I want to be BLACKPINK in Indonesia
Indonesian girl group Star B is moving toward great success through K-pop training.
A press conference for Indonesian four-member girl group StarBe’s domestic activities and a showcase for the release of new songs were held at the Chungmu Art Center Convention Hall in Heungin-dong, Jung-gu, Seoul on the morning of the 30th.
Stavey consists of Abel (21), Chelsea (19), Kezia (21) and Sheila (21). It debuted in December 2019, and the representative song is the song “Time to Fly” released in March 2021 with more than 4 million music video views. In addition, Starby’s music video has an average of more than 1 million views, enjoying great popularity throughout Southeast Asia.
Starbee was selected as the target of training for the 2023 Shared Growth Stepping Stone (Grow Twogether) project hosted by the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism (Minister Park Bo-kyun) and organized by the Korea International Cultural Exchange Promotion Agency (Director Jung Gil-hwa). The shared growth stepping stone project, which marks its third year this year, is an international cultural exchange program based on the popular culture industry, inviting new artists from target countries to Korea every year to provide training opportunities. Training subjects produce music, music videos, and Korean culture experience contents with K-POP experts while living in Korea and send them to the world.
Earlier, the shared growth stepping-stone project invited Vietnamese idols Super V and O2O Girl Band in 2021 and Thai new girl group Roseberry in 2022 to Korea, and Roseberry won the Rookie of the Year award in their country for growing up right after the training.
Jung Gil-hwa, director of the Korea International Cultural Exchange Promotion Agency, said of “Grow Twogether,” “Go Twogether” is a colloquial word that symbolizes the Korea-U.S. alliance. “I changed it a little bit,” he said. “The concept is to invite artists from countries with high preference for Korean Wave and share K-pop training.” “This year marks the 50th anniversary of diplomatic relations between South Korea and Indonesia,” he said. Therefore, I think it will be a business that harmonizes well,” he said.
“We interviewed about 20 groups,” said Park Kwan-yong, head of the MCN division of Soon ENT, the operator of “2023 Shared Growth Stepping Stone.” The group that received the most response was the group called Starby,” he said. Starbee will participate in the 2023 Asian Song Festival on September 8 at the outdoor special stage in Seoul. Director Park said, “We also record and present BLACKPINK’s ‘Shut Down’ ourselves.”
Shella said, “I’ve been wanting to come to Korea for a long time. I am happy to be able to come to Korea through this opportunity and join the exchange program between Korea and Indonesia,” he said. Kezia said, “I’m so happy to be able to come to Korea.”
Abel said, “We are preparing hard for the ‘Asia Song Festival’.”
Kezia said about her goal, “I want to let many people know that our starbi is an Indonesian girl group. “I hope Star B will become a girl group that is widely known around the world later,” he said. Chelsea said, “Like Kezia, I hope Stavi will be active on the Korean stage a lot.”
Abel said, “It was a new experience to be able to shoot a music video in Korea. “The staff who worked with us while producing the music video were kind and good people,” he said. “We were also impressed to be able to include the symbolism of Indonesia and Korea in the music video,” he said. When we were filming the music video, there was an LED behind us, first red and white, then red and blue, which symbolizes the flags of Indonesia and Korea,” he said.
Chelsea said, “We’re trying to project Indonesian elements in our music video in various ways. “I want to show Indonesian elements by putting traditional Indonesian instruments, instrumental sounds, and folk songs together,” he said.
“At the beginning of the music video shoot, the floor was slippery. We used slippery things to play like sliding,” he said in a behind-the-scenes story. Chelsea said, “I also had a lot of fun filming the rap part.”
Since then, Starby has performed a new song “BANG” featuring intense, hip-hop sounds and addictive melodies. It’s a song that’s in the style of “K-Innipop. “K-in-Nipop” is a combination of K-pop and In-Nipop, and is a new word that means a genre created through international cultural exchanges between Korea and Indonesia. The harmony of Korean and Indonesian lyrics stands out.
Chelsea said, “There are so many people who are crazy about K-pop that it is said that K-pop is the trend in Indonesia right now. Artists also visit often to meet Indonesian fans,” he said. Abel said, “The Korean pronunciation practice process was difficult. Because Indonesian and Korean pronunciations are very different. He said, “Maybe because our tongue was hard, we pronounced it well, but from the listener’s point of view, we were able to pronounce it perfectly after several attempts. 광주호스트바
Abel said, “The Korean and Indonesian systems themselves are very different. While training in Korea, we practice dancing all day long and sometimes we fall asleep in the practice room. “During training in Korea, the dance genre we learn is very different compared to Indonesia,” he said.
Shella said, “When we hear BLACKPINK, BLACKPINK is actually more like our idol. Regarding BLACKPINK’s enjoyment of ATEEZ on stage, we also want to enjoy the stage, so we want to become BLACKPINK in Indonesia later on. In fact, the hip-hop elements are strong right now, but I want to do various genres later on. “I think innocent songs would suit us if we tried them,” he said.
Abel said, “I personally think that the difference between Korean culture and Indonesian culture is not that big in my opinion while I am in Korea. However, since Indonesia is a multicultural country, there is a conservative part in some ways. In the case of costumes, if you wear revealing clothes in Indonesia, you can get a little bad eye, so I think it’s good to wear stronger clothes. The lyrics are important when listening to Korean songs in Indonesia. Among Korean songs, I think songs that can be heard without age restrictions can be more popular if they enter Indonesia,” he said.
