One of South Korea’s most unique and engaging exports, The Rose bring their mould-breaking, alternative-leaning sound to The Indigo O2.
It was 8:02 when The Rose began their show at the Indigo O2, and I was rather confused. It was dark, and mist shrouded four mics and an acoustic setup in front of a drawn curtain. A deadpan, robotic voice issued quippy instructions:
“Photography and videography at this concert is completely…up to you.”
“There may be loud sounds throughout the performance, so please be thoroughly surprised.”
By 8:06, however, I decided I would gladly pay money to come see them again.
For the uninitiated, The Rose is made up of Woosung, Dojoon, Hajoon and Taegyeom (formerly Jaehyong): four very pretty, very talented Korean men who sing, play instruments, and write their own music. So they’re a K-pop group, right? Not quite.
It’s an easy assumption. They’re Korean. They perform. They’re (have I mentioned?) very pretty. But contrary to immediate impressions, The Rose is simply just a group of lads who love to make music, most of which just happens to be in Korean.
I say this because I went in only really knowing one of their songs — “Back To Me,” a heartfelt indie-rock anthem with a soaring, chantable chorus — and was completely thrown off when the first three tracks of the concert turned out to be mellow, yearning ballads played by very dressed down band members on two acoustic guitars and a cajon. Don’t get me wrong, it was genuinely lovely.
The audience listened quietly, which is not usually what one would hope for at a concert, but the silence felt more reverential than dismissive. By the third song, “The Definition of Ugly Is”, people were singing along and cheering every time vocalists Woosung and Dojoon hit a harmony. The pair blended well together, trading soulful solos — soul-os, if you will (I will not, on second reading of this sentence).
A rousing rendition of their upbeat track “Tomorrow” raised the energy levels; they had previously remained stoically emo, notwithstanding the muffled chuckle at a solitary voice screaming “I FUCKING LOVE YEWW” very conspicuously into the stillness.
This is not The Rose’s first rodeo in London, or even their fifth. The two nights at the Indigo O2 this week came after seven London performances in the eight years since their debut: impressive numbers for a self-produced indie Korean rock band whose members started out busking on the streets.
“[Our first gig at the University of London] was the time I recognised you can hurt your ears with human beings screaming out loud,” said Dojoon during their first break in the set. “Yeah, you guys did a great job… back then,” continued Woosung pointedly, provoking cheers from the crowd. He waved them off. “It doesn’t count when I tell you to do it.”
After the acoustic set, the band moved into their signature rock sound in a cosy bedroom backdrop, complete with bed, houseplant, window, and graffiti-ed piano. With Hajoon (“our sexy drummer”) on drums, Taegyeom on bass, Dojoon on piano and guitar, and Woosung on guitar, each of the four members was playing an instrument at all times, which meant that there was little to no choreography that one would expect from a K-pop group (which, again, The Rose is not). The entirely English “Back To Me” was an immediate crowd pleaser, as was “Alive”, their most sonically aggressive track of the night, built around distorted guitars and an unpolished, almost snarling vocal tone that broke the set’s earlier softness.
A large proportion of the audience is made up of fans who have already seen them in concert before. “I watched one of their live concerts online and thought, this is lit”, 26-year-old Cair Fitzpatrick told me. “They’re so down to earth, you know they’re going to tell you off if you do something stupid, instead of being like ‘Oh, everything’s lalala’,” adds 33-year-old Rachael, who’s seen them twice in concert already.
Unlike many Korean boy bands whose members are barely out of their teens, The Rose members are aged from 30 to 32 — a slightly more age-appropriate match for a crowd that looked solidly over 21. Then again, one fan was there on her sixtieth birthday, so who’s to say.
A big draw for many is the amount of talking they do from the stage. Fluent and impossibly charming English speakers, Woosung and Dojoon shouldered most of the crowd interactions, which were considerably funnier and more comprehensive than the average K-pop concert. It also helped that the setting was more intimate than the average K-pop concert, which the band said was a deliberate choice. In Woosung’s words, “All the dads on their phones right now, we see you.”
They soon moved back to their more emotional, soft rock songs, which have lyrics like “Deep inside my broken mind, I’m haunted by the things I’ll find” (Eclipse) and “Staying up late at night/Imagining all kinds of settings/Dreaming about my life/Everything seemed so possible then/Now I don’t even dream” (Childhood), touching on themes like loneliness and regret. By now, I’d spotted even a couple of dads nodding along.
Although the graphic visuals were stunning and the set quite detailed, it wasn’t the most slickly produced show, which the band seemed fine with. There were pad-filled silences while they drank water, and a notable absence of potentially seizure-inducing strobe lights every five seconds. The quartet powered on even through a couple of technical glitches that turned the music off for some seconds of “Never Mind” and “Wonder”. Fortunately, the issue had the inadvertent effect of proving they were, in fact, performing 100% live, which is sadly not a given in concerts these days.
Before closing out, there was a bit more talking, including a cryptic comment during “Cosmos” when Woosung said, “It doesn’t matter what is blue and what is red. We’re all just humans sharing experiences.”
Now, this could’ve been a nod to politics in the US, where he grew up, or in South Korea, where idols often avoid wearing political colours during election season. Or it could’ve meant nothing at all, because Korean artists aren’t exactly known for making political statements.
Either way, the band had the crowd back in the palm of their hands by the end, finishing with a heavily John Lennon-inspired “O” from their newest album, WRLD.
By 9:45, I was already googling next tour dates. And if you’ve been sleeping on the very wholesome, very talented, rather funny The Rose, I would advise doing the same ASAP.
Words – Hannah Abraham
Photography – Ryan Coleman
