DJ Sharkin. 

Although not popular enough to be on the Korean music billboard, he was a somewhat known artist in the EDM scene. During one of his live streams on social media, a comment stood out to him. 

“All music sounds the same these days, and there’s nothing worth listening to? I totally agree. But that’s how EDM evolved into what it is now. It’s the same for electronica or hip-hop. Hasn’t it gotten to the point where EDM is basically mainstream in pop music now?”

His straightforward answer came easily from his experience hosting radio shows.

“What you’re looking for is something fresh and different, right? Oh! I have just the thing for you. There’s an artist who gives off that old French house vibe. No, not the current stuff. It’s French house from its prime time. What? You think prime time is now? Yeah, right. I don’t think so.”

Sharkin and the viewers laughed as they exchanged banter. 

“Yeah, you guessed it. Daft Punk. That superfan of theirs came up with something new again. Truly great artists. Seriously, how are their superfans all geniuses? I came across this one when I was searching for Daft Punk for the first time in a while. Oh, you say Daft Punk doesn’t have a genre? Yep, Daft Punk is all about interpretation. That’s just how this field is. Apart from the clones, talking about genre gets complicated.”

‘Yeah, so who is it!’ Viewers clamored.

“Okay, okay. I’ll get to the point. It’s Yumi. Search for Yumi on YouTube. Just a heads-up, though. If you’re the know-it-all type that likes to nitpick at every little thing, don’t bother listening. She’s finding her own style right now, so I would suggest you don’t interfere with that. She’s not famous yet. But, she’s ready to become famous any time. Even if it seems like I’m not active in music these days, I’m actually hard at work, you know? I go to lots of parties, and do you know how hard I dig for–“

Although the conversation veered off, some viewers began searching for Yumi. Ten minutes later, as Sharkin was wrapping up his stream, viewers started to mention Yumi in the chat.

– Yumi is actually so inspiring. How old is that song? I’d rather listen to the dubstep.

– I’ve got nothing to say to you 🙂 Yeah, you keep listening to dubstep.

– Yumi is a genius. I just listened to her music, and it’s literally endless.

Seeing this, Sharkin added a comment.

“Didn’t I say to not listen if you were gonna start talking about stuff like if her songs are big room, moombahton, dubstep, or jungle terror? To be honest, Yumi could release an album with those songs. The original songs were completely overhauled, and you know what the best part is? She remixed Daft Punk’s second album. It’s the very one that sparked controversy with its excessive sampling. If Yumi released those songs as an original album, would it spark a Daft Punk sampling controversy? I’m joking, of course. Hahaha. Anyway, I’m signing off now.”

Once the live stream ended, even those who hadn’t checked out Yumi began looking for her YouTube handle. Though there were only about 1.2k viewers, they were avid EDM lovers who tuned into DJ Sharkin’s live streams.

It was inevitable that they were active in various EDM communities.

***

“Boss, I feel like you’re very busy these days. Maybe we should consider hiring more staff.”

“It’s just because I was helping LOAN with going independent. It’s not that urgent yet.”

Originally, I intended to help on my own, but thanks to Hae-yeol’s assistance, things wrapped up quickly. Now, all that was left was to work on Hee-yeon’s songs.

Someday, we would need to hire more staff and find a better practice room. For now, though, things were manageable.

“We’re also getting quite a few offers for interviews and photoshoots. Wouldn’t we be able to handle everything if we hired more staff?”

The number of requests asking for Hee-yeon and Yoon-jung skyrocketed after the recent hype surrounding them. And I politely declined all of it.

“Having no staff doesn’t affect my decision about those things. Right now, Hee-yeon has her hands full working on the song, and Yoon-jung still needs to grow more. To the industry, Yoon-jung is seen as just a ‘famous streamer’ right now. They only want to take a piece of the cake from all the hype. If she does those things now, it’ll only make her value go down.”

“Would her value really go down from this? We could also take advantage of the hype and then move on. I think it would be beneficial for us.”

