F.T. Island (Korean: 에프티 아일랜드 Japanese: エフティー・アイランド; stylized as FTISLAND), short for Five Treasured Island, is a five-member South Korean band. The members are consist of Choi Jong Hun (guitar and keyboard), Lee Hongki (lead vocals) Lee Jae Jin (bass and vocals), Song Seung Hyun (guitar and vocals), and Choi Min Hwan (drums). Their debut album, titled "Cheerful Sensibility", was the sixth best-selling album in 2007. Their debut song "Lovesick" topped the K-Pop charts for eight consecutive weeks.[2] Oh Won Bin had been a member of the band up until the beginning of 2009.
2007: Debut and Cheerful Sensibility
Although F.T. Island's first album, Cheerful Sensibility, was scheduled to be released commercially in May 2007, the members appeared on the show "Wanna be my girlfriend?" (Korean: 두근두근 여친만들기) on the Korean television channel MNet. The band also performed on stage live at Rolling Hall and held their first official showcase at Live House Melon-AX, Gwangjang-dong in Seoul on May 27, 2007.[3]
On June 7, 2007 the group performed their debut song Love Sick on the music television program M!Countdown; their debut album, Cheerful Sensibility, was released on the same day.
Cheerful Sensibility combined 13 songs that were loosely divided into two parts, “Emotional Chapter” and “F.T. Island Chapter”, according to the genre of the songs.[4] The “Emotional Chapter” consists of rock ballads. The "F.T. Island Chapter" was produced by the Japanese composers who worked with the Japanese band, SMAP and is composed of a variety of pop rock songs.[5]
Selling over 79,000 copies in 2007, it was the sixth best-selling album of the year.[6] The album was re-released on December 3, 2007, titled The Refreshment, with three extra songs, a photobook, a stack of photocards, and a mixing program called Music 2.0 which allows one to adjust the levels of the instruments and vocals. This edition sold 25,724 copies in December 2007.[6]
[edit]2008: Japanese Debut, Colorful Sensibility, and other activities
After debuting in Korea, FNC Music moved F.T. Island's activities overseas. On March 31, 2008, an autograph session in Malaysia at the Damansara Cineleisure was held, which was to be follow the next day by the group's first concert at the Sunway Lagoon Amphitheater.[7] The performance was cancelled, and their first concert was held in Thailand instead, at the Royal Paragon Hall on April 12, 2008. The band performed songs from their album and showcased their individual talents in their solo performances.[8]
F.T. Island's Japanese debut album, entitled Prologue of F.T. Island, was released on June 7, 2008, with the first single released being Soyogi . The album consists of 8 songs, 2 of which are newer versions of the original songs F.T. Island and Primadonna. The last track, Always Be Mine, is an English version of First Kiss from their debut album (though the lyrics are original). Music videos were also released for Soyogi and Friendship, displaying the band's professional and youthful sides, respectively.
After their promotional activities in Japan ended, the band returned to Korea to release their second Korean album Colorful Sensibility on August 27, 2008. A follow-up EP, Colorful Sensibility Part 2, was released on October 17, 2008.
Later that year, F.T. Island released The One, their first Japanese commercial single, under an indie label AI Entertainment. The single hit #9 on the Oricon daily charts.[9] F&C Music stated that although other Korean bands utilized the assistance of large Japanese record labels to gain popularity, F.T. Island was able to make it onto the charts without any true marketing efforts.[10] The single also was the last official release with member Oh Won Bin before his departure.[11]
[edit]2009: New lineup, Jump Up, Cross & Change, and Japanese singles
On January 28, 2009, it was announced that Oh Won Bin would indeed be leaving the group,[12] with FNC trainee Song Seung Hyun joining as a guitarist and backup vocalist.[13] With the new lineup change, F.T. Island released the music video for their mini-album title song "Bad Woman." They also promoted it on SBS Inkigayo, and two days later, released the band's first Korean mini-album Jump Up.
