Chapter 132:
Chapter 132
Can you write this song for me?
The first game ended with Lee Minha, who had a cheat item, slaughtering the surviving members of Awi.
“And with that, the hyper mode of ‘Ground Survival’ is over! The winning team of the group match is…”
The result of the group match was Miracle’s victory.
After a short medal ceremony, the closing ceremony began. The singers who were waiting on stage clapped and cheered for the announcer and caster who came up on stage.
“Thank you! Well, we will now close the curtain of the first ‘Idol Game Olympics’!”
“Let’s hear a word from our on-site MC, Seodam.”
“I had so much fun today. I hope I can host again if I get a chance.”
The camera lights went off after a brief interview with the hosts and winners. The singers bowed to the broadcast staff.
“I thought it wouldn’t be hard if it was a game, but it was harder.”
“My back hurts.”
The Awi members walked down the corridor after getting off the stage. Miracle approached them.
“Do you want to play again later?”
“Yeah. Give me your number.”
They exchanged numbers and even made a group chat. Carter, a Korean-Canadian, was the first to get Ian’s number.
***
As the repackaged album release was confirmed, the Awi members went back and forth between their dorm and the company practice room to prepare for the album release.
“Did you get the choreography, hyung?”
“Roughly, hey Juyeong, how about this?”
The difference from the previous album was that all members participated in producing the album. Even if a member composed a song in the previous album, there was additional participation from an arranger, and the same was true for choreography. They also received help from choreographers other than Kim Hyun and Kim Juyeong.
“How about this image?”
“Good. But didn’t someone do this first?”
They didn’t avoid getting help from experts for parts that required expertise. Instead, they decided on the overall direction of the album first.
“Ah… I’m tired.”
“It’s fun but my head is going to explode.”
The members collapsed on the floor after thinking for a long time. There were magazine scraps and other things that the company gave them to refer to scattered on the floor.
“But who will appreciate us doing this?”
“The fans will.”
“Well, as long as the fans appreciate it. Ah! I want to go on stage soon.”
This year, their album sales hit a career high, but they couldn’t do any event stages because of the global pandemic.
“When there’s no audience, I’ll enter the stage with a tumbling.”
“What? Really? Can I record that? Keep your word.”
“Hey hey hey Choi Ian.”
As Jo Taewoong turned on the recorder and tried to catch Ian, someone opened the door of the practice room.
“Hey guys, are you busy?”
“Hello!”
“You don’t have to get up so quickly and greet me…”
Lim Taewoo entered the practice room with an awkward smile. It was his first time seeing him since they had dinner with other celebrities after Awi’s tour.
“It’s been a while, sunbaenim.”
“I told you to call me hyung.”
“Yes, hyung.”
The members smiled warmly and made room for Lim Taewoo to sit.
“Are you working on your next album? Are you doing everything from producing?”
“Yes, I’m dying.”
“Wow, you have a lot of materials.”
Jo Taewoong lay down on the floor again. Lim Taewoo looked at other singers’ concept photos with a nostalgic expression.
“By the way, didn’t you say you produced before?”
“I did. The previous company didn’t let us release an album, so we worked hard ourselves. Wow, we did all this research too.”
They mobilized their nonexistent budget and connections. They went to Dongdaemun at dawn to buy clothes and hired relatives across the street to take pictures. They borrowed a recording studio from an acquaintance during their trainee days and recorded all day long.
“We couldn’t release that. Someone caused an accident.”
“Ah…”
“We suffered a lot back then but it was still a memory…”
It was one of his most vivid memories from his faded Kim Yongmin days. Ian smiled bitterly.
Lim Taewoo laughed awkwardly as if he had made the atmosphere gloomy.
“Speaking of which… can you guys write this song for me?”
“What?”
Lim Taewoo took out an old USB from his pocket and put it on the floor.
“Wow, this is from years ago?”
“I wonder if the file will open.”
Park Jin-hyuk brought his laptop and plugged it in. He was doubtful, but the file opened properly.
“This is…”
Inside the folder, there were MP3 audio files, and Ian recognized the file names very well.
[What is this?]
‘The song I worked on before.’
[From the Diamond days?]
Ian nodded.
‘He must have kept it all this time.’
[You didn’t have it?]
‘I… threw it away.’
On the day Kim Yong-min failed the audition, he had to cross the Han River bridge without any money. It was chilly, so he put his hand in his pocket and felt the USB memory he had always kept because of his regret.
‘There’s no point in keeping this!’
He stared at it blankly for a while, then threw it into the Han River in anger. Ian felt uneasy when he faced the traces of his past again.
“This is the song I worked on back then. It’s useless now… I was wondering if you guys could use it…”
“Can we listen to it?”
“It’s an old work, so it won’t meet your standards.”
Lim Tae-woo scratched the back of his head. Lee Ju-hyuk played the song, and music came out of the Bluetooth speaker in the practice room.
“Wow… I didn’t expect it to sound so loud.”
Lim Tae-woo’s face turned slightly red. He felt like his old shame was being exposed. Lee Ju-hyuk nodded his head to the rhythm and smiled softly.
“Oh, the melody is nice, isn’t it?”
“Yeah?”
“Did you work on it alone?”
