What The Kpop is back with another exclusive interview with KARD, along with a review of their dynamic concert!
On July 21st, less than a year since their last visit, the powerhouse co-ed group returned to Atlanta for the third time. KARD performed at the Coca-Cola Roxy as part of the quartet’s “2023 PLAYGROUND WORLD TOUR” which kicked off in Mexico earlier that month.
The U.S. leg of the tour saw them visit nine different cities, a testament to KARD’s enduring international popularity thanks to hit songs such as “Bomb Bomb,” “Don’t Recall,” “Oh NaNa” and many more.
Debuting in 2017, the DSP Media group gained an immense following for their Latin-inspired music style, amazing choreography, and the unique chemistry between members BM, Somin, Jiwoo and J.Seph both on and off the stage.
After holding an interview with the popular group, What The Kpop was able to attend the Atlanta show where we saw the action go down first-hand from the floor!
Fans went wild as the opening VCR played and lights flashed to finally reveal the group onstage. As the first notes of “ICKY” played, the sound of the crowd became deafening as they cheered. Despite it being the group’s newest song, the fans all began to sing along to every word without missing a beat. As the beat dropped on the chorus, the entire crowd began to bounce and dance. It soon became evident the energy wouldn’t let up for the rest of the night.
KARD went on to perform songs like “Without You,” “Rumor,” “GUNSHOT,” and “Bomb Bomb.” Throughout the evening, fans hyped up the group unfailingly. “I love Atlanta!” BM said multiple times as he and the other members waved and cheered. Fans screamed to him messages of support and often yelled slightly risqué comments which would have made other idols blush, but he took it in stride and just laughed it off. When the entire crowd began chanting one particular thing to him, he and the other members just laughed in disbelief and danced along as they encouraged the crowds to chant it even louder, showing once more why American fans love KARD’s open personalities and fun-loving behavior.
The members all showed solo stage moments and collaborations as well, giving fans a glimpse of their individual talents like dancing, singing, and rapping. It’s evident that the artists are never eager to take the spotlight from each other and are willing to share the stage evenly, something that makes them work so well together.
All of the members of KARD continued to show great fan service through their interaction with the crowd, reading fans’ signs, sending hearts and winks to the audience, talking and chatting like they were friends, and seeming to have a genuinely great time onstage.
As the night culminated with the tracks “Cake” and “Dumb Litty,” the crowd truly went wild as Atlanta fans are known to do, showing their passion and enthusiasm that helped KARD respond with even more energy onstage. For the encore, KARD performed “Ride on the Wind” and “GO BABY” before rocking out once more to “ICKY.”
If you couldn’t make it to the concert, don’t worry! WTK has you covered. Read below to see what KARD had to say in our exclusive interview that took place before KARD’s performance.
WTK: Welcome back to Atlanta! To start off, is there anything you would like to say to your Atlanta fans?
Jiwoo: This is our third time performing in Atlanta, and I hope a lot of people will enjoy it.
BM: Also, I heard “swag surfing” is really trending here, and I want to try that with everyone today. It looks like it would be fun.
Jiwoo: I don’t think the interviewer knows what that is. (Laughs)
BM: “Swag surfing” is when you have a big crowd, [who then] all put their arms around each other and just wave left to right to the beat. So, I am really excited to see that.
WTK: You made your comeback this summer with “ICKY,” which was co-written by BM and J.Seph. Can you tell us what inspired this song and concept?
J.Seph: I actually didn’t compose the song, I just wrote the lyrics. Personally, when I write lyrics, I like writing from lines in the guidebook. So, where I get inspiration from is just from the guidebook since I really like it. (Laughs)
WTK: So generally speaking, you tend to write lyrics from starting by looking at the guidebook?
