22
- 3 months ago
"It made me feel like I have hope…like I can reach for something that feels so impossible." Just as Arden Cho was about to retire from acting and EJAE was on the brink of feeling defeated, 'KPop Demon Hunters' came into their lives. EJAE and Arden breaks down their entire process for the groundbreaking movie, from the first voice note they recorded, understanding what Rumi's character is all about, what it means to them to represent their Korean heritage and so much more.
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00:00Things were not working out, no matter how much I worked hard, trying to be perfect.
00:04It's just not working and I think Golden kind of was the song I needed at that time.
00:09And so when singing it, I naturally kind of cried.
00:14And I feel like it helped me feel like there's some hope and maybe I can reach for something that feels so impossible.
00:21Hi, I'm EJ.
00:22Hi, I'm Arden Cho.
00:24And this is how we became Rumi in K-pop Demon Hunters.
00:30I kind of got on the project before the script was written.
00:38Yeah, it was a very small team back then and Maggie and Chris told me about the plot of the movie and I fell in love instantly.
00:44You know the struggle that Rumi goes through, the duality of things and trying to accept all parts of herself.
00:51That was definitely something that hit a nerve.
00:54Also just like the fact that it's a big animated film based in Korea is like the first time I've ever heard of one.
01:07So I was like definitely right on it.
01:10I think for me, I had basically retired and I was like, I was like, I'm done.
01:14I traveled, I did all the bucket list things.
01:17And I remember my team was shocked because they were just like, wait, what do you mean?
01:21There's still other opportunities.
01:22But I think I just felt so discouraged that my heart had left.
01:26But then my agent would send me things here and there and be like, what about this?
01:30What about this?
01:31And K-pop Demon Hunters was one of those projects that when it came in my inbox and I was like, wait, Maggie Kang.
01:37Oh, Kang is she.
01:39So Kang is a Korean last name.
01:41My mom's a Kang.
01:42And so I was like, oh my gosh, she's Korean.
01:44And then for me, it was like, I would love to be Celine.
01:47I thought it was so cool and I didn't even consider anything else.
01:50And I did a voice note for my Celine audition.
01:53I was in a hotel.
01:54I think I was in Korea at the time.
01:56And that became, I guess, something that made them think Rumi.
02:02And I was so excited because I didn't even consider that I would be right for Rumi.
02:06I listened to it recently.
02:07And it was really funny because I was like, in my mind, I had done like a very mature, like older voice.
02:14And I listened to it and I go, oh, it sounds like Rumi.
02:17But that was my first audition.
02:20And that's what got me the callback for Rumi.
02:23Yeah, I mean, something about voice memos.
02:25You know, I wrote golden in a voice memo.
02:27Voice memo, I know.
02:28Those voice notes.
02:29I got a call from my producer and they asked me, hey, should you be down to sing for Rumi?
02:35It was in the midst of singing all these demos.
02:38Amazing millions of demos.
02:41And I was just like, of course, like, I love the, you know, I love Rumi, the character herself.
02:47And I connect with her so much and being able to emote her emotions through singing, a huge honor.
02:54And also was quite efficient because, you know, since I wrote a lot of songs, it was just kind of a easy transition into singing for Rumi.
03:03My callback was in person.
03:05And I remember I was in Korea at the time and they gave me the option.
03:07They were like, do you want to do your callback on Zoom?
03:09You know, having experienced 20 plus years in the business doing in front and behind, I was like, ooh, in-person auditions are like the way.
03:17And so I remember flying in for that.
03:19And after that first audition, I was like, ooh, I feel like I know Rumi.
03:24But I think maybe auditioning for Celine helped that because it helped me understand more Rumi because you know what I'm talking about.
03:32Yeah, 100%.
03:33I can't really share some of this, but I know EJ knows.
03:36EJ knows the secret.
03:43Something I love to do is obviously when you read the script, I love like breaking it down, scribbling everything and writing notes and asking like, you know, where I'm coming from, right, as the character.
