starb✰y

background

born in san francisco on christmas eve in 1995. ash’s dad is an engineer and his mom is a journalist and photographer.

they had him young, but some family money on his dad’s side and a few good gos at the stock market kept them comfortable. they weren’t mega rich, no chaebol money, but they always lived very comfortably with few financial worries. if asked, ash would say he grew up in ~an average middle class american household~ but he went to private school and lived in a nice townhome in san francisco so,,,

he very clearly loved music from a young age and began playing piano at four and violin at five. took to them both very naturally. down the line, he’d start dancing at seven and playing guitar.

he competed in some piano and violin competitions here and there and was pretty successful. ask ash around middle school and he would have said his career goal was being a pianist

he auditioned for bc entertainment on a whim on his thirteenth birthday trip to los angeles and got offered a trainee contract. a few months later, he had moved to seoul and began training. he didn’t know korean very well, so he was a lonely trainee, but threw his all into training and took songwriting more seriously as a method of bettering his language skills.

found out he was going to debut at fourteen and debuted less than two weeks after his fifteenth birthday as the maknae, main vocal, and lead dancer of titan. was talented, especially for a kid so young, but wasn’t great at the whole idol thing.

he had a couple of attitude controversies mostly caused by cultural differences or ash just not wanting to be there in the early days.

the first few years of his career were generally okay. he stayed in the background and didn’t branch out into solo activities, keeping to himself and trying to find ways to enjoy the fact he was living his dream. it didn’t live up to what he expected because he valued freedom so much and didn’t get a lot of it and he admittedly hated being the maknae of his group.

on new year’s day 2016, his relationship (of almost a year at that point) with a popular actress was exposed. he’d previously had rumors with the actress and a sasaeng had gotten pissed at him for ~not being thankful enough to his fans~ and leaked/sold pictures of them kissing at a hotel. bc had to confirm because it was hard to deny and at least he was past the four year “dating ban”. they dated for a little over two and a half years (just over one and a half of those were “public”). it did damage to his image and his girlfriend’s too, for that matter, because she was known for playing innocent/first love roles and he was, by force, the innocent maknae, and the general online rumor mill around their relationship had very… sexual overtones. people claiming they lived in the same building with her and they saw him over there like every night, they might as well be living together, or they came into the convenience store i work at and bought condoms, i swear!!

2016/early 2017 was really hard on him mentally. some of his fans turned on him and antis were emboldened and grew in number. it would only get worse over the years and to this day he has a major problem with both sasaengs and concentrated anti campaigns

didn’t plan on renewing his contract with bc because he wanted to leave and live a normal life and settle down with his gf, but he renewed because they broke up and because bc promised to push him as a soloist and songwriter/producer.

bc pushed him as promised, and he did really well. released successful solo music and wrote successful songs. everything seemed great on the career side of this life.

he was getting brand deals, magazine covers, solo concerts, solo fanmeetings, songwriting gigs, etc., etc.

but he continued to struggle a lot behind the scenes mentally, and after an ankle injury while filming a solo cf in 2018, his physical health took a hit. he’s taken a few different hiatuses or missed schedules since renewing his contract for health reasons.

in 2018, he released trouble maker with another idol, which sparked dating rumors between them. they weren’t actually dating, they just had good chemistry. but people were pretty convinced they were secretly dating, which didn’t help his image.

in 2019, an incriminating selfie of him with another (female) celebrity was uploaded to her social media and quickly deleted. not quick enough tho! bc had to release a statement that did not explicitly confirm or deny they were dating but was worded to sound like a denial. she was a controversial figure, so it got him in more shit. they were spotted at the same club overseas once, they got a lot of lovestagram accusations, people tried to link his lyrics to her, etc.

also started to come into himself more at this time and was determined to give less of a shit about what people thought. has gotten tattoos and facial (and nipple and navel) piercings since, which he’s also gotten hate comments for.

like i mentioned, he’s had a few hiatuses over the past few years. most notably when he broke his ankle in 2018, last fall when he was hospitalized and was out of schedules for three+ months, and summer 2021 when he took a mental health break.

he’s sensitive so the amount of hate he gets and the anti campaigns does get to him, but he’s actively trying to care less.

very much struggles with the idea of wanting to be true to himself and knowing that if he conforms a little more, he’ll get less hate

he’s pretty established as a producer now in canon works, which has earned him more respect and acclaim as a songwriter and producer. he’s worked on songs for equinox, calypso, polaris, andromeda, and lily.

it’s impossible to shake the idol image when you’re in one of the biggest boy groups of all time, but he’s leaned more into the “artist” image as a solo artist. gets some level of respect for being so singularly involved in his own music and has managed to get some fans as a soloist he wouldn’t have had otherwise.

personality

ash kwon’s personality

romantic, reckless, independent, idealistic to a fault while also being painfully jaded, and creative

perhaps a little more reckless than he should be as an idol and he oscillates between extreme paranoia that prevents him from living his life to complete disregard for his status as a celebrity

he’s more secure in himself professionally than the first famed version of him was. he’s gotten more widespread praise for his songwriting/producing and is more established there with people beyond his friends.

cares deeply for those close to him but isolates himself a lot, so isn’t always the best at showing it

is the kind of person who’s hard to get close to. he keeps a lot close to his chest and when he does open up, that’s often followed by him becoming even more distant. this is an issue both in friendships and romantic relationships. has had either a very small circle of friends or basically no friends at different points in his life since moving to seoul (he had a wider friend circle as a kid)

depending on the day, his first impression can be kind of cold and quiet? that’s definitely his idol image and he’s very introverted and reserved around strangers.

