JYJ│JYJ: We wish our fans' love for us would at least get recognized by objective numbers

JYJ performs in Barcelona, Spain on October 29, 2011. [C-JeS Entertainment]

“Let's all have crazy fun!" yelled JYJ's Park Yuchun at their first concert in Europe held at the Poble Espanyol in Barcelona, Spain on October 29. The trio, also formed of Kim Jaejoong and Kim Junsu, debuted as part of quintet TVXQ in 2003 and after enjoying much popularity in the Asia region, started their careers anew following a legal dispute with their agency SM Entertainment in 2009. This is probably why "We start again after the flowers wither," the last phrase to Kim Junsu's self-composed song "Fallen Leaves," left the strongest impression at the concert this day. Below are excerpts from a press conference held with the three ahead of the concert.

<#10_QMARK#> Why did you choose to perform in Spain when I'm sure you have a lot of fans in countries such as England and France as well?
Park Yuchun : We want to show more sides to us in a wider variety of places. We see hope in Europe, just like we saw hope in moving forward when we toured the U.S. It was quite hard to estimate how influential we could be in Europe but I think we've established a stepping stone to make ourselves known in Europe, starting with Spain and Germany. We may not get to hold concerts that are as big as the ones we hold in Asia but we'll be sure to cover what we can here and we'd also like to do a good job of communicating with our fans.
Kim Junsu : We'd been asked to come to a number of cities in Europe since last year so we'd like to be able to go to everywhere in the region but we decided to choose on locations that would geographically be easiest for our fans to gather at than taking a risk. I think Spain is the place to gather fans in western Europe and Berlin for our fans in eastern and northern Europe. I'm thinking that we'll be able to put on better performances at even more countries the next time we tour Europe.

JYJ member Kim Jaejoong sings at his concert in Barcelona, Spain on October 29, 2011. [C-JeS Entertainment]

<#10_QMARK#> How enthusiastic are your fans here in Spain?
Kim Junsu : I think a lot of people recognize me for my standards. I actually didn't know much about Spain other than the fact that it's famous for its soccer so I was surprised when we were told that almost all the tickets for our first show have sold out. I walked on the streets of Barcelona last night and quite a lot of people recognized me.
Park Yuchun : Maybe you were mistaken. [laughs]
Kim Junsu : Oh, no. [laughs] I was really surprised. I even had my hat on but there were a few people who recognized me at a cafe and on the streets. And one of them said they're from Italy and asked me to sign their copy of our CD.
Kim Jaejoong : That person must be one of the three thousand (who bought tickets for our show). [laughs]
Kim Junsu : Anyway, I was surprised yet thankful and it made me want to do an even better job with our concerts.

<#10_QMARK#> Is there anything you prepared in particular for your concert in Spain?
Kim Jaejoong : We added fancy choreography and acrobatics to the choreography we'd done till now, after discussing it with the choreographer here, to bring out the passionate vibe of Spain.
Kim Junsu : But we didn't make much changes to the set list. Our fans in Spain and Europe are seeing our performance for the first time so we prepared a performance that'll bring out our style.

<#10_QMARK#> This concert will be small compared to your past concerts. How does this feel?
Kim Jaejoong : It may be smaller in size than our past performances but it has a different significance. We started small in Korea and Japan as well and based on that, gained more fans so I think our first concert in Europe will be a good start too. I think it'll be better to make the first step small, with the mindset that we're starting all over again, than trying to exaggerate or blow up the size of it.

<#10_QMARK#> But I'm sure you had big goals in mind for when you started on your activities in Japan in the past as TVXQ. Do you have any particular plans or hopes for your career in northern or eastern Europe?
Kim Junsu : In Europe, we're trying to show the 'Hallyu' as K-pop singers whereas in Japan, we pursued our activities as J-pop singers which is also a bit different from Korean singers in Japan nowadays. We really took on Japan with the mindset of being complete newcomers to the scene and sang on small steps, linoleum and even while jumping over the cord of our own mics for dance songs so things have changed a lot now. Of course, what's important is the process but the results are important too since that's what'll show so I hope we'll get to put on concerts accommodating over 10,000 people and in order to do that, we'll have to fulfill the expectations of our fans in Europe.