03:53And it's so funny because I feel like with Sony and Netflix, it was so like top, top secret.
03:58We weren't allowed to like print it out.
04:00So I remember like writing down as much as I could in some of the scenes and then we'd go in and sometimes they'd be different.
04:06And again, with voiceover and animation, it's like ever changing and developing as we go.
04:10They're stealing the souls of our fans.
04:12They're stealing the souls of our fans.
04:14You know, I think as an actor, our responsibility is bringing out the soul and the heart and maybe the vulnerability, maybe the pain.
04:22And so I think I was really trying to understand who she was in wanting to be accepted, you know, wanting to be whole and loved as who she is.
04:33And I feel like her relationships with the girls, Huntrix and relationship with Celine and then with Chinoo, sort of the first to see who she is and accept and protect her.
04:45I worked on a lot of what those relationships meant and who they were more so than, I guess, the tone of my voice, which that I can thank Maggie and Chris for really directing and helping.
04:57Cause they'd be like, wait, do that again.
04:58But like your lowest register or like do that again, but more like this.
05:02And sometimes you just do it and they're like, oh, that that's it.
05:05Do that.
05:06Yeah.
05:07And I'm like, oh, what was I doing?
05:08I'm like, I think that was just me.
05:10And so I think in the end, there's still so much of us that just comes out.
05:15The first demo was actually How It's Done demo, but it wasn't called How It's Done.
05:20How It's Done went through so many transitions.
05:24I think like eight titles.
05:25I don't know how many titles.
05:26There's so many.
05:27The very first version was like 2020.
05:30Your Idol was the second and then the mantra.
05:34And then Golden was actually the last song of the whole film that we wrote.
05:38Well, for How It's Done, it was kind of like, again, just a whole process for years.
05:42Kind of came back, like lost it, did the other song and then came back to that.
05:46Like there's a lot of back and forth.
05:48Again, very collaborative effort of everything.
05:50You actually hear a lot of the original melodies.
05:52The dun dun dun was definitely one.
05:58And then the first verse.
06:05That's all.
06:08That whole thing was in their original demo.
06:11But yeah, that was the first song.
06:12General like freestyle, the dun dun dun came.
06:15And that was always so hooky.
06:16And we're trying to figure out how to make dun dun work.
06:19Whether it be like, is it dun dun dun, like dun dun dun dun.
06:22And like that kind of vibe.
06:23Or is it like other words?
06:24And like How It's Done kind of like, I heard from something like on TikTok probably.
06:28And I go, that's how it's done.
06:30And I was like, wait.
06:31How it's done, dun dun.
06:32And once we got the concept down, all the lyrics just came flowing.
06:38How did the Fit Check for the Napalm Era line come down?
06:41Fit Check for the Napalm Era.
06:43When I write, I kind of just freestyle on top of the track.
06:47And I literally went, and this was like live on Zoom, with Mark, my amazing co-writer.
06:52And I was like,
06:54Fit Check for the Napalm Era.
06:58And then he goes, EJ, did you say Napalm Era?
07:02And I'm like, no, what is that?
07:04And he was like, that's genius when you put that down.
07:06And I'm like, okay.
07:08And then Mark just, you know, made the genius, coined the Napalm Era, genius line.
07:14Did not know that would stick, but it worked.
07:17But that's like such a fan favorite.
07:19I didn't know that would be the fan favorite, to be honest.
07:21And then like For Your Idol was the same concept, laying a bunch of melodies on the track.
07:26And I was really inspired by the whole kind of like cathedral, like, oh, oh, oh.
07:36I added a lot of the harmonies.
07:40And Ian Eisendrath and I like kind of collaborated with a bunch of the vocal production of that.
07:44You know, with Mark, we were just kind of figuring out fun lyrics, lots of puns in that.
07:48Thank you for the pain, cause it got me going viral.
07:51I can be the star, you rely on you.
