Asian Talents Make Big Strides
BY STEVE McCLURE
Amid all the uncertainties surrounding the
Asian music industry, one thing remains constant:
talent.
The past year saw acts in multiple genres
make great music that captured the hearts
of fans across this vast and varied region.
And Asian labels created imaginative and
aggressive promotion strategies in response
to the challenges posed by continuing harsh
market conditions.
South Korea's Lee Soo-young is a perfect
example. The slow and steady promotional
strategy used for this ballad queen is paying
off. She is on course to become the territory's
top-selling artist for the second straight
year. Where many pop albums come out with
a bang and are soon forgotten, Lee is that
rare commodity: a steady seller.
Lee has steadily become South Korea's top-selling
female singer by amassing a never-ending
string of catchy, slow songs complemented
by stirring music videos.
Yiga Entertainment released a remix album
of past chart-toppers, "Lee Soo-young
Classic - The Remake Album," in January.
It has sold more than 430,000 copies, according
to her label. Meanwhile, Lee's sixth album,
"The Colors of My Life"(Yiga Entertainment),
has sold 320,000 copies since its September
release, her label reports. All together,
that amounts to more than 750,000 albums
that Lee sold in 2004.
Lee's mysterious image - she almost never
appears in her music videos, opting instead
for teary mini-dramas - is a deliberate part
of her label's promotion.
ALL ABOUT IMAGE-MAKING
"It's all about image-making,"
says Lee Han-woo, chief manager of record
label/management company Yiga Entertainment.
"We mobilized all the media for it:
TV, newspapers, the Internet and mobile phones."
As with most Korean acts, touring is an
afterthought. But now with Korea in her grasp,
Lee and her management are looking at Japan.
She released a CD single there in June, and
there are plans for a full album in 2005.
"We see the possibilities of the Japan
market," Yiga's Lee says. "We strongly
believe that Japan will be fascinated by
Ms.Lee's unique voice and elegant image if
the promotion is done properly."
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