On April 22, F.T. Island released their second Japanese single, I believe Myself. For the first time, members participated with lyrics and composition. For the song Moonlight Angel, member Lee Jae Jin co-wrote it and leader Choi Jong Hoon co-composed the song. I Believe Myself is the first Japanese single with member Song Seung Hyun. They held their 2009 F.T. Island Tour-I Believe Myself in cities all over Japan during the summer of 2009.[14]
F.T. Island toured parts of Asia which include Singapore, Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, etc. to promote themselves in the summer of 2009. The showcases kicked off in Singapore during June 25 to 27.[15]
While preparing for overseas promotions, the members were in the midst of recording their third album. On July 9, FNC Music released a jacket photo for the upcoming third album called Cross & Change. On the following day, a musc video teaser was released online, featuring kids watching their idols (played by the members themselves) on TV. The title song, called “I Hope/Barae”, was released on July 16.[16] F.T. Island tried out a variety of music styles for Cross & Change; it includes a total of 12 songs, ranging from moving ballads to addictive songs with a bright melody. F.T. Island adopted a new fashion style and concept for the album, using a "retro" and the so-called “Bokgo” approach, which was inspired during the “jeans jeans look” from the 80s in Korea.[17]
F.T. Island released their 3rd Japanese single, Raining, on October 21, 2009. A music video of the single's title track was released. Leader Choi Jong Hoon played the piano for the title song instead of the guitar.[18]
F.T. Island's sub-group: F.T. Triple
The three members Choi Jong Hun, Choi Min Hwan, and Lee Jae Jin formed a sub-group called F.T. Triple. Some of the reasons behind this move were to showcase more of the members' skills and to prevent lead singer, Lee Hongki, from overstraining his voice again (refer to Gayo Daejun Incident under 'Headlines' below). Another reason was to continue promoting F.T. Island while Lee Hongki was busy filming the South Korean drama "You're Beautiful" and while Song Seunghyun was busy with variety shows. At first, this trio was unofficially announced at the Dream Concert in Japan as "A3". They almost named themselves A3 because they all are blood A type. They wanted to keep the F.T. name so they added Triple at the end of it to represent that it is a trio. In F.T. triple, Lee Jaejin, originally in charge of bass for F.T. Island, becomes a guitarist and the lead vocalist; leader Choi Jonghun plays the piano and Choi Min Hwan continues to play the drums. Their first single was titled "Love Letter" and was released with F.T. Island's 2CD Repackaged Album Double Date as a second CD named Two Date that features all F.T. Triple songs.[19]
F.T. Island held a national tour titled, "Men's Stories".The national tour began on November 14, 2009 in Seoul, South Korea. Their hit single from the album, I Hope, was very well received by their fans and the five members planned on showing their life behind the stage along with strong visuals and sounds on a more personal level for the fans. For their concert, F.T. Island emphasized their growth as a band as they begin to shed their boyish charms for a more mature and masculine appeal.[20]
[edit]2010: Major Debut in Japan, Beautiful Journey, and Success in Taiwan
In the months January and February, the boys started touring in Asia. The tour visited Japan, Thailand, Taiwan, Hong Kong, Philippines, and Singapore. Tickets were sold out quickly; representatives of the band believe it was due to the popularity of Lee Hong Ki starring in the drama, "You're Beautiful".
After celebrating their 1000th day in the music industry, they flew to Japan and stayed there until the end of August for their major debut in Japan under the combination of new Japanese label company, Warner Music Japan and their official label company, FNC Music. They also began a new Japanese show which began airing starting 7 April 2010.[21] On May 19, 2010, F.T. Island released their new single "Flower Rock" under Warner Music.[22] "Flower Rock" entered the Oricon daily charts at 3rd position on May 19, 2010, the day of its release, and held the fourth position of that week.[23] On July 14, 2010, F.T. Island released another single named "Brand-new days," which included songs written and composed by the F.T. Island members Song Seung Hyun and Choi Jong Hun. F.T. Island performed a five-city concert tour in Japan after releasing both singles.[24][25] They also performed at the international rock festival "Summer Sonic 2010" in Maishima Arena, Osaka,Japan.[26]
After promotions in Japan, F.T. Island focused on their comeback in Korea in mid-August 2010.[27] Their new mini album "Beautiful Journey" and the music video for their main title song "Love Love Love" were released on August 25, 2010. F.T. Island held their comeback performance in Korean on August 27, 2010. The title song topped many popular music charts in South Korea and also gained international notice, especially in Taiwan.[28] Choi Jong Hoon co-wrote and co-composed one of the songs, titled Don Quixote's Song, making it the first Korean song that includes the composition from F.T. Island itself. During November and December, F.T. Island balanced two separate concerts, the Beautiful Journey Concert and So Today... Concert, in both Korea and Japan.
