Sechs Kies come back with all-time hit remake
Sechs Kies, a popular boy band of the late 1990s to early 2000s, returned with a new album “2016 Re-ALBUM” under the management of YG Entertainment. The group was formed by Daesung Entertainment, now called DSP Entertainment, in 1997 and disbanded in 2000. They received much attention along with first generation idol groups, such as H.O.T., S.E.S, and Fin.K.L.
The veteran acts’ new album consists of re-arranged music of their all-time hit songs like “Couple,” “Road Fighter,” “Reckless Love,” and Come to Me Baby.” YG Entertainment’s rapper Tablo and producer Future Bounce participated in re-recording and re-mastering Sechs Kies’ 10 best songs from before, plus a bonus track “Three Words.” The group tried to keep their original music style and identity by keeping the melody alive but YG producers gave a small twist in re-arranging the music to better suit it with the recent trend of K-pop music.
Sechs Kies said they hope their remake album can be a gift to their old devoted fans who are now in their late 30s or 40s, and will become a chance for new fans to get to know about their hit songs of the past. Q Why did you choose Couple as the title track of the remake album?
A Eun Ji-won: It is one of our best songs that represent us well and we expect this song can help us get our old fans back. At the same time, the song can play a bridging role between our fans of the past and the present. During our concert with Infinite Challenge recently, we learned that young fans love the song Couple a lot, so we decided then to make it a title track if we return.
Kang Sung-hoon: Also Couple is a winter song and it suits the end-of-year theme. Q Did you miss the old times while re-recording your old songs?
A Eun Ji-won: We did not weep for sure, but singing our old songs is comfortable and pleasant at the same time. The newly arranged songs contain their original melodies as we intended to make them not so different from the old versions but the still come as new to us.
Kang Sung-hoon: We recorded songs in a very harmonious atmosphere. Before, we had songwriters coaching us and directing us to sing in certain ways under a strict and scary atmosphere. Now, people respect each other — especially Tablo was very nice and Future Bounce only gave us compliments while we were recording.
Eun Ji-won: In the case of Re-ALBUM, the producers left all the recording up to us as they said we should have a better understanding of our old hit-songs. Q Many expected Sechs Kies to return with new songs, but you returned a remake album. Was there a reason for this?
A Kang Sung-hoon: Every output comes with consequences and there can be different opinions. There is no concrete answer. We just prepared this album as an end-of-the-year gift and we will present new songs next year as part of an event to celebrate the 20th anniversary of our debut.
Eun Ji-won: We hope our fans take this album as an extension of our new album to be released next year. We wanted this album to play a bridging role between old fans and new and for those who wanted new songs from us, they will be ready soon. Q Did you feel a burden to top the music charts?
A Eun Ji-won: We did not expect our album to top the charts and it did not become too much of a burden. Instead, we were rather careful that our remake songs would be different for our old fans who still like the original version. Q What is the main difference between your old fans and new fans?
A Kang Sung-hoon: We are just curious why the young fans like us. We are old. One big change we catch are the cheering tools. Before, it was balloons and raincoats were the big items but now fans use plastic bars glowing in the dark.
Kim Jae-duck: I want to shake hands with fans and talk to them, but the fans are sofar away and busy taking photos. Also, we had fans waiting in front of our houses before, but we don’t see any of that nowadays. Fans show more etiquette than they did in the past. Q What does it mean for Sechs Kies to return?
A Eun Ji-won: We are trying to reach what we feel we could have achieved in the past. The contents for idol groups become more diverse and we want to try them all. If idol groups have strong images for only being active for a short period of time in the past, recent boy bands stay alive much longer now. BIGBANG just celebrated its 10th anniversary of debut. We want to perform as long as possible, maybe until we reach our 50s.