BM: We start based on the demo. The instrumentals [for “ICKY”] just from the demo were really good. The song was in a female vocal key, but J.Seph wanted to retain the integrity of the song, so he wrote his lyrics [in the same way] as the demo. For me, I think I got a lot of inspiration just from what we thought the next direction of KARD should be, which was [to] push the boundaries a little bit with lyrics and performance. [To create] a bit more mature and sexier vibe, because one, we’re all of age now. We’re not young anymore, you know, so the type of music we want to put out, we do want to make it age-appropriate for us. We’re also aging with our fans as well, and being that we’re on our sixth year now, I think it’s kind of an appropriate time to start spicing up our music.
WTK: This was your sixth mini-album to be released and all of the members participated in writing lyrics or composing for this album. When you have four members with such distinct styles and personalities, how do you all work together to make sure you are all represented well in the music and vibe of the album?
Somin: Are you referring to our duets?
BM: He means for the [whole] mini-album, but I think our personalities come out in our lyrics. I think a lot of our styles and our direction with music individually comes a lot from our interests in music, our preferences on what we listen to [most] often, the message we want to portray [through the song], and what is right for our [voice] tones as well. So, I think I can speak out for the members when I say they cater to themselves and also to each other, in that sense. So, for example, Jiwoo and Somin are both vocalists. Jiwoo is more on the minor range [while] Somin is more on the major range. So, when we’re building top lines, we kind of focus on that, yeah.
WTK: Now that you have been together with your group and label for several years, is the process of producing an album becoming easier? What was the biggest challenge of making this new album?
Somin: There were actually surprisingly hardly any difficulties at all in making this new album, [as] we all tend to have similar opinions. It is true we sometimes do have disagreements, but our company actually didn’t like the song we chose for the title track and wanted to go with a different song [instead]. However, we voiced our strong desire together to use [“ICKY”] as our title song. After fighting quite a bit for it, we ended up using it as our title [track].
WTK: So, it has naturally gotten easier over time for all of you to work together in the song writing and composition process?
Somin: After putting together our title song, the process has definitely gotten easier.
WTK: Besides music itself, what things in life inspire you when it comes to writing music?
J.Seph: I get inspired by pretty words. So, if there is a pretty word in a film or TV show, then I can be inspired by that. If I just hear a word in my daily life, then it works the same way. I receive a lot of inspiration from just words.
WTK: Some people might say that KARD being a co-ed group is what makes them distinct, but what is it about KARD that you personally think sets you apart from other K-pop groups?
Jiwoo: From different hip-hop groups?
WTK: Just in general, if you were to compare yourself to other groups, what do you think makes you different?
BM: Apart from co-ed groups?
WTK: Yes, exactly.
BM: First off, even though there are a lot of both boy groups and girl groups with similar tones as us, I think those tones have different characteristics. I think we are a group with an exact time that can make colorful music.
Somin: I think we are unique in our voice tone. Even though each of the four members’ voices certainly are very different from each other, I think all of our voices sounding like one voice as KARD is something a lot of people love.
WTK: I agree. Even though KARD is a co-ed group, I get the feeling of your voices sounding as one while listening to your songs.
KARD: Thank you!
WTK: Are there any countries that you haven’t been able to visit yet on tour that you would like to travel to?
Jiwoo: I have wanted to go to Turkey for a while now. I’ve heard we have a lot of fans there and we haven’t had a chance to go yet. So, I would like to go and spend some time there. We’ve been to Europe a lot, but still have not gone to Sweden or Poland. I would like to meet our fans in those countries.
WTK: I’ve heard there’s a lot to see in both of those countries.
KARD: (Laughs)
WTK: So, now it is time to ask some fun questions! Would you guys ever consider getting matching tattoos?
Jiwoo: Matching tattoos?
WTK: Yes, as in would you all get the same tattoo?
Somin: Ah, all four of us? We originally thought of getting tattoos, but when did we decide we wanted to do that?
Jiwoo: We thought [about] getting tattoos for our seventh debut anniversary around three and a half years ago, but that’s already happened and we haven’t gotten them yet. (Laughs)
WTK: So, now you guys haven’t given any more thought to it?
