Asia: We The Fest Rocks Jakarta, Jisan Rock Canceled, Psy Scandal

Indonesia’s biggest music festival, We The Fest, took place the weekend of July 19-21 in downtown Jakarta, attracting a record crowd of 60,000 people from all over Southeast Asia and abroad, as well as a raft of international and local artists performing on four stages. The festival was launched in 2014, when it attracted about 15,000 people.

Among the international headliners who performed were Alvvays, Troye Sivan, Travis, Daniel Caesar, Anne-Marie, Nina Las Vegas, Cigarettes After Sex, Cashmere Cat, 6lack, Rae Sremmurd and Yaeji. In addition to the music, the festival offered films, fashion displays and a lot of local art. The festival organizers, Ismaya Live, have said the festival will definitely return next summer  bigger than ever.

South Korea’s 2019 Jisan Rock Festival was officially canceled July 23, as announced by festival organizer D2 Global Company. According to the announcement, the company said it “lacked perspective reading the trends of today, and that the biggest problem was that it did not communicate enough with the fans.” Beyond that somewhat cryptic explanation, the company did not elaborate any further on the event, which was to take place July 26-28. All tickets would be refunded, and the company would also reimburse any festivalgoers who incurred cancellation fees for lodging, the company says. 

According to the Korea Herald, the announcement came as a great shock to the Korean concert industry. One unidentified artist who was slated to appear told the newspaper that they were only informed of the cancellation the day before. Moreover, there had been no indications that the event would be called off, even though the history of the festival is spotty. The first Jisan Valley Rock Festival was in 2009 in Gyeonggi Province. It relocated in 2013 and later disappeared for a while. In 2016 it moved back to Jisan but didn’t take place in 2018.

Korea Herald suggested that some people felt there was something amiss since Jisan is considered one of the country’s main summer music festivals featuring international artists, but the 2019 edition had only attracted one until the middle of July: King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard.

Local fans of the internationally famous South Korean singer-rapper, Psy, are demanding refunds for his summer concerts after it was revealed that he was involved in a 2014 social gathering with Yang Hyun-suk, former head of top talent agency YG Entertainment, who allegedly entertained investors at the gathering by providing them with prostitutes. Yang has been arrested by South Korean police.

According to the Straits Times, there is apparently a difference of opinion among Psy’s fans as to the extent of his knowledge of the matter at the time. Many say Psy is innocent, that he knew nothing about the solicitation, while some think he may have been acting in cahoots with Yang. At the time, YG was managing Psy, and it’s assumed he was invited to impress the investors. Psy has since left YG and started his own talent agency. 

Prior to Yang’s booking, Psy was reportedly questioned for nine hours by police. He denied that he knew of any improper activities going on at the dinner he attended with Yang and the investors, which included Malaysian businessman Jho Low. South Korean media say that Psy and Yang left the dinner early and together. 

YG has been embroiled in scandals for much of the year, with several of its artists accused of sexual impropriety and drug use. Yang stepped down as the head of the company in June. So far, the scandal has not affected Psy’s own company, P Nation, whhich has said it will honor any requests for refunds from fans who bought tickets to his summer concerts in South Korea.

China News reports that 10,000 people attended a concert in Shanghai on July 19 where both of the headliners were virtual performers: China’s Luo Tianyi and Japan’s Hatsune Miku.

 Each “singer” did at least five songs on their own, some with human partners or choruses. About 10 other virtual singers also performed. Then, at the end of the evening, the two stars performed together on stage the song “B With U” and then a song on the website of Bilibili, the Chinese web-culture community that hosted the concert, with two other virtual singers. The concert lasted three-and-a-half hours.

Hatsune Miki, considered the world’s first “virutal teen idol,” made her debut in 2007, developed by Crypton Future Media using Yamaha’s voice synthesizer software. Luo Tianyi, also modeled after a teenage idol, was also developed by Yamaha but in conjunction with Shanghai Heinian Information Technology Company in 2012. Luo has since become the biggest virtual idol in China.