he’s a workaholic, but only in regards to work he cares about or feels the need to prove himself in. catch him finding excuses to dip out of titan rehearsals, but then spending all night up in the studio

honestly he can be kind of judgmental. one small thing can make him decide not to like or trust a person and it can be hard to change his mind after that

a sad boy who says he just wants to be happy but sure doesn’t act like it !!!

connection ideas

as a Serious and Established^tm producer, ash would be happy to work on songs for people, even if they don’t get released. dropping by his studio to work on a track is the easiest way to actually socialize with him, so give me people with solo ambitions ash helps out by working on a few tracks for, people ash asks to sing demos for him, people who he helps teach songwriting/producing, other songwriters and producers he respects, etc.

friends? ash is not good at keeping friends, but i’d like him to have some. especially people he might have met outside of a work setting.

romantically, ash has mostly been very tied up with his ex emotionally, but when they weren’t together, he sometimes had hookups and very short flings, so he’s open to a few of those kinds of plots. could be light/intense, cordial/bitter, etc. depending on the muses and the situations. likely would have lacked much emotional intimacy from him (but may have still been emotionally intense knowing him?) could also be people he rejected (may have led them on) because of his emotional hangups

people who hate him for all his character flaws or sometimes reckless behavior or are wary of him because he seems to bring scandal wherever he goes.

people he sees as little siblings or mentees that he’s taken under his wing to protect. he doesn’t want the idol industry to eat away at anyone else the way it did to him.

alternatively, older people who watch out for him. he’ll act like he doesn’t need it, but he’ll appreciate it deep down

if anyone wants their muse to look up to him or be a fan of his music, feel free. ash will stress cry about it.

ash hadn’t been specifically seeking out a house in jeju. he’d been looking for a place he could stay to get away anywhere more secluded than seoul. his search did have to be limited within korea, as leaving the country would be bad optics for him and the company. at first, he was looking at a little bit of everything: airbnbs, guesthouses, places to rent, and places to buy. he stumbled upon this place by chance and upon visiting it, fell in love and decided it was the right place.

ash is renting the placet, a decision he came to against all financial advice he’s ever been given (since he could have afforded to buy it) because it’s harder for sasaengs to track him down that way since his name is less formally attached to it. he’s willing to throw a few million won out the window with no return every month in exchange for more privacy after everything he went through leading up to his hiatus. the owner mentioned potentially planning to sell it fully in a couple of years when they retire and had offered the option to ash expressly as a potential earlier sell, so it’s an unspoken option on the table for ash to buy it then, but that’s not something ash was considering when he lived in it. he’s considered it since because he grew attached to the house, but has yet to buy it officially.

the house is located in the south of jeju, in one of the more secluded parts of the broader area outside of the seogwipo. it’s a two-story one bedroom house with a private garden/orchard area on ground level and a terrace off of the bedroom. there’s also an office area on the second floor that he eventually made his makeshift studio.

the studio isn’t as extensive as the one he has at home in seoul since he didn’t anticipate using it as much, but he made it as productive as he could while he was there since ideas started coming to him at the end.

the house is a short walk from a beach front and the garden houses a variety of flowers as well as a mini tangerine orchard. the tangerines technically belong to the house’s owner, but they gave ash permission to pick them for personal use when they’re in season if he wants/

how would you describe this release?

“blacklight is an album that’s hard to describe concisely. all of my albums are about feelings and experiences, that’s what i always focus on as a writer, but if the ret of my albums were more... outward, looking at other people, blacklight is more of an inner reflection.”

what is your favorite part about this release?

“how involved i got to be in it. blacklight, for the most part, is exactly what i wanted the album to be and look like and how i wanted it to be presented. there are things i might have done a little differently in a perfect world, but budget and normative constraints are hard to avoid entirely.”

what were preparations for this release like?

“i didn’t know i was writing a new album when i first started working on blacklight, so the actual preparations for the release, knowing it was going to be released and how, started a lot later than the work started. at the beginning, the process was hard. there was a time last year when i couldn’t write at all. it wasn’t even that i couldn’t write songs i liked. i couldn’t do it at all. there was nothing in me. during that time, i wasn’t thinking about an album, but i found my way back eventually and worked on getting back into music again. that time when i was getting back into writing was when the idea of the album started to come to me, so i pitched everything i had in mind to the company a little while after that.”

what do you hope to achieve through this release?

“rather than charts or wins, i wanted to focus on delivering an album that was personal and spoke to a specific experience. i wanted to release it and feel like i’d been more honest than ever. whatever happens now that it’s out, i’m happy.”

what is your favorite song on the album?

“writing for this album was such an emotional experience that i can’t pick one and call it my favorite. it would feel wrong. every song is like a piece of me, so they all play an important role.”

what is the most memorable lyric from this single/album for you?

“i wrote all the lyrics except for what minjung wrote in no blueberries so this feels a little... [laughs]. but... oh, maybe in the song ‘welcome to the show’, where i say, ‘so turn down the lights, they'll see you now’. that line sums up the album, i think. it’s the feeling of stepping out of the spotlight and having to live with yourself when people can see the real you.”

what inspired you creatively for this album?

“my experiences, the things i’ve been through. fame, social media, insomnia, anxiety, stress, the lows and the highs — my own internal world, really, and the unique mix of influences on it. obviously, that affects anything i write and create, but this time, i came at it from the perspective of more of a mirror inward instead of everything just filtering through that.”

the music videos for the album seem to be connected. is there a story there?