07:53And with Golden, the famous story of going to the dentist and writing the melody of that,
08:01that came in the car.
08:04And it kind of like, again, if the track is so good, the inspiration comes quite instantly.
08:09And then the first thing I heard was like...
08:16And the second one was...
08:22And then what's crazy is when I laid down all the melodies, I'm literally going like...
08:25Like that.
08:30And then Mark was like, oh my God, cause he like focused a lot on the lyrics of things.
08:34One of his ideas was gonna be, gonna be golden.
08:37He was like, wait, EJ, how about gonna be, gonna be golden?
08:40I was like, oh yeah.
08:42And so that's like when the magic happened and then we wrote it.
08:45And again, still lots of fine tuning and making sure it fits with the storyline.
08:49But when we finished writing that, we were just like...
08:52Like I was like...
08:53Again, we just like stared at each other on Zoom.
08:55We were just like, I think this is a hit.
08:57Did we just write a smash?
08:58I'm just like...
08:59I know, it was just...
09:00It was really, really like serendipitous magical moment when we wrote that.
09:04And it was actually one of my favorite songs of the film.
09:17Any of these concept melodies all come from, again, the directors and the studio.
09:22You know, Netflix and Sony Animation and Ian Eisendrath.
09:25Like, they would give us a guideline.
09:27A very detailed, like, summary and guideline of what we need to write about.
09:32melodically what we need.
09:33Like, even with Golden, you know, Maggie and Chris was like,
09:35can we please have like a really high note where Rumi struggles?
09:41That was always part of it.
09:42She's struggling to reach that high note.
09:44Like, she's struggling to get her dream of closing that whole moon and making it gold.
09:53So within that, again, because I connected so much with Rumi as a character.
09:58You know, her whole struggle with being essentially a perfectionist, a workaholic to cover up the things she's very shameful about
10:07and being a perfectionist of, like, trying to always put her best foot forward and that could be very exhausting.
10:13I've definitely felt that when I was a K-pop trainee.
10:16Korea has this beautiful culture.
10:18They're perfectionists.
10:19A lot of the cultures, like, perfectionism was one of them.
10:21But because of that, Korea is where we are today.
10:24They work so hard.
10:25They're one of the hardest working countries I know.
10:28As a trainee, always trying to be perfect, doing my best and never crying and showing that I'm strong.
10:34And, you know, that was kind of where I kind of was able to write in the lyrics.
10:39But at the same time, you know, struggling or just, like, wanting your dream to come true was a huge part of the writing that I tried to put in.
10:49So Golden for me was so important because it really helped me through a hard time for myself.
10:54I was going through a lot.
10:56Things were not working out.
10:59No matter how much I worked hard, trying to be perfect.
11:03It's just not working.
11:04And I think Golden kind of was a song I needed at that time.
11:08And so when singing it, naturally kind of cried.
11:12And I feel like, you know, it helped me feel like there's some hope and maybe I can reach for something that feels so impossible.
11:22And yeah, I'm here today with Golden.
11:25Golden, so it really did save me in different levels.
11:32I had, I don't know, maybe like anywhere from like seven to ten sessions or so, all within the span of about a year and a half.
11:41Less than two years, for sure.
11:43Yeah, I think similar.
11:44Singing wise, probably like a year when I'm singing demos.
11:48I take multiple takes, so it's perfect.
11:51So I'm so glad that Ian Eisendrath, our music director, is on the same page as me because like we went hard.
11:58Like we would do a lot of takes until it's perfect.
12:01And meaning perfect is not just hitting the notes, really, it's emoting the lyric.
12:07That was the most important part of the film because, again, we're animated characters.
12:12You're not actually using human faces and expressions and that detail you see.
12:16So it was so important that each detail that you, each breath, each like crackle in your voice is intentional.
12:23And it really was able to make the lyrics shine.
12:26So that's why it did take a lot of different takes to give the directors multiple options.
