Sonic Sensation

Eight years since their debut, South Korean girl band Apink is making bigger waves than ever with a cool new sound and tour. Son Na-Eun, arguably the K-pop phenom’s most popular member, speaks exclusively to L’officiel Singapore in Seoul about that fresh music, getting (even more) serious about her leisure pursuit that is painting, and wanting to establish her own colour

You recently visited cities like Hong Kong and Taipei while on the Apink Asia Tour. How has the experience been?

It has been a while since the six of us held our own event for our Asian fans. I am well aware that our fans have been waiting for this for a long time. We thought it’s the time now, as we released a new album this year. The purpose of the tour is not just to showcase our new numbers; we’d like to give our fans various performances. It’s actually a combination of fan meetings and concerts.

Many have described Apink as having a new musical direction – being cooler and more mature with the latest album. How would you describe the new sound?

The style of the music we released this year is new – to us, and our fans and critics. It took us a lot of time for us to find the direction for our album. The style and the concept were things we thought about a lot. In the end, we agreed that there should be changes in the style of music we do. We also had many different concepts that we wanted to create. We just wanted for our new sound to be cool.

How did you react when the album hit number 11 on the American Billboard World Albums chart?

It has been our dream: going global. At first, I didn’t feel like it was real. The stories that came out were so positive. Things have gone just as we wished and we’re all feeling great.

Describe the sisterhood in the group.