While promoting their second Korean mini-album, F.T. Island recorded another Japanese single titled So today... to be released in November. All three songs were co-written by Lee Jae Jin; the song,Boom Boom Boom, was composed by Choi Jong Hoon.[29] The single ranked 6th on the Oricon Daily Chart. With F.T. Island’s 3rd single taking the 6th position, they now have a record of all their singles ranking top 10 in the Oricon charts.[30] About 10,000 fans turned up at their promotional events in Osaka and Tokyo on 20 and 21 November.[31]
Due to their immense popularity in Taiwan, F.T. Island held a concert on December 25, celebrating Christmas together with 9000 fans. F.T. Island is Korea’s first rock band to hold a big scale concert in Taiwan and they had no other special request besides asking for the best sound systems and hardware. Former vocalist and guitarist, honoured guest Oh Wonbin, performed his first single as a solo artist and a brand new song, which has yet not been released, at the concert. F.T. Island performed songs in three languages, Korean, Japanese, and Chinese.[32] Though they have only entered the Taiwan music industry for a short period of 10 months, with an album sales record over 100,000, FT Island won favorable comments in the Chinese media.[33] Just for the concert tickets and merchandises alone, the revenue for FTIsland’s [Beautiful Journey] concert have exceeded a total of NT$20Million. They have been named the Korean artistes who earned the most money for the end of 2010 and FTIsland also wished to visit Taiwan again soon.[34] Four main news agencies namely, China Times, Yonhap News, Apple Daily and Liberty Times, covered news on the concert, showing the band’s high popularity. FT Island also broke several records in Taiwan with 500,000 hits on mobile downloads and 10,000,000 hits on music downloads.[35]
[edit]2011–present: Five Treasure Island and Return
On April 20, FTIsland released their 4th major Japanese single Satisfaction with accompanying tracks, I want and Friends, in which Choi Jonghun participated in the composition of both songs. The single topped the Oricon Weekly Charts at 2nd place. They were positioned right after Johnny’s Kanjani8. Their title song “Satisfaction” was also selected to be the ending theme song of the current airing anime “Toriko”, generating high expectation from the public.[36]
On May 18, FTIsland released their first major debut album in Japan, titled Five Treasure Island. The album features songs from singles, Flower Rock, Brand New Days, So Today..., and Satisfaction; it also contains several new tracks, including the OSTs for Japanese drama, "Muscle Girl", in which member Lee Hongki plays lead male role. FTIsland set a record by being the first Korean band to top the Oricon album daily chart at 1st position. Their first Japanese regular album sold 20,410 copies on the first day, attaining the 1st position on the Oricon album daily chart. FTIsland held an album release commemorative event yesterday at Yomiuri Land and shared the joy of their result together with some 5,000 fans. FTIsland started their performance with songs from their past singles and also new album songs like “mirai”, “yume”, “Rock’n'roll”, as well as theme songs “itsuka” and “haruka” from Lee Hongki’s drama, TBS “Muscle Girl”. FTIsland expressed their happiness of attaining the 1st position on the Oricon chart, “It’s unbelievable that we’ve got the 1st position. We will work harder in future to bring even better music. Please give us lots of love and support.”[37]
FTIsland returns to South Korea with mini-album Return. The album was released on May 24 with title track, Hello Hello. The album features five songs, one being I Confess, which leader Choi Jonghun said he wrote with their fans in mind.