12:32And sometimes the storyline would change.
12:34We have to change the lyrics that we have to rerecord it.
12:36So I would say many times.
12:39Is there like a lyric or moment in particular where you like struggled to get it right?
12:44And then when you got it, you were like, oh, I'm so happy.
12:47I got it.
12:48You mean like born a bee?
12:50Yes, definitely.
12:51That was one.
12:52Absolutely.
12:53It was one.
12:54We did many takes of that because there are so many different ways to sing it.
12:56It could be born a bee or born a bee.
13:04That was one of them.
13:05But another one was actually more than golden.
13:08It was actually for me how it's done.
13:11The raps are so hard.
13:13Danny Chung, shout out.
13:15His raps in it were, oh, so hard.
13:18Like, yeah.
13:19And then there's something about when you come in the crowd.
13:21That part took way too long.
13:23But when I got it right, it was great.
13:32I remember the very first session because it was at Sony and it's a huge like sound recording booth room.
13:39And I think in my mind I'd always imagined it'd be like a tiny like sound booth stage.
13:44But it wasn't.
13:45It was huge.
13:46They had all these cameras set up.
13:47But I'm showing up with like sweats, no makeup on.
13:50And I'm like, oh no, they're filming.
13:51And then I was like, wait, is it okay?
13:53I look ugly.
13:54I'm like, is this okay?
13:55And they're like, no, no, it's okay.
13:56It's just for like reference for the artists.
13:58And so, you know, in the beginning I think I was definitely feeling quite shy and a little bit nervous and anxious because I didn't really know what to expect.
14:08And I had what I had prepared.
14:09And then, you know, listening to Maggie and Chris share about Rumi and the movie.
14:13And they would show us as much as they could at the time, some of the animation, some of the art, some of it was sketches.
14:20And we'd sort of break down some of these scenes and start recording.
14:25And it was really fun because there is something that's so freeing about voice acting because we only have to focus on our voice, not so much the physicality or your body.
14:35And when we're doing silly things, it's okay to be like 100 or to do silly things with like your face and your arms.
14:40I think I was making faces that I don't know if I'd want it to be recorded in film forever, but I love that in the animation world, it's kind of like cute.
14:49It's like ugly cute.
14:51They're demons.
14:53They're demons.
14:55They're demons.
14:57We'll write a brand new song, a diss track to those.
15:01Whoa, that was weird.
15:02In my mind, I always imagine like the animation is done and actors just go in and like ADR.
15:08I had no idea it was so collaborative or, you know, even seeing scenes where the characters like don't have movement in the mouth yet.
15:16But then seeing that sort of come to life was, it's so fun.
15:19It's also magical.
15:20Do you remember seeing both of you, the character of Rumi and also your voice with her for the first time?
15:25Like what were your reactions to that?
15:27Oh my God.
15:28I couldn't connect.
15:30I don't know why.
15:31I was like disassociating from my voice.
15:33It was crazy.
15:35I don't know.
15:36I loved your voice on Rumi.
15:38I felt perfectly like from, you know.
15:41I remember always feeling a bit awkward, especially with like Mira and Zoe.
15:47Demons are never nice.
15:48I didn't know how the voices were all going to sound and I didn't know what it would be like.
15:53I have this actor thing where I never feel like the character until I'm in hair, makeup, clothes, shoes included.
16:01I'm like the shoes make me the girl.
16:03And so with Rumi, I was never feeling like the girl, right?
16:06And I'm like, oh, I gotta be like top star.
16:08I gotta be like demon hunter.
16:10And it's hard when you're not like in the fits.
16:13And I remember just being like, okay, closing my eyes and being like, all right, I'm cool.
16:18I can do this.
16:19I'm Rumi.
16:20But then some of the easiest things were all of her like broken moments and all of her intimate moments with like Celine and the girls because that I felt like it was appropriate being in sweats and being sort of naked in a sense.
16:34Yeah.