“Yeah, usually it would be. But not for Yoon-jung. She’s really into dancing right now. She’s busy creating choreography and shooting videos. When someone is growing, you just let them grow. Making her do other things would be a loss. It’s best to leave her as she is right now.”

Jung-han looked confused, but there would be a day when he understood what I meant. Because Yoon-jung wasn’t just a one-hit-wonder kind of celebrity.

Instead of dispersing her focus for short-term gains, it was a hundred – if not a thousand – times better to let her focus on dancing so she could grow.

“Then, I’ll be going to pick up Hee-yeon,” Jung-han said.

When Jung-han left, I suddenly had nothing to do. So, I spent some time searching for Hee-yeon and checking out Yoon-jung’s YouTube. I decided to look at Yumi’s YouTube and was stunned.

“She’s already uploaded twenty-five videos?”

Her speed was astounding. However, her view count was even more impressive. Even though her channel had only been up for a short time, her latest video had nearly 40k views. 

As I sat up and examined the videos more closely, I was completely taken aback.

“Why are they all Daft Punk?”

She remixed fourteen songs from their second album into twenty-two songs, and one song from the third album into two, plus one original song I had asked her to upload. It was 25 songs in total.

Daft Punk was certainly a legendary duo that brought EDM into mainstream music, but the number of views didn’t make sense. There were countless videos remixing Daft Punk’s music, after all.

‘It would be a different story if this channel had been around for a while, but this channel is basically straight from the oven and already getting this many views.’

To solve this mystery, I scoured the videos and comments. In every video, one name was consistently mentioned.

– Came from DJ Sharkin. Yumi is an incredibly talented artist. As someone from France, I support her.

– Ignore anyone calling this old fashioned. They can go listen to trashy music at the clubs and drink their alcohol lol

– Yumi’s remixing speed is scary fast and it’s not as if she’s uploading half-baked stuff.

– I can’t wait for her to remix the fourth album. Thank you DJ Sharkin for introducing Yumi 🙂

– Why hasn’t she done the first album? Is there a special reason? I really want to hear Yumi’s remix of ‘Da Funk’

– Damn! We’ve got a growing beast on our hands. Why are Daft Punk fans such monsters?

└ Simple. Because Daft Punk is the king of monsters.

So, there was a clear reason. It had become a bit of a sensation overseas.

“Overseas…”

Maybe this was inevitable. The EDM genre received much more attention abroad than locally. Having overseas interest from the moment Yumi delved into EDM was almost a given.

However, one question remained.

“I clearly told her to explore a lot of genres. Why is she sticking to EDM? And only Daft Punk?”

Could it be that she was continuing with it only because I complimented her initial Daft Punk remix? It seemed better to ask her directly, so I headed straight to the practice room since it was around the time she would be there.

As I descended the villa stairs and opened the door, a warm, thick air greeted me. Yoon-jung was practicing singing in one corner while Yumi and Jin-ah were dancing in front of a full-length mirror.

I felt a pang of guilt over their poor practice environment.

“Hello.”

“Huff, huff. You came?”

“Did you come here empty-handed?”

Ignoring Jin-ah’s last comment, I motioned for Yumi. She trotted over and looked up at me with curious eyes. 

“Yumi, did you know your YouTube views are going up?” I asked, seeing her innocent expression.

“Really? Well, since I uploaded videos, someone’s bound to watch them, right?”

She was clueless, and I couldn’t help but laugh. Right. That wasn’t the important thing right now.

“Why are you only doing Daft Punk songs?”

“Um—” she started and blinked. “Just because? They’re considered masterpieces, so I tried it. You told me to try various genres, so I was planning to do hip-hop next.”

“Just because? EDM was just a phase?” I asked, my eyes opened wide. 

Yumi’s head shrunk back.

“So, Yumi, you’re saying you didn’t get fixated on Daft Punk but just followed my advice to explore various genres, which is why you remixed twenty four Daft Punk songs?”

