JUNNY, In Full Color
JUNNY, courtesy of mauve company.
It only took JUNNY five hours to decide he would uproot his life from Vancouver, Canada to move to Korea.
The decision came from a song buyout most singer-songwriters only dream of. Prior to this life-changing deal, JUNNY had composed and released music on his SoundCloud from his parent’s basement. When a freelance A&R agent contacted him to ask if she could try selling one of his songs to an idol in China, he didn’t think much of the proposal. But then she returned in disbelief: Not only had he succeeded in securing a buyer for the song, but the artist was Lu Han from EXO.
Quickly, JUNNY realized he had an opportunity to seize: Now was the time to move. He had three choices: Los Angeles, Toronto or Korea. But the decision felt easy.“It was a no-brainer [to move to Korea],” he told Eric Nam on the Daebak Show.
Nearly five years later, JUNNY is embarking on his first North American tour, titled “BLANC”, which is a testament that he made the right choice. The tour kicks off on September 4 in Los Angeles and will bring him home to Vancouver, before concluding on September 16 in Montreal. “BLANC” signifies a new era in JUNNY’s career, one where he’s embracing new sounds and concepts. “I’ve learned that it’s okay to make music that is bright and happy,” he told Eric and I can hear that most clearly on his latest track “Color Me”, featuring CHUNG HA, an absolute banger of a single that embodies brighter production and lyrics. But it’s also present in one of his best releases, “MOVIE”. “The ticket is still in my pocket,” he sings in the pre-chorus. “And the movie hasn’t even started. What a wonderful scene. I hope it lasts forever.”
Growing up in Vancouver, JUNNY developed a love of Korean music from his two older brothers. “They introduced me to a lot of Korean pop and the legends of Korea,” he told Eric. Together, the brothers would hang out in the family’s basement and sing the Korean classics on their karaoke machine.I love this image of a young JUNNY, hanging out late at night with his teenage brothers as they sing Korean tunes that are often heard in 노래방, or karaoke rooms in Korea. In this music JUNNY found a diaspora of customs and artistry that linked him to his identity as a Korean-Canadian.
Along with the gift of music, JUNNY’s brothers normalized becoming an artist to their parents. “I have to thank my brothers though because they did this too,” he reflected on the Daebak Show. “My oldest brother paints and illustrates and that’s not a traditional thing.” Most Korean parents, he said, want their kids to become doctors or lawyers but his brothers were different. “But [my brother] started that off being the oldest and he showed my parents that its possible to make a living on art. He made my parents a little more open minded.”
JUNNY started producing and writing music in high school, mostly after classes while strumming on his guitar. “I decided on music really early,” JUNNY said on GET REAL. “I graduated high school and I didn’t know what to do. But I love music. I love singing and since my brothers are doing what they like, I thought I’m gonna do music.” Originally he wanted to be a vocal coach so he found a community college with a specialized music program. In college, JUNNY was trained in how to produce and write music. One course in particular on music production changed his life.
“As soon as I took [that program], everything just opened up,” he shared. With some training and hard work, JUNNY found that he could take apart a song he loved and learn how to produce it himself. His world, he found, began to open up.
SoundCloud was a viable option to share the music he created. “As soon as I put the music on SoundCloud, I realized I wanted to do this for life,” he remembered. “That’s when I decided I wanted to go to Korea.”
In his parent’s basement, he would toil away as he tinkered with beats, added his vocals and sang self-penned lyrics into a microphone. Along with his love of Korean classics, JUNNY had accumulated an eclectic taste in music, soaking up artists from Eminmen to Green Day. These genres would fit into each of his songs like a game of tetris. Listen closely and you can hear some punk, some hip-hop, or R&B in each of his songs, whether it’s in raw lyrics or an unexpected chord progression. This is what makes him compelling as an artist– and it began in a Vancouver basement.
JUNNY, courtesy of muave company
There comes a time in every artist’s life when they must make what I call “the cliff jump”. It’s the moment when something pushes you to the edge and you’re faced with abandoning all safety and security for the risk of a leap. When JUNNY sold his song to Lu Han, he realized now was the time to jump.
