TAEYANG

As K-pop legend and veteran idol TAEYANG steps back into the limelight, he opens up about adapting to a new era of music and what he hopes to do in time to come.

- AZRIN TAN

There are only a few things in life that are as assured as the sun. Day after day, it peeks out over the horizon, begins to stream through cracks and windows and signals a new day. The sun, taeyang in Korean, yields itself to an easy metaphor for new beginnings. This is a metaphor which Dong Young-bae—better known as K-pop superstar TAEYANG or SOL in Japan—is no stranger to.

Over the past few years, TAEYANG has lived a relatively hushed life. After his solo world tour in 2017, he tied the knot with his partner Min Hyo-rin, whom he now shares a son with. Shortly after the wedding, the K-pop star enlisted into compulsory military service, delayed as a result of his stellar career as a member of one of the biggest groups in K-pop—BIGBANG.

As a part of the prominent quintet, TAEYANG became a part of K-pop’s seismic rise to the global stage, with BIGBANG producing some of the greatest hits ever known to the industry. Title tracks such as ‘Fantastic Baby’ and ‘Bang Bang Bang’ broke numerous records in their heyday. Together, they set the standard for what the industry could look like; the paragons of K-pop that new-era groups would seek to emulate years later.

BIGBANG, which debuted in 2006, falls under the era of second-generation K-pop—alongside the likes of Girls’ Generation and Shinee—and were whom younger, budding idols had aspired to become. From BTS and Blackpink to Stray Kids and Twice, many of the third- and fourth-generation idols have spoken of the fierce impact BIGBANG had on them in their trainee years. From their unparalleled stage presence to their experimental approach to musical production, they can be said to have laid the foundation for younger generations to break new ground in the K-pop scene.