Jiwoo: We were planning at the time to get tattoos for our seven-year anniversary since [at that time] it was halfway until then, but upon that time coming, we realized time flew by quicker than we were expecting. We realized we weren’t prepared at all to get [matching] tattoos, and especially since we have some members who have tattoos and some who do not, we haven’t gotten a chance to discuss as to what we’d like to do.
Somin: I think we would have to give a lot of thought to the tattoo design first.
WTK: What is your biggest “ick” (pet peeve) about the other members?
Somin: I don’t think there are any.
WTK: If you could describe the other members in only one word, what would you say?
BM: One by one?
WTK: You can just describe the person sitting beside you.
Somin: J.Seph oppa, how would you like to do it?
J.Seph: Is it you describing me? You can do it. Is it not you describing me?
WTK: How would you describe Somin in one word?
J.Seph: She has a bling-bling charm.
Somin: I would like to say BM has worked really hard. He always puts his passion into each KARD album and there’s a lot of things which I’m thankful to him for. (Turns towards BM) You’ve worked hard.
BM: Thank you.
BM: Unique. In one word, I would say Jiwoo is unique.
Jiwoo: I already wanted to say this to him earlier, but I think J.Seph is a person who doesn’t need language to express himself. Of course, Korean fans understand him, but I think he has a way of having international fans understand him even without translation. I think that’s quite amazing.
WTK: What’s your favorite song to play when driving or riding in the car late at night?
Jiwoo: I have never driven at night. (Laughs)
WTK: Do you not have a license?
Jiwoo: I do, but [I] don’t have a car right now.
Somin: I listen to SZA’s music a lot.
WTK: Which song?
Somin: I like “Kill Bill.”
WTK: If you could switch credit cards with another member for one day and go on a shopping spree, who would it be?
BM: Jiwoo.
Jiwoo: I don’t have a credit card though.
BM: How about with a debit card then?
Jiwoo: Debit card? Why?
BM: Because the things I would buy are really expensive. (Laughs)
Jiwoo: … What in the world? (Laughs)
WTK: Would you rather have someone read your thoughts or read your browser history (including the ones in incognito mode)?
Jiwoo: I pick my internet search history.
Somin: I also think it would be better to choose internet search history.
BM: Jiwoo probably has some bad stuff in her search history.
Jiwoo: Why mine? What weird stuff could I possibly be watching? I just look up the same things and watch the same stuff on YouTube.
BM: Same here
J.Seph: For me, it’d be better to choose internet search history. Someone reading my internet search history would be better than reading my thoughts. I just really don’t want anyone reading my thoughts at all!
KARD: (Laughs)
WTK: You’ve traveled around the world so much as in-demand artists. What is one location or tourist spot you have visited that stood out to you the most and what made it so special?
BM: Right now, I think it’s the U.S. We’ve happily toured here in the past, [so] a lot of people here know us, and we get a really good feeling when we’re here. Actually, since we are building up more and more experiences whenever we go on tour, it makes us feel good and makes us want to show a good side of ourselves to our fans.
Somin: While we were touring, we went to Costa Rica for the first time. There were so many Hidden KARDs there, and it seemed like [they] had a lot of fun watching our performance, so I think that was particularly memorable.
WTK: What is the strangest or most bizarre experience that you have ever had as a group together?
Jiwoo: One unique experience, rather than it being bizarre, was when we appeared on a TV program in New York. We had been on different programs before in other countries which a lot of people had seen. [However] what was amazing [about this program] was that a close friend of mine who lived in New York knew about [it] and so did his friends. I thought that was a rather unique experience.
WTK: What is your favorite song to perform on tour?
BM: “Cake”!
