aespa: K-pop’s Newest Sensation

SM Entertainment's first girl group after 6 years, aespa, composed of four members Karina, Winter, Giselle (who is Japanese), and NingNing (who is Chinese) debuted on November 17th 2020. aespa’s debut was highly publicized, and rightfully so, since they come from one of the “Big Three” companies of K-pop. Usually, acts from these companies are extremely popular and easily make their name in the industry.

Their name is a combination of the words “avatar”, “experience” and “aspect”, stylising the merge with the letter “æ” and signifying meeting different aspects or avatars of oneself. This relates to their group in that they have AI-members and a lot of related lore throughout their music videos (more on this later).

Their debut has been very successful so far, breaking the record for most views in 24 hours for a debut song at 21.4 million views and peaking at #2 on Trending on Youtube. The overall reaction from listeners has been generally positive as well.

The Debut

The group's debut track, "Black Mamba," was described by Korean pop-culture blog Soompi as “a powerful dance song with a signature synth sound and a strong bass” and as having “a catchy hook that resembles the chanting of a spell.” The first part is certainly true. The song is probably the literal definition of popular girl group music in K-pop right now, leaning towards a girl-crush sound and aesthetic. It is nothing groundbreaking or innovative, but it’s certainly catchy.

As for the second part of the description, in my opinion, the hook isn’t like the chanting of a spell. The hook is essentially them singing “Aya ya ya ya”, and if anything it sounds like a battle cry. I personally love the song though, it’s an absolute banger. The drop in the chorus hits hard and the pre chorus develops it nicely. The choreography is amazing as well, maintaining the quirky image that aespa seems to aim for. My personal favorite is the last chorus choreography.

The music video has a very bright, video game aesthetic, which complements the song nicely, too. The camerawork during the chorus has been immensely praised, as well. The part from when the CGI snake bites towards the screen until the scene where the beat drops after complete silence (timestamp: 1:43 - 2:06) is one of the best sections, in my opinion.

There is a lot going on, and the whole thing is very auditorily and visually engaging- it’s almost like an overload. The aesthetics even completely change at certain points (refer to aforementioned timestamp), however this is K-pop, and so that is not very surprising.

Now interestingly, the hook sounding like a battle cry fits in perfectly with the music video since they are trying to fight off an antagonist. Through the lyrics and video, they are talking about a villain named “Black Mamba'' who is wandering in their world and preventing the connection between AI members and the real life members, and is corrupting all of them. The song is a very story heavy one that begins a long line of lore that will add to the story aespa is trying to tell, and will also connect to other artists under SM Entertainment.

Anyway, SM’s founder stated “there are artist members of aespa who exist in the real world as well as avatar members who exist in the virtual world,” adding on that “the avatars had existed all along in a world of their own, and one day, they met the real world members of aespa.” At that point, it seemed like the AI members were only going to be used for their storyline, however, as revealed in one of their many teasers, it seems like there is much more to aespa’s virtual members. It seems like they will be used in the story, as well as for special performances of songs, concerts at home, joining Instagram lives for added fan interaction, etc. All of this connects back to SM’s rumoured upcoming app named “SYNK”. It seems like the app will be a way to do all of the latter activities, as well as to serve lore purposes (many lyrics in “Black Mamba” reference SYNK as a way to communicate with their counterparts, such as “From some time ago you SYNK out”) just like the AIs.

The fact that the AI are based on the members of aespa themselves causes unease for many though. People are worried that the unrealistic body proportions of the virtual avatars will eventually degrade the mental health of the idols they are based on, and increase the normalization of unhealthy beauty standards in Korea. They feel that humans were replaced by AI for the aforementioned benefits, with the company using the storyline as a scapegoat. On the other side of the spectrum, lots of fans are quite excited about the idea, justifying the characters’ bodies as being inspired by cartoons and video game characters. Regardless, exactly what SM has planned is still unknown, and we will have to see what develops as time progresses.

PLAGIARISM

There have also been certain plagiarism claims against the group already. Canadian photographer Brian Hyunh pointed out that the aespa teaser images were extremely similar to a photoshoot of his. It also doesn’t help aespa’s case that fans managed to find the exact same photo in their director’s Pinterest board. In the end, Bryan Hyunh clarified that he did not mind that they took inspiration from him but still wanted to have discussions with their company. It is unknown whether this occurred or not.

Another photographer and artist from Germany named Timo Helgert also noticed similarities between the music video for “Black Mamba” and his own works, including a garden in, as well as a snake slithering through a train. These are integral parts of the “Black Mamba” music video.

Furthermore, there has recently been a third claim of plagiarism. Visual artist Blake Kathryn noted the extreme similarities between one of her 3D renders, and one of aespa’s live performance sets. She also pointed out that she had long desired to work with K-pop artists, but “alas theft came first”. There has so far been no news of compensation or agreements between SM and Blake Kathryn.

I cannot condone the possible plagiarism though, despite Bryan Hyunh and Timo Helgert essentially not expressing much desire to take the issue further. Blake Kathryn did express interest in having discussions with SM Entertainment, but nothing of the sort has occurred yet. It confuses me how SM Entertainment, in spite of being one of K-pop’s biggest companies, thought it would get away with plagiarizing such prominent artists, that too for one of their biggest debuts. Hopefully this does not provide a green light for SM Entertainment to continue this, whether accidental or not. Nevertheless, I am super excited to see what aespa has to come in the future!

Overall, aespa has a lot of potential. They’ve already broken records, and even though their debut was pretty conventional, it was executed very well. The story is quite interesting and “Black Mamba” had a stunning music video, choreography, vocals, and is one of my favorite songs of the year.

All the members seem to be extremely talented as well. Regardless of opinion, one can’t deny that the AI members might not even entail all the possible negative effects since nothing has truly been confirmed. It may very well turn out in aespa’s favor since the fan-service and somewhat innovation in it all could definitely boost their success. Be that as it may, this was the perfect step for SM Entertainment into the 4th generation of K-pop, and despite my skepticism about the debut, they’ve definitely exceeded my expectations.