16:35But I will say the moment that it like clicked and I was like, what was when we first saw the screener when it was at like 80 to 85% complete.
16:46And that was the first time I heard all of like EJ's music and the voice.
16:52Yeah.
16:53Because we never got to, they were so secretive about the music, which, which I totally understand.
16:56It was a big top secret business, you know, but yeah.
16:59Oh yeah.
17:00And then when I was watching it and I remember the second like Golden came on, I was like bawling.
17:06I was like crying already at like how it's done in the beginning.
17:09Yeah.
17:10I was like, what?
17:11We're so cool.
17:12Thank you for making us so cool.
17:14But yeah, I remember Golden.
17:15I was just like, oh my goodness.
17:18Like the little girl in me was like, I never imagined that there would be a movie like this.
17:23There's never been a Korean centered movie in this capacity in Hollywood.
17:28What's so crazy and serendipitous is that if I were to ever debut as an artist, I wanted to be an animated character.
17:34Wait, what?
17:35Yeah.
17:36So the fact that-
17:37I mean, you manifested this.
17:38No, literally.
17:39It's kind of crazy how the movie also is just manifesting itself and breaking the fourth wall.
17:44So that's why when I saw Rumi like singing, I was just like, yes.
17:49Well, and then you know what's so weird?
17:52So my favorite color is purple.
17:55Meets.
17:56Meetsu.
17:57I love-
17:58And if you look back at my partner track like premiere day, I'm wearing like full purple head to toe.
18:02I'm in like purple all the time.
18:04So I've had like friends be like, is Rumi's hair purple because you love purple?
18:08And I'm like, I had zero like negative to do with any of the art and creative.
18:12It's so crazy.
18:13It's crazy because mine is technically not purple.
18:15It's lavender.
18:16I love lavender.
18:18And when I saw Rumi's hair, I was just like, wait, what?
18:21And that's what's crazy.
18:22Like lavender is literally my favorite color.
18:24It's crazy.
18:25We have twin nails, like not even planned.
18:27Isn't it crazy?
18:28Okay.
18:29But yeah.
18:30The other big like moment for me was when I was watching the end scene of the girls all coming together after Rumi's like, where it's time to make a new one.
18:37And then they all come together and sing what it sounds like.
18:41Oh my goodness.
18:42I think I replayed that moment.
18:43I mean, countless times because it's just perfect.
18:56I feel like I made my little EJ girl proud.
19:03I think, uh, don't you, don't bring that up.
19:09It's okay.
19:10Making all the girls proud.
19:12Yeah.
19:13I'm just like, yeah.
19:14It's really gratifying to be honest.
19:16One of the things I felt when I was younger, especially when I got dropped was like, oh, I guess hard work doesn't pay off.
19:22It was like the biggest feeling I got.
19:25And you know, from since then I got like dropped around like 2015, 16 and 10 years later, you know, this happened.
19:34So I think it just gives a big lesson of just keep going and whatever opportunity you have, say yes to it and work your butt off.
19:42I had been told so many times you would never be a one or that we couldn't really be a one in America or this day and age.
19:48I think everybody would be like, if you want to be the lead, go to Korea.
19:51And I think it was always hard because I was born and raised in America.
19:54And I think partner track at that time felt like, oh, this is it.
19:59This is going to be the show.
20:00And it's, you know, my moment.
20:02And then when it got canceled, I was like, just how you felt, you know, maybe hard work doesn't pay off.
20:08And maybe that was my time who would have known, you know, in a sense, sort of coming out of retirement and sort of being back in that booth and working on something again.
20:18But then with like a new excitement, being like, wait, we can be leads.
20:23We can be the main character and tell our stories and show our culture proudly.
20:28It just felt like everything made sense.
20:33You know, like 20 plus years in this business.
20:35I'm so excited to be a part of truly one of the most incredible films of all time.
20:41Not just animation, but just movie.
20:44Mm-hmm.
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