This story is a part of Billboard‘s Ok-Pop Situation.
After taking off on TikTok, FIFTY FIFTY’s second single, “Cupid,” cracked the Billboard Sizzling 100 in March. It shocked many within the Ok-pop scene — not simply because the quartet was solely 4 months into its profession and had 18.9 million official U.S. on-demand music streams on the time, in keeping with Luminate (however now boast over 44.7 million U.S. streams and 195 million official international on-demand streams), however as a result of it’s the primary group to debut beneath ATTRAKT Inventive Content material Group.
The corporate calls its newcomer standing a bonus. “We’re a small crew that advantages from attaining sooner outcomes with extra versatile decision-making processes,” explains SIAHN, founder/CEO of The Givers, a artistic Ok-pop consulting agency that additionally manages FIFTY FIFTY alongside ATTRAKT. “Not like conventional Ok-pop firms, we strategy our artists with flexibility and private communication, leading to extra genuine and pure performances from the women. Our streamlined communication construction is one thing that bigger firms typically lack resulting from their advanced organizational hierarchies.”
FIFTY FIFTY’s identify references its complementary types on every launch. Debut EP THE FIFTY included the hard-hitting girl-power anthem “Log In” and dreamy, R&B-pop love music “Larger,” whereas the Korean model of “Cupid” had a rap to attract in Ok-pop followers in addition to a rap-less English model serviced to worldwide audiences.
Members Saena, Keena, Sio and Aran (who vary from 18 to twenty in age) wish to continue to grow and “broaden our musical spectrum,” Aran says. To that finish, for the group, ATTRAKT is shying from the normal Ok-pop enterprise preparations that are likely to bind artists to their labels’ established modes of promotion and administration. “We plan to suggest a brand new label construction for FIFTY FIFTY — a separate label for them, solely concentrating on the artist’s improvement,” says SIAHN. “Ok-pop firms have an entrenched ‘artist-agency’ relationship, which poses a big impediment to an artist’s long-term international growth. To beat this persistent drawback, The Givers is exploring a construction the place the label instantly contracts with the artist whereas the principle producer oversees the artistic points of the group and collaborates with the label.”
LISTEN TO: “Cupid,” “Larger,” “Lovin’ Me,” “Log In”
This story initially appeared within the April 22, 2023, problem of Billboard.