The singer didn’t give himself long to consider the option. In just five hours, he decided he would move to Korea.
It wasn’t until he packed up his bedroom that he realized the gravity of the decision. “I didn’t know what was going to happen,” he remembered. As he drove away from his parents, he knew there was no turning back. His brothers teased him that they thought he’d be back, but JUNNY never doubted his intuition.
In Korea, JUNNY learned to live small and rough. He found a tiny studio with a shared kitchen. The room had no windows and he would spend everyday making music. “I made probably twenty songs in a week,” he remembered. He had nothing but free time and hunger to succeed to motivate him. JUNNY had taken the money from his buyout to initially fund his trip to Korea, and a successful later release “Thank You” also kept him afloat.
After nearly a few months in Korea, his living situation got to him and his health plummeted, but JUNNY persisted. “I didn’t have that moment of thinking of giving up because I was so busy,” he recalled. “The stages were so proportionate, the timing and everything. I had a little boost of something, whether it was music or socially. I’d just get those little boosts from time to time that made me not think of the painful struggles. It’s super cliched to say it but I never thought about giving up. It kept pushing me and it led me here.”
His perseverance paid off: A year after arriving in Korea, JUNNY was invited to an SM writing camp. Momentum began to build. At the writing camp, JUNNY met a team of professional songwriters who were heavy hitters in the industry. Soon he became one too. In the past year alone, JUNNY has written songs for NCT Dream, EXO’s lead dancer KAI’s title track “MMHM” and, perhaps his biggest accomplishment, a song for his idol IU. “I had tears in my eyes when IU reached out,” he said humbly. “My family loves IU.”
Over the past few years, JUNNY has worked at a nearly superhuman level to release music. His discography, which only spans three years, includes 17 singles and EPs, not counting his collaborations with artists like Def. and songwriting credits.
“I’ve always thought music would just be music. If I made music, that was it. If I made a good song, that was the end of my job,” he told All K-Pop this year. “That’s what I thought. But after coming to Korea, meeting these artists, and being able to work with them, I realized that there’s so much more that comes to play in this art.”
Now JUNNY is interested in all the components of being an artist: the art direction, the music videos, the visuals. He’s clearing his own lane in Korean music too: At times his music veers into indie soundscapes but often lately he’s embracing the brighter, poppier music he told Eric he was learning to appreciate. His voice, deep and soothing like scents of lavender, can glide over nearly any melody. “As an artist, I got to know what I want. I don’t think anyone else can decide that for me. I need to know exactly what I want, what kind of music I want to make, and what kind of visuals I want to come out with,” he said in the same interview. “That’s the most important part, keeping that intact, keeping the force strong, never being swayed, and stuff like that. The most important factor when I’m creating new music is I think about how I’m going to perform the song, especially on stage.”
JUNNY has grown so much in just the year that I found his music in 2021. While writing this article I spent a few hours going through his discography, and was impressed with how many songs I genuinely love that have been recommended to me from Spotify. “Distance” from one of his first 2019 EPs allows his falsetto to soak onto a beat like the R&B music JUNNY and I grew up listening to. But switch to the sick beats of his collaboration with Jay B on “FAME” and you’ll see the guy’s got swagger. Perhaps my favorite song, and the track that packs the biggest emotional punch, is “Nostalgia”, a sweeping, dreamy track recorded again with Jay B. “Nostalgia, tell me please,” he pleads, “Where did we wrong? Fingers point at each other/ A reason why we’re lost.” It’s an earnest song and one that never fails to stop me from whatever I’m doing when it plays on shuffle. Sophisticated tracks like “Nostalgia” are what sets JUNNY apart.
JUNNY’s told journalists he wants to be the full package. I would argue he’s succeeded. He’s a true hidden ace in K-Pop. It’s just a matter of time before the public catches up. “I’m camera shy,” he admits in his song “MOVIE”, but he says, “We’ve come this far and my life’s turned around like a movie.” Join JUNNY on his end of summer tour and see him take center stage in this movie. It’s one you’ll regret missing.
Check out JUNNY’s video for his fans below announcing the tour! TICKETS ARE ON SALE NOW!
JUNNY’s message to fans for his “BLANC” Tour!
