About SHINee

About SHINee…OhmyJesus. How can a couple hundred words (thousands? millions?) ever describe everything about SHINee? So. I guess I’ll start with basic info.

SHINee is a five member contemporary band from the prestigious entertainment company, SM Entertainment. These members consist of Onew, Taemin, Jonghyun, Minho, and Key. The meaning of their name, ‘SHINee’: the ‘SHINE’ part means light, and ‘ee’ is a suffix, thus meaning ‘one who receives the light’. Their goals as a contemporary band is to be a trendsetter in all areas of music, fashion, dance, etc. Unlike other SME groups, they remained ‘secret’ until various articles about them surfaced on the Internet on May 19th, 2008. On May 22nd, 2008, their music video for their debut single, Nunan Numoo Yeppeo (Replay), or Nuna You’re So Pretty (NYSP) was released, and their first stage performance was on Mnet’s M!Countdown, also on May 22nd. On May 23rd, their first mini album, Replay, was released and debuted at #10 on the charts and peaked at #8. On May 25th, 2008, their official debut performance was performed on SBS’ InkiGayo. ‘Nuna’ literally means ‘older sister’ used by males, but can also be used as an affectionate term for older women. On August 28th, 2008, their official debut album, The SHINee World, was released. The title track was Sanso Kateun Neo (You’re Like Oxygen, or Love Like Oxygen). On October 30th, 2008, they released a repackaged first album called Amigo. The promotional single was Ah.Mi.Go which stands for ‘Areumdaoon Minyuhreul Joahhamyun Gosenghanda’, literally meaning, ‘if you love a beauty, you will suffer’. SHINee has come back with the concept of the ’21st Century Romeos’ in their new mini-album, Romeo, which was released on the 25th of May, 2009, their one year anniversary. The title track is ‘Juliette’, which Jonghyun wrote the lyrics to. Their comeback stage was on June 5th, 2009 on KBS Music Bank and won #1 on the same day.

SHINee was literally the best newcomer in 2008. It has also even been said that they are the most successful group ever to debut, as most other recent A-list bands were not very well known at their debut, for example, Big Bang and most of the time, many new groups to debut have never been heard about again. They swept up all of the newcomer awards there were and even topped charts with their single Love Like Oxygen on September 18th, 2008. Love Like Oxygen reached #1 on Mnet’s M!Countdown and also received the Mutizen Award for topping charts on SBS’ InkiGayo. They also topped charts on KBS Music Bank with Juliette on June 5th, 2009 (the day of their comeback) and June 19th, 2009. They received the Mutizen Award for SBS InkiGayo on June 28th, 2009 and July 5th, 2009. They also started what is called the SHINee trend, which consists of skinny jeans, high top sneakers, and colorful sweaters. They have filmed 4 CFs respectively for Smart (a uniform brand) which they also recorded a Blue Pink Song for, Nanas’ B (a Korean cosmetics company) Reebok, and Clride.n, a clothes brand. They have modeled for many magazines and clothes brands such as Smart, Clride.n, Vogue, Elle, etc. SHINee has also filmed a 12 episode reality show which ran from August to October in 2008 called SHINee’s Yunhanam. Yunhanam literally refers to the concept of a younger man dating an older woman, contributing to SHINee’s Nuna concept. They participated in the No Smoking Campaign, recording their own version of the song; they also participated in the Save Energy, Save Earth Campaign, also recording their own version of the song. They have recorded ‘Eco-Water Song’ to promote awareness about conserving water which they also performed at the Environmental Water Campaign. SHINee has also contributed an OST, Stand By Me, to the popular KDrama Boys Over Flowers, a remake of the popular Japanese manga Hana Yori Dango. They also recorded the song ‘Bodyguard’ for an AnyCall CF featuring popular BOF couple SoEul (So Yi Jung+Chu Ga Eul). SHINee also contributed an OST, Countdown, to the kdrama ‘Dream’ starring Kim Bum and Son Dambi. They also released a song, Scar, along with fellow SM members in the SMTOWN 09 album. Their fanclub is called SHINee World (ShaWol) after their first album and one of the songs in their first album; or more recently, Juliettes, after SHINee announced that the Juliette in their title song from their second mini-album were their fans. Their fanclub color is pearlescent blue.