Jiwoo: I’m excited to perform “Cake” [too]. Actually, I’m nervous about performing [it] because I think to myself that I have to show the fun qualities of this song while dancing. However, what is exciting about it is that quite a lot of fans who come to our show are looking forward to seeing us perform “Cake” specifically, so I’m very excited to see how their reactions will be.
WTK: So, now we will go to individual questions! J.Seph fans want to know if you will start a YouTube channel and blog about food?
BM: Food?
J.Seph: I have filmed content for that, but it has not been edited yet since our company does not have a video editor.
Jiwoo: That’s right, you’ve only done the filming for it, but it’s because we don’t have a video editor yet.
BM: Email DSP and tell them to hurry up and get an editor, please. (Laughs)
WTK: Jiwoo, fans want to know where you are learning and practicing your English from these days? Are there any other languages you want to learn?
Jiwoo: Recently, I’ve thought to myself that I need to study English again in detail because I actually haven’t been able to communicate with fans while using the Bubble private messaging app since I forgot a lot of my English. I want to study and improve because I want to be able to convey what I’m thinking to our fans without interpretation. I am studying right now via a learning app, but I’m still just at the kindergarten level. I’m mad that I’m only at this level. (Laughs)
WTK: Somin, fans want to know if you have any hidden hobbies they don’t know about? If not, are there any that you would like to pick up in the future?
Somin: (Laughs) I would like to tell you all, but [I] don’t have any new hobbies at the moment. If I try any fun and interesting hobbies later on, then I will definitely let our fans know.
WTK: BM, what is your dream collaboration outside of music? (For example, it could be collaborating with a person, a brand, a channel, a company to design jewelry/clothes, or even a non-profit organization or charity, etc.)
BM: I think right now I’m starting to get into furniture a little bit. Furniture is very interesting to me, and not just regular furniture [that] you would see in a regular place, but very artistic, very different types of furniture. Something that just started piquing my interest is art, [and] creating something [new] with something that’s already there, right? I think furniture is the same way and furniture is interesting. I’d love to collaborate with a brand that I like. I don’t know yet specifically what I’d want to do and who I’d want to do it with yet. [However], being that I’m always looking at things and trying to see various things in an artistic light, whether it be clothes, fashion, furniture, street art [or] music, [then] something is going to come up. [So], when it does, I’d like to be in a place where I can creatively give direction and create something beautiful for the fans to see.
WTK: Any final thoughts for all of these fans here in Atlanta, as well as the other fans who will be reading this interview?
BM: We want to thank you guys for taking the time out to read this article, first and foremost. We’re here in America touring, hitting nine cities. [Currently] we’re here in Atlanta, Georgia awaiting our show and we just can’t wait to meet our fans. If this is your first-time hearing about us, get to know us. KARD is a fun group who has a lot of good tracks, so stick around!
WTK: This concludes the interview, and thank you so much!
KARD: Thank you!
KARD will be heading back out on the European leg of their “2023 PLAYGROUND WORLD TOUR” on August 30th. They will be performing across five major cities in Europe including Budapest, Madrid, Frankfurt, London and Paris. Tickets for all five concerts are available from the organizer Official K-Events webpage here.
In the meantime, make sure to check out KARD’s latest release “ICKY” which is available now on all streaming platforms. Also, be sure to watch the music video here.
To keep up to date with all things KARD, follow them on Twitter, Instagram, YouTube and their official website.
Special thanks to KARD, MyMusicTaste and TREND PR for helping make this interview possible. As always, we had a lot of fun with KARD and they were very generous with their time. We hope to meet for another chat sometime soon. We wish them every success with their future plans!
Were you able to see KARD in Atlanta? Did you see them on another stop on their U.S. tour? Did any of the info in this interview surprise you? Let us know your thoughts by tweeting to us @whatthekpop1 or commenting on our Facebook or Instagram!
MEDIA: What The Kpop
Photography: Angel Escobar
Translator: Zach Bagley
Review: Amy Leigh
Chief Editor: Justin Esposito
*This interview may have been edited for clarity.