"Our role model is Rain, our aim this year is the 'Rookie of the Year' award


"To be honest with you, we are under a lot of pressure. Even though we were lucky to be produced by Rain sunbaenim, if we do something wrong, it means that we'd be putting him to shame. So in order not to disappoint anyone, we're trying more than our best whenever we're on stage." (Lee Joon)

Like teacher, like student. Every word that the members of MBLAQ said were filled with passion and strength. Their average age is 20.8 years old. Even though there were some members who could be seen as a 'boy', their determination towards music was so veteran-like.

5 "Rains" have fallen to the world of music. They are Seungho (Yang Seungho, 22), G.O. (Jung Byunghee, 22), Lee Joon (Lee Changsun, 21), Mir (Bang Chulyong, 19) and Chun Doong (Park Sanghyun, 20).

When MBLAQ are on stage, 'Rain' is clearly visible. With their muscular bodies, there is only one word that could describe their performance and that is 'powerful'. The person watching the performance of their hip-hop-influenced song 'Oh Yeah' can only stand and watch in awe.

But their journey towards debut wasn't easy. After endless amount of years as trainees, they started training as MBLAQ a year ago. But Rain's lashing continued.

"In terms of dancing, Rain wants us to to the impossible moves straightaway so it was hard. He's a perfectionist. But I think this gave us the skill of preseverance and trying until we can do something. There are lots of unpredictable situations that could happen on stage but he has given us the power to improvise." (Seungho)

"There was a time when I didn't prepare what he told me to prepare and I seriously got told off. He told us whether we only wanted to release a memorabila album then spend our time being jealous of other singers on TV, and if we didn't want that to happen to us, then we were going to have to try harder. I think he wanted to release the passion in us. Thinking about it now, I think it was a good catalyst." (G.O.

MBLAQ has taken the 'strong performance' approach, separating them from other new idol groups such as Beast. Like "Bad Guy", "How to avoid the Sun" and "Rainism" which consolidated his strong image, Rain has expressed that he wants a strong image unique to MBLAQ.

"If you only look at the melody of "Oh Yeah", it's not normal. I think you can get the real flavour of the song only if you look at the performance whilst listening to it. I think that the advantage us that we do acrobatics and make the performance as strong as possible so that the people watching won't get bored." (Mir)

Even though MBLAQ is a "Beast Idol" similar to 2PM, they are preparing for a different image in the follow-up song 'Good Luv'. They have said that they will turn into the typical 'cute' idol.

"Our aim as a group is to get the 'Rookie of the Year' award. It's not self-admiration, but because we tried our hardest it's a confidence that we have. I think it's important to always show that we're trying hard." (Seungho)

"Our aim is to get closer and closer to Rain." (Lee Joon)



CREDITS: BLAQ'n'white@mblaqattack.com (translation) + SPN E-daily (source)