Awards:

Cyworld Digital Music Award (Rookie of the Month) 6/22/08

Mnet 20’s Choice Awards (Hot New Star) 8/23/08

MNET Mutizen for LLO 9/18/08

SBS Mutizen for LLO 9/21/08

5th Asia Song Festival (Best New Artist) 10/11/08 (<—confirmation of date needed)

2008 Style Icon Awards (Best New Icon Award) 10/30/08

15th Annual Korean Entertainment Awards (Rookie Award) 11/12/08

10th Mnet KM Music Festival (MKMF) (Best Male Rookie) 11/15/08 (*this is one of the hugest end of the year music festivals, ever since KBS, SBS, amd MBC decided to not give out awards; this award has been won before by now famous, A-list boy bands such as Shinhwa, G.O.D., and DBSK)

23rd Annual Golden Disk Awards (YEPP Newcomer Album) 12/10/08 (*the other huge end of the year music festival)

Seoul Music Awards (Newcomer Award) 2/12/09

KBS Mutizen for Juliette 6/5/09

KBS Mutizen for Juliette 6/19/09

SBS Mutizen for Juliette 6/28/09

SBS Mutizen for Juliette 7/5/09

Members:

Name: Lee Jinki

Stage Name: Onew, or Leader Onew

Nickname: Dubu (Tofu), Leader-shii, Leader, Ondubu, Appa, etc.

Birthday: 12/14/89 (19 years old, 20 years old by Korean standards)

Position: Leader, Main Vocalist

Discovery: 2006 SM Academy Casting

Solo Activities: Collaboration with Lee Hyun Ji in one of her songs, Vanilla Love; Recorded duet with Jessica of SNSD (One Year Later) for SNSD’s third mini-album, ‘Genie’.

Commonly Known For: ‘Onew Sangtae’ or ‘Onew Condition’ which refers to his knack for making random comments, being random and clumsy, etc.; soft and sweet personality and vocals (thus the nickname ‘Dubu’); known as ‘Husband’ (read below for explanation in Key’s description)

Name: Kim Jonghyun

Stage Name: Jonghyun, or Bling Bling Jonghyun

Nickname: Bling Bling, Bling, Ma Bling, JJong, Puppy JJong, etc.

Birthday: 4/8/90 (19 years old, 20 years old by Korean standards)

Position: Lead Vocalist

Discovery: 2005 SM Casting System

Solo Activities: Predebut, Sang duet with Zhang Liyin in Wrongly Given Love

Commonly Known For: Cheerful, sensitive personality; ‘gangsta’ style; impressive vocals and vocal range

Name: Kim Kibum

Stage Name: Key, or Almighty Key

Nickname: Key, KimKey, Almighty Key, Key Umma, etc.

Birthday: 9/23/91 (17 years old, 18 years old by Korean standards)

Position: Rapper, Vocalist

Discovery: 2005 SM National Tour Audition Casting

Solo Activities: Predebut, appearance as extra in Super Junior’s movie The Pin-up Boys; Rapped for Xiah Junsu’s XIAHTIC in DBSK’s 3rd Asia Tour; member of project boy group consisting of 2AM, 2PM, SuJu, and Taemin and also of the Wonder Boys version 2 (refer to Taemin’s solo activities for more details).

Commonly Known For: Umma-like (literally, mom-like) personality (Onew is known as the ‘husband (thus, dad or appa)’ and Taemin is regarded as the ‘adeul (son)’); good, unaccented English; ‘sexy’ stage presence; interest in fashion; powerful dancing

Name: Choi Minho

Stage Name: Minho, or Flaming Charisma Minho

Nickname: Flaming Charisma, Bulkot Charisma, etc.

Birthday: 12/9/91 (17 years old, 18 years old by Korean standards)

Position: Rapper, Sub-vocalist

Discovery: 2006 SM Casting System

Solo Activities: Appearance in SNSD’s music video, Gee; modeled in Andre Kim’s fashion show; predebut, modeled in Ha Sang Baek’s fashion show (Ha Sang Baek is also SHINee’s designer and the creator of their style)

Commonly Known For: Modeling and acting; quiet, deep, thoughtful, caring personality; large ