In the third Lee Hi teaser photo released through the YG Life Blog, fans finally got answers to the questions raised about her come back in the first two teasers.
The first teaser showed three dates March 1st, March 7th, and March 21st leading fans to wonder if YG was giving three possible dates that her next releases could be coming out on. The next teaser showed “mini? single? album?” making many wonder what exactly Lee Hi would be coming back with–only a single, a mini, or a full blown album? With teaser 3, we now learn that at 00:00 on March 1st, Lee Hi’s pre-release song “Turn it Up” will be released on YG Life. So does that mean the a mini album will be released on the 7th and a full album will be released on the 21st? Only YG knows.
There has been much anticipation over the new maknae of YG entertainment’s next release after her successful debut with “1. 2. 3. 4.” But with her successful solo debut and news of her comeback came controversy, when it was announced last week that the much loved girl group from season 1 of the popular variety show K-pop Star, Su Pearls, had been disbanded and that the contract for all the members other than that of Lee Hi had been terminated. Not many details were given about why the disbandment occurred, but some are blaming YG with not caring about the group after Lee Hi’s solo success, and that YG still had its other rookie girl group in the works. I think it’s safe to say that the reason that groups are able to stay together and move along in the competition in season 2 of K-pop Star is in large thanks due to the popularity of Su Pearls.
YG Entertainment is infamous for pushing back release dates so anything is possible. And it definitely looks like it will be “The March of YG” as not only will Lee Hi make a comeback: Gummy just released a comeback song, “Snow Flower,” for the OST of the K-drama That Winter, The Wind Blows and will make her first comeback performance this Sunday on Inkigayo; Se7en will hold his goodbye concert Thank U on March 9th in Seoul which will be one of his last performances before enlisting sometime this year; Daesung‘s Japanese solo album dropped yesterday and with the release of the album it was also announced that he will be adding another 21 dates to the tour making the total 25 concert appearances; 2NE1 is also supposed to make their long awaited comeback in March; and G-Dragon will start off his solo world tour on March 30th in Seoul at the Olympic Gynamstics Arena. For a company notorious for only promoting one artist at a time, this seems overly ambitious.