It was clear she wasn’t sure if she had done something wrong or not. After hesitating, she spoke slowly.

“Yes. Should I try a different genre now? I was just about to switch genres anyway. Should I change genres with each new song?”

I couldn’t count how many times her talent had surprised me. Yumi hadn’t broken her promise with me. She had simply started with EDM and focused on Daft Punk because their albums were renowned.

I folded my arms and pondered. Her talent was growing with no limit in sight, and I needed to decide on a direction. Should I nudge her further into EDM to achieve some results or have her expand into other genres? The decision wasn’t easy. 

In front of me, Yumi’s head shrunk further.

“Yumi, you’re not in trouble,” I said.

“Really?”

“Yeah, I was just wondering if it would be good to continue EDM since it felt like we’re getting some reaction from it, or if we should try another genre.” 

“Oh.”

“But I can’t really come to a decision. What do you want to do?”

“In that case, I want to do something that’ll help our group!” She said, peering at me with a twinkle in her eyes.

“Something that will… help the group?”

“Yes! I’m growing my song-making skills to help our group, right?” Yumi elaborated with little hesitation.

She really was commendable. However, I was aiming for an Avengers team. While she was right that I was planning for her to be in charge of writing and composing songs for the group, Yumi’s personal success would be a big help to the group.

“Also, I did compose something. What should I do with it?”

“What? You haven’t uploaded it?”

“No. I need to record the singing.”

When I said I could just listen to it first, she shook her head.

“Listening to this one ahead of time won’t help much. The singing part is going to be a bit unique.”

I immediately understood what she meant when I recalled the songs she had been arranging. It felt similar to ‘Harder Better Faster Stronger’ and ‘Technologic.’ It meant the vocals of the song would be used more like an instrument than a voice, with various effects added to it.

‘Then, I guess it wouldn’t be too late to decide after recording whether to have her delve more into EDM or expand into other areas.’

“Alright. Let’s do that. Do you want to handle the vocals, or should we call someone else?”

“Jin-ah.”

I made eye contact with Jin-ah, who had been eavesdropping with both ears open. She looked surprised. Yumi, seemingly unaware, continued speaking unperturbed.

“Jin-ah has a husky voice, right? It sounds good in both rap and singing parts, so I think it’ll fit perfectly here, too.”

Jin-ah’s nostrils flared at the compliment, and she bit her lips to suppress a smile.

“Jin-ah. Come over here.”

“What? Why?”

“Don’t pretend you didn’t hear. Come quickly.”

“What are you talking about! I was practicing hard!”

Jin-ah rushed over, unable to control the corners of her mouth from lifting.

“I’ll schedule the recording, so get familiar with the singing part.”

“Why a recording all of a sudden?”

“Oh, stop it!” 

“There’s actually no need to get familiar with it. Just a few lines will do,” Yumi interjected.

Yumi demonstrated on the spot, and Jin-ah’s face quickly filled with disappointment.

“What?! This isn’t singing!”

“It is. Voice. Singing. Don’t you know?”

“Urgh…!” Jin-ah glared at Yumi’s playful teasing.

Jin-ah might not have known, but I did. Even if she recorded a single line, her voice would be stamped through the entire track. That was how most Daft Punk-style music worked.

“Yumi, so you just need Jin-ah’s voice, right? No need to rent the studio for very long?”

“This time, I think we’ll need a lot of equipment. I want to do some detailed mixing, too. Is that okay?”

“Mixing?”

“Yes. The equipment we use at the dorm has its limits. It doesn’t come out as well as I’m imagining it would.”

“Then we could just leave it to a profes… Actually, I got it. I’ll get more equipment for you.”

Since EDM was all about the sound, she would be sticking close to the engineer mixing the music. If that was going to happen anyway, it might be best for her to learn it herself this time.

There was a studio we could use for free anyway.

“Hello, Director Hae-yeol? Is there a recording studio left over?”

—

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