JYJ member Park Yuchun smiles during his concert in Barcelona, Spain on October 29, 2011. [C-JeS Entertainment]

<#10_QMARK#> In the U.S., there has been increased interest and evaluation of K-pop during the past few years and it seems that there's a lot of interest in it in France as well but it doesn't seem to stand out quite as much in Spain. Does this not burden you in any way?
Kim Jaejoong : I think there's a mania fanbase which is being called a K-pop fever rather than there being an actual K-pop boom. And I heard that our Barcelona concert will accomodate 3,000 people so I think most of the audience will be our mania fans. That's why I think they'll be able to sing along to our songs even if we sing in Korean. We don't really feel much pressure about doing K-pop.

<#10_QMARK#> You're the first Korean artist, as a team, to hold a concert in Spain but just a few years ago, this is something nobody had even dreamt of. What do you think is the driving force of this?
Kim Jaejoong : I heard that people in Europe really started taking notice of K-pop in 2006. That's probably around the time that we were part of TVXQ. And I think that's when people got drawn to Korean singers that could dance and sing live at the same time and created the fever there is over us today.

<#10_QMARK#> Is there anything in particular that you want to do in Spain?
Kim Jaejoong : Junsu's very interested in soccer so he wanted to watch an FC Barcelona game but I think he was supposed to find out about it months in advance to get tickets for it.
Kim Junsu : I still thought I'd be able to watch a game but the date changed so there's a match at the same time and date of our concert. However, I heard Marseille's playing on Monday so I think it'd be nice to watch it with the members of my group.
Kim Jaejoong, Park Yuchun : ......
Kim Junsu : We've come all the way to Spain. We've got to watch at least soccer!

<#10_QMARK#> Your first worldwide album "The Beginning," which you released in English last year, was released in Spain as well. Are you preparing on a second worldwide album as well?
Kim Jaejoong : We're looking into it in an extremely positive light because our first album got great response. And we're placing significance into getting to go to places that Korean singers haven't and deliver our music there. It's just that it's hard to do with the time constraint. We go on tours and we all have our own individual activities so we don't have enough time. These days I wish there were 24 months in a year, not 12. [laughs]

JYJ member Kim Junsu sings at his concert in Barcelona, Spain on October 29, 2011. [C-JeS Entertainment]

<#10_QMARK#>You worked with many famed American producers such as Kanye West and Rodney "Darkchild" Jerkins for your album "The Beginning." Would you ever consider working with music officials in Europe?
Kim Jaejoong : I actually like European music a lot. And we're familiar with European music because when we were with TVXQ, about 50 percent of the music we went with for our activities in Japan were purchased from Europe. We'd definitely like to work with European artists in the future although we didn't have time to this time around.

<#10_QMARK#>You performed in front of some 80,000 people at a concert held at the earthquake-struck Hitachi Park in Japan in mid-October. How was that? It must've been very meaningful to you.
Kim Junsu : It was our first time to perform in Japan in a while and it (Hitachi Park) was a place we hadn't been to even once during the five, six years that we pursued our singing career there. But we were moved that people filled up the seats although it wasn't too easy to get to and to see several tens of thousands of people for the first time in a while. The seats were not in the form of steps but just all laid our horizontally so this in particular made it seem like there were an endless number of people. I felt bad for the people who were sitting in the back since they probably weren't able to see us properly but I was moved because they sang along to our songs till the very end. A lot of things have happened till now but we were truly very grateful and it helped us gather up our minds again.

<#10_QMARK#> Well you're making yourselves known in various regions now yet it is hardest to see you guys as JYJ in Korea. What are your hopes regarding your activities in Korea?
Park Yuchun : We're not even dreaming of getting to appear on television. If there's a hope that we have, it's that we'd like things to happen in a fair way. For example, getting onto charts is one of the ways of repaying our fans for buying our albums and listening to our music and while we know there's a reason for it, it's disappointing. We wish that our fans' love for us would at least get recognized by objective numbers.

<#10_QMARK#> What are your plans for after your Europe tour?
Kim Jaejoong : I think the tour will mark the end to our activities as JYJ this year. And we'll probably take some time off in December and rest but it would be a waste to just rest so we'll probably prepare for Jan as well. From January to March, we plan to move forward with our work regarding music. And we'd like to visit other cities in other countries outside of Spain and Germany. If we have more time, we'd also like to visit Spain and Germany again and repay our fans for their love.

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