On “Life Goes On”, Onew Remembers His Rooftop Dreams

SM Entertainment

When he was a trainee at SM Entertainment, Lee Jinki (SHINee’s Onew) would spend afternoons on the company’s rooftop. 

“The training room was always so crowded,” he said in a 2010 radio interview. “There were so many trainees. I was new to the place and felt a bit awkward, so I liked practicing on the rooftop.” 

Being away from the chaos of trainee life helped Jinki relax. Frequently he used the rooftop as an escape route to dream.  “I liked singing while seeing the sky and floating clouds,” he remembered. “Wondering, ‘Can I send my voice up there?’”

Jinki returned to his rooftop memories this summer as he released his first Japanese album “Life Goes On”. The album pulls together the most tender parts of Lee Jinki’s personality: It’s an earnest, hopeful work that reflects a changed outlook on life, one that he sees when he looks at the sky. 

“Many people think of a blue sky when they think of the sky, but there are sunset skies, yellow skies, gray clouds, and dark rainy days,” he told Biglobe Beauty. The point, he said, is that the sky shifts and changes constantly. So do we. Our life can be vast and empty or it can shake us violently as we hit turbulence. He titled his first Japanese album “Life Goes On” because, as Jinki learned by looking at the sky, life is unexpected and the best we can do is try to keep a positive disposition. “We won’t have blue skies every day,” he said. So it’s best to learn to take a look at the sky and see what nature is trying to teach us. 

“Life Goes On” is an album that grew on me. It does not have the immediate pull that Jinki’s Korean album “DICE” : It takes its time to melt into your heart. Some of this is by design: "Osoku Okita Asani (遅く起きた朝に)", the album’s second track, is adventurous and clocks in at six minutes. While “DICE” found Jinki returning to his roots in pop music, “Life Goes On” feels like the sequel to his Korean debut album “VOICE”. This release gives his honey vocals an opportunity to settle into the production.

The album plays best on a night like tonight when temperatures are expected to dive close to zero and sheets of snow could cover my city. Nights like this, when we crowd around fireplaces or bundle under blankets are best soundtracked by vocalistsl ike Lee Jinki. What if we can’t leave our homes? What if we’re iced in? I’ll play Jinki’s album. 

Jinki enlisted in the military in 2018, but his parting gift was the somber mini-album “VOICE”. The previous year was tumultuous and tragic for the singer. In 2017, SHINee’s Jonghyun passed away, and six months later SHINee returned with Jinki in a leadership position that no one can prepare you for. How do you lead a group in the throes of grief and mourning? Jinki learned that you can’t. You can only use each other to pick up the pieces and move forward. 

For the first time, the military gave Jinki time to sort through his life; to process the year and who he was at 29.. “Maybe it's because I've had more time to think alone after enlisting… Until then, I thought I knew myself best,,” he remembered. But time alone gave him a chance to deepen his own understanding of himself. He realized that his voice could be an instrument of service, a way to heal others if he would just allow others to see who he really is. Jinki wanted to be honest about himself; to strive less for perfection because, as he admitted, this felt “toxic” to him. 

“Up until now, I thought that I would become ‘Onew’ only after doing hair and makeup and wearing costumes. That's why I've separated my real life and work too much,” he began to wonder. “But these days, is that still necessary?” At home, he was Lee Jinki, a man who was more interested in being in nature than being a celebrity. This person, he said in the same interview, is actually “kind of boring”. But he’s also real. “ I came to think,” he said, “that I can have a good influence on people for the first time when I stand as myself.” 

Jinki decided to be courageous when he returned from the military. He couldn’t be Onew the idol anymore. He just wanted to be Lee Jinki, the human. 

“I thought, I don’t want to meet people wearing some kind of mask,” he explained. “When I meet people, I want to face them honestly with a feeling that comes from my heart.” 

Although he’s learning what makes his voice so powerful, he could still be shocked when others told him how much they love his voice. You can see a crumpled look of shock and awe on his face when IU, a superstar in her own right, told him on her variety show Palette that his voice was her favorite. “Me?” he asked incredulously. 

Yes, you. 

“Lighthouse”, the fifth song on “Life Goes On”, best illustrates the kind of artist Jinki wants to be: A source of solace for others. “While wandering aimlessly and crying/ There is one place to come back to,” he sings. “Welcome back to you/ Welcome back to me.” No matter where you are, Jinki sings, you can always count on his voice to bring you back to a place of comfort.

I think back to the 15-year-old Lee Jinki who would sing on his company’s rooftop and wonder if his voice could touch the heavens. How high can it go? “I’m someone who likes to reach high,” he said this year. Sometimes to reach those heights, we are hit by the hardest pain possible. But if we can find the use in our pain, it can transform us.

“There’s nothing to regret,” Jinki sings on the title track. “I want to move forward smiling with you.”