(G)I-DLE's Soyeon apologizes for plagiarism

Soyeon of K-pop act (G)I-DLE / Courtesy of Cube Entertainment

By Dong Sun-hwa

Soyeon of K-pop girl group (G)I-DLE apologized Monday for plagiarizing some parts of boy band ATEEZ's 2019 release, "Wave," to compose her song, "Sun."

Her apology came one day after she unveiled her self-written track, "Sun," on MBC's audition program, "My Teenage Girl." In its last episode that aired Sunday, Soyeon, who appeared as a mentor for female singer hopefuls, gifted "Sun" for them to perform in the finale. Some viewers, however, pointed out that the tune sounds similar to ATEEZ's "Wave," which was written by producer Eden-ary.

"I want to apologize for sparking controversy," Soyeon wrote on her fan community, admitting her fault. "I belatedly realized that some melodies in 'Sun' sound similar (to those of 'Wave.') So I informed the composer of 'Wave' about the situation and made an apology. In the future, I will take extra care."

When "Sun" was first unveiled on Sunday, Soyeon and producer Pop Time were identified as its only composers. But after some online users accused Soyeon of plagiarism, the name of Eden-ary was suddenly added to the credits.

But Eden-ary's agency, KQ Entertainment, insisted that neither the producer nor the company agreed on this.

"The incident took place without any prior discussion," KQ said in a statement. "We hope the incorrect information gets fixed as soon as possible."

In response to KQ's statement, Cube also came up with a press release, saying, "KQ told us that it did not want to include the producer's name in the credits about one hour before the further release of 'Sun.' So we tried to remove his name, but we were too late ... We sincerely apologize for making a change in the credits without KQ's consent. We will make sure that no incident like this recurs in the future."

Soyeon debuted as part of (G)I-DLE in 2018 with the single, "Latata." She took part in the creative process of the group's hits like, "Lion" (2019) and "Hwaa" (2021).

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