your korean bias

JYJ’s Jaejoong recently sat down with Hankooki for an lengthy interview, where he opened up to talk about a variety of personal matters such as dating, his Twitter account, and his music career.

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Jaejoong had just finished another interview with a different newspaper company at a cafe in Seoul when he met with Hankooki, and at the time, he looked bright and happy as he had “drunk a few glasses of wine.”

While on their way to a pub in Samsong-dong for the interview, Jaejoong began to share his thoughts on the recent Japanese earthquake and radioactive problem as a way to ‘break the ice’ in the car. Surprised by his considerably profound opinions on the matter, the interviewer asked, “Do you read a lot of books?”, to which the singer answered, “Rather than books, I learn a lot from other people.”

After arriving at the pub, Jaejoong put down a total of six cellphones on the aluminum table, one of which include the phone he uses in Japan. He explained that each phone is for business-related use, and doesn’t own a particular phone just for family. Jaejoong also revealed that there was a time when he deleted over 1,000 contacts, saying, “As I kept plowing through my troubles with my own strength, I realized that I had become distant with a few people. I didn’t keep in contact out of my gloom, which is why I think I have a smaller number of people around me for support now… But with that being said, I still have my members and fans.”

Within Jaejoong’s words also contained a deeper level of complications and hardships. The biography on his personal Twitter reads ‘JYJ from 東方神起 always keep the faith‘, and on the interview day, Jaejoong tweeted ‘JYJ.‘. The singer explained, “The fact that TVXQ was my first is definite, and that will never change. There’s no other reason behind it. It’s the same as for my ‘JYJ.’; when I woke up in the morning, I felt that my whole life was about ‘JYJ’, which is why I changed it. The period, or full stop? Well, that really has no meaning behind it… haha.”

During his other interviews on the same day, Jaejoong openly confessed that he’s dated a total of four times. He also revealed a few complicated stories regarding his family, but emphasized that he wanted to focus on talking about ‘music’.

“I learned a lot after being given the role of executive director for a stage performance in Thailand. When I was given that role, I had a lot of worries. If it goes well, it’s thanks to the staff, if it turns out bad, it would’ve been my fault. I wanted to take full responsibility for everything. Before the concert began, I went early to carefully check everything from the arrangement to the stage timings. It was a relief that it finished well, but to be honest, it was thanks to the huge help of Junsu and Yoochun, haha.”

JYJ held their ‘World Tour 2011′ in Thailand last February and March at Bangkok’s Impact Arena for over 22,000 fans. With the help of other staff members, Jaejoong created of the lighting, traffic flow and outfits for the concert from scratch. He even used stop watches in order to directly check the perfect timing of how long they have backstage to get ready for their next stage.

“Since I am a singer, there are a lot of times when I think, ‘Ah, I wonder what it’d be like if we had something like this’. If I get to become the director more frequently, don’t you reckon I’ll soon be able to create an even more complete stage?”

Jaejoong also expressed, “The fans would’ve felt it too, but I think our music have changed very slightly. We never used to have a song like ‘Fallen Leaves’ before. It’s true that we were hesitant on whether we could pull off a song without a beat. We’re thinking of learning more about harmonics in order to keep pursuing change. After producing songs by ourselves, we felt the need to learn more about musical theory as our background.”

As time went on, the soju bottle began to empty, and Jaejoong’s words became more genuine than light-hearted. He began to express his inner thoughts on the situation with his former agency, colleagues, and the juniors who are changing, and talked about the wall that is slowly forming due to his sufferings and scars. Jaejoong consistently expressed that he wishes to participate in a variety of activities and promotions like the other members.

Jaejoong hoped that once the controversy with his former agency died down a bit, he would be able to meet his fans frequently via TV broadcast. However, his hopes have yet to be fulfilled.  When asked if he was lonely, he laughed and answered, “Where and how can I meet with my fans? To be honest, most of my worries are based on just that. I believe that it’ll turn out ok. I’m planning to sing for the rest of my life, so it’s not like I can get tired of it, haha.”

by: woon

sources: Allkpop and Hankooki