Jonghyun: Korean Pop's Kind Auteur

On December 18, 2017 the Kpop community suffered an immense loss. Kim Jong-hyun, member of the internationally popular male group SHINee, was found dead in his apartment at the far too young age of 27, a victim of suicide. Shock, grief, and sadness extended beyond that of his immediate family and friends it is a tragedy that is still being felt across the globe to this very day.

My relationship with Jonghyun was of the most parasocial variety. I knew of Jonghyun only through his contributions in SHINee. His passing affected me not nearly to the extent of his family, friends, or fans. As someone who, at the time, was struggling with suicidal ideation among many other mental health problems I felt compelled to learn more about him than just association via SHINee. What I found was a wonderful and kind hearted soul, a brilliant man with emotional intelligence and consideration to rival anyone, and above all else someone who was proud to create and even more proud of his creations.

Jonghyun’s art for me could be best described as “comfortable agony.” Smoothness and sadness was his creative peak and comfort zone. When he was at his most brutally honest lyrically and smartest use of instrumentation. And it was something that he valued as highly as anything in his life. Unlike many others, not only in his industry but beyond, he never used creation as a means to an end. Refining his craft to a needlepoint precision, as anyone who is truly passionate about art would tell you, it's a laborious, sometimes exhaustive process, and one that they'll constantly find purposeful drive within. To continue challenging perceptions and asking the difficult questions of the subject. He had an ability to connect with the listener the way that I believe no other Korean pop idol has ever been able to match.    

To give an example, one of Jonghyun’s best and most impactful songs, Diphylleia Grayi is about how life is constant cycle of being stripped bare by emotions and pain and having life lose its color. Using the skeleton flower as a living analog with the emotional component that any human being can identify with. As time passes one will gain that color back and recover but ultimately the cycle will repeat itself infinitely throughout our lives. Our "emotional petals" that are weary and dying, ultimately will. We have to let go, but in letting go we can continuously create ourselves anew. More aware and introspectively smart than before. The way he repeats “time passes” to end the song, each time becoming more out of breath and staggered until he leaves it unresolved it to convey so much exhaustion and heartache. It's a cycle any human being can relate to, expressed through smart use of vocal tone and dynamics. It is the personal touches he put in his pieces that tethered me to his work exponentially more, that got me to want to know more about his creative process and at the very least the aspects of himself he was not afraid to show. Aspects that others in public spaces are discouraged from doing so, especially in the realm of Kpop idols, with which mental health's ugliest forms are taboo at best and sinful at worst. Tainting the image of "perfection" companies desperately desire to have their employees viewed in. Jonghyun knew he wasn't perfect, and was proud of his imperfections, regardless of what his company wanted him to project.

All this was achieved under the umbrella of SM Entertainment, a record company who is notorious for being extremely strict with their employees and the direction of their careers. How Jonghyun was able to wrestle complete creative control of his music from them is impressive on its own but the fact that he was able to produce what, in my opinion, are real creative triumphs makes it all the more fascinating. No wonder he was proud of himself. So many arguably more well-known performers with even more industrial pull weren't even able to wrestle creative control out of the palms of SM's management at the time, BoA, one of the most influential female soloists ever comes to mind.

I can never claim to have ever truly “known” Jonghyun. I knew what he felt comfortable with me seeing. Nothing more. Anyone outside of his family and closest friends who tells you otherwise is deluding themselves. There is no right or wrong way to remember someone who has passed away and of course I will not speak for anyone, especially those who have passed on. 

With all of that in mind, I want to think that Jonghyun would sincerely appreciate how I’m choosing to remember him. A remarkable person who was so proud of what he did his posthumous album release was titled “Poet | Artist.” A creator who made art for his radio listeners when they were feeling isolated and lost in life and understood the value of it. One that was not afraid to be personally vulnerable through his lyrical and songwriting ability, that constantly pushed back against the standards of the industry and society in which he lived in, that he never allowed to take the best parts of him. The parts that made him Korean pop’s most important, kind, and caring, auteur.

You did well, Kim Jong-hyun.