consecutive High 10 singles in Korea (together with 5 High 10s on Billboard‘s World Digital Tune Gross sales chart), miss A launched much less incessantly by its third 12 months because the members’ careers took off down non-musical roads like appearing, tv, internet hosting and modeling, whereas Chinese language members Jia and Fei balanced alternatives in Korea and their residence nation. MIN booked selection tv and film roles, however her authentic intentions for solo music appeared incompatible with the fast-paced Okay-pop scene and a quickly rising JYP Leisure.
“I’ve such a giant respect for JYP and we nonetheless speak,” she says of the corporate’s founder and namesake who additionally produces music for his acts. “There are lots of people working for one group and I’m one of many artists. It isn’t that my opinion doesn’t matter — we listened to everybody’s opinion to determine something — but it surely additionally relies upon perhaps how a lot cash you make for the corporate after which individuals would possibly take heed to you and your opinion would matter extra. It’s a giant enterprise with lots of people needing to be paid…and perhaps for some individuals, it’s only a job. However for artists, it’s their life. It’s my life — giving 14, 15 years of my life. I’ve needed to launch solo [music], but it surely didn’t match and didn’t occur.”
To encourage extra miss A music and group actions, MIN discovered herself within the “peacemaker” position amongst her band mates across the band’s fifth 12 months. “I consider that I attempted my finest at the moment,” she displays. “However I feel that was already too late to take that position on or to make everybody completely happy.”
Certainly, earlier than its fifth anniversary, miss A launched what could be its remaining album, Colours, in March 2015. Whereas the EP grew to become the quartet’s highest- and longest-charting entry on World Albums, gossip relating to discord between the members started affecting its fanbase, and extreme media hypothesis led a younger MIN to want she had been extra image-conscious.
“I didn’t perceive the followers’ need for us to be finest pals,” MIN admits. “I feel everybody needs that to be true, however I feel it’s simply very unfair. If I understood that, I feel I might’ve acted in another way. I used to be simply younger and really feel like I ought to’ve thought forward. It’s scary to be in entrance of individuals and on digicam, and I might have acted smarter.”
Regardless of being characterised as miss A’s spunky essential dancer, usually rocking a jagged bob and exhibiting heel-over-head flexibility in music movies, MIN says she started battling excessive ranges of self-doubt and nervousness close to the act’s third or fourth 12 months. On the time, psychological well being assets and utilizing social media for direct fan communication have been removed from the place they stand as we speak in Okay-pop, permitting for rumors and nameless trolls to run amok relating to the group.
“Simply because I may dance and look sturdy doesn’t imply I can take or deal with all of the unhealthy sides of the business,” she says matter-of-factly. “The whole lot that we have been and we did was totally underneath management, so I really feel like lots of people see me in a sure method. Issues have been extra based mostly on ‘the picture,’ however I wasn’t a robust particular person, so I might get damage by feedback and on-line bullying — it simply haunted me daily.
“I don’t actually have a look at my stuff on-line. I all the time ask my pals if there are good [comments] that will cheer me up for my psychological well being and they’d screenshot the great ones. However again then, naturally, I might perhaps scroll down and see a foul remark, and I simply couldn’t fall asleep. Wherever I used to be in public, I began to really feel like, ‘Oh, perhaps that particular person was considering that.’ I felt my persona grow to be very small and guarded…I nonetheless wrestle with sure issues and sure feedback. In a method, I really feel like I’m villainized, you understand? It’s very unfair and unhappy, however I don’t wish to dwell previously and I don’t wish to drag anybody down; that’s not me.”
By the top of 2017, MIN’s contract with JYP ended, and the corporate introduced Miss A’s disbandment. Whereas contemplating gives from new businesses, she “blocked each communication” and hid in her grandmother’s residence as a protected house. She practically signed on to affix a Okay-pop survival present for idols rebooting their careers, however her grandma suggested towards it.
“I feel I might’ve burnt out,” she remembers. “I simply was not able to face the world after my contract ended with JYP. I used to be in a extremely darkish place; I used to be simply scared to be outdoors and even be seen in public. I simply had a lot nervousness, so if I wasn’t seen then I may keep away from all of that pressure.”
Years later, MIN slowly returned to the highlight with a brand new, noticeably un-idol-like perspective heard on singles like 2021’s “Onion” (with lyrics like, “I smoke, I drink, I get nasty with me/ Soiled, totally different and messy/ Affected person, assured, weary/ Child, there are layers to me”) and returned to New York (to co-star within the musical KPOP on Broadway in late 2022) settling in along with her pet pomeranian Dan-chu. She credit town partially to her music comeback.
“It’s a hustle; everybody’s hustling,” she muses of NYC. “I simply get that vibe and vitality within the metropolis and of the individuals. Nobody cares if you happen to’re a f-cking Okay-pop idol. Nobody cares if you happen to’re no matter.”
Liberating herself of out of doors expectations and reconnecting along with her love of music and dance in New York translated into the Prime Time album the place MIN says she has the liberty to return to, in addition to break free from, her picture in miss A.
MIN’s comeback single “PRIME TIME,” that includes rapper Lil Cherry (who enlisted MIN on an experimental album reduce in 2022), purposely opens with a knocking, tougher hip-hop opening as a callback to her miss A days. Her hovering belt hops right into a Jersey membership beat earlier than all of it will get mashed right into a glitchy, glittery, gutsy refrain.
“No one’s telling me that I’ve to place out my album by a sure time or be a sure weight by a sure date,” she says that doubles as an anthem towards stereotypes and pretenses within the Okay-pop business.
“I felt like I’m an outdated particular person, however I’m not an outdated particular person!” she laughs. “The typical age is so younger, particularly within the idol world, so that you breathe in that air and understand it like that…however I’m simply doing this as a result of I wish to and I feel now could be a time that I can totally [use] my potential to the fullest with out caring an excessive amount of of anybody’s calls for — it’s on my phrases.”
Listening by way of the EP, “SHIMMY (Skip)” shrewdly makes use of a Korean playground track as a foundation for setting boundaries (“I may be something, you may’t inform me what to sing”) whereas the breezy, easy-listening pop of “M.A.W” (standing for “Would possibly as Properly”) is a private motto for each her and her grandmother — who closes the EP with a shock, uplifting voice recording on “HAPPY PLANT (A Name From Grandma).”
“She’s my position mannequin,” MIN is certain so as to add. “Every time I needed to make a giant resolution, I all the time go to her and ask her opinion. She would say, ‘Would possibly as effectively simply do it.’” Whereas Grandma is worked up about her granddaughter’s music (“She’s simply so completely happy for me”), MIN additionally needs to ensure listeners perceive that the boldness in Prime Time outcomes from not letting the surface world crush what and who she loves on the within.
“I wish to give people who find themselves within the hardest second of their life a message of hope and encouragement,” she says. “I really feel like I may relate to them as a result of there have been so many ups and downs in my life as effectively. I need individuals to know that it’s okay and also you don’t have to surrender in your life. Don’t. As a result of there may be somebody that loves you.”
The ultimate seconds of the EP echo simply that: MIN’s sunny chuckle and her grandmother’s heat rasp ending “Name From Grandma,” telling one another that they love each other.