“No, I had two other members…”
Ian also pulled down his hat deeply to hide his awkward expression.
‘There are so many weird parts when I listen to it again.’
He remembered his shame of pretending to learn composition, and boasting about who would get more parts. Ian coughed lightly.
“Isn’t this too calm?”
“This part, this part can be kept.”
“The lyrics are good.”
Unlike Ian and Lim Tae-woo’s reactions, the Awi members listened to the song seriously.
“You did a good job. It’s a pity. If you released it on time, it could have been a hit…”
“Don’t flatter me.”
“I’m serious… But did you get permission from the other members you worked with?”
“I got permission. They agreed to give me all the rights.”
Lim Tae-woo nodded. Park Seo-dam rolled his pen and said.
“Aren’t you sorry?”
“I think it would be better for you guys to sing it than to bury it like this.”
Lee Ju-hyuk groaned. He was tempted by the song, but he knew the background behind it, so he couldn’t easily decide to say ‘we’ll sing it’.
“What if Ju-hyuk hyung fixes it a bit and Tae-woo hyung sings it? You’re not releasing an album before our repackage anyway, right?”
“Huh?”
Lim Tae-woo asked with a dumbfounded face at Ian’s words. Lee Ju-hyuk took the bait.
“That’s a good idea. Hyung, what do you think?”
[The song was well received, and you made it yourself. But you’re not taking it?]
‘The Diamond song should be sung by Diamond.’
He thought of his old days when he listened to the song he composed himself, but he was an Awi member now, not a Diamond member. He wasn’t indifferent to the song, but he felt uncomfortable taking it and singing it with only Awi members.
“Hey, I can’t sing this song, it’s too idol-like… I’m a trot singer.”
Lim Tae-woo waved his hand. Ian turned his head sharply and looked at Jo Tae-woong.
“Is there a law that says trot singers can’t sing idol songs?”
“No. If you think about it, you’re just like an idol.”
Jo Tae-woong agreed and said. Ian turned his head to the other side.
“Isn’t saying that idol-like creating a wall between music genres?”
“That’s right. Music is the only drug that the country allows.”
Kim Joo-young shrugged his shoulders from the opposite side. Kim Hyun pointed at the trio and said.
“That’s what they say.”
“But…”
“Don’t you trust us, hyung?”
“No, that’s not it.”
The Awi members chuckled. They had no qualms about teasing their hyung.
“It doesn’t seem like that’s not it.”
Lim Tae-woo was sweating profusely.
At that moment, a short vibration sounded from Ian’s phone. It was a text message from Park Dong-soo.
“I’m going up to the conference room, be right back.”
“Let’s go together.”
“Hey, don’t run away, bro.”
Jo Tae-woong grabbed Lim Tae-woo’s hem with a playful smile.
“He told me to come too.”
“Ugh.”
Lim Tae-woo’s phone screen also flashed with a text message. Jo Tae-woong let go of his hand without hesitation.
Ian asked Lim Tae-woo casually as they waited for the elevator.
“Bro, did you hear from the Diamond members after you left Vietnam?”
“I did, but… the person I really wanted to hear from didn’t contact me. You know I went all the way to the countryside to find Yong-min.”
“Maybe they feel sorry for contacting you now?”
“Well, maybe… You know a lot.”
“But why don’t you want to write songs?”
Lim Tae-woo gave a bitter smile. Actually, he had tried to write songs.
He wanted to sing the songs he had worked on with the members back then. He had made his name as ‘The Man of Trot’, so he wanted to share the glory with the members who had suffered with him.
‘Hey, Tae-woo? You know me, right? Lee Ji-won. I re-debuted as an actor…’
‘You should come and see our kid once. He’s on a parenting program this time… It would be nice if you came.’
Some members had contacted him shamelessly and made a fuss, but the composers of the songs were different.
‘That song? You can have it. I decided not to be a singer anymore.’
‘I don’t want to ride on your popularity. I’ll give you all the rights.’
He had gotten their permission, but he didn’t feel comfortable writing the song alone. So he thought about giving the song to someone else.
Preferably, not a solo singer, but a group. He wanted to see the group stage that Diamond had never done through another idol group.
“To be honest, I don’t know.”
“Why?”
“I became a trot singer. I felt embarrassed to sing again now. And I thought that song would be better sung by a group than a solo.”
“…”
“That song was… how should I say it… a heavy song for me.”
Ian guessed Lim Tae-woo’s feelings vaguely and couldn’t say anything else.
“The heavy thing… might be regret, I guess.”
“I guess so.”
They entered the elevator as the door opened and stood shoulder to shoulder.
“Don’t worry too much. Joo-hyuk and Jin-hyuk will do well. You know that.”
“I know.”
“If the group suits them, we can feature them. You too, bro. You can be our tenth member.”
“You guys are seven, why am I the tenth?”
“The eighth and ninth are already there, our managers.”
“Oh.”
Lim Tae-woo chuckled. The elevator door opened and they walked towards the conference room.
“The file name was Untitled earlier, think of a song name.”
“A song name? Well…”
Lim Tae-woo muttered with a confident face after a moment of hesitation.
“The song name is… Diamond.”
“…That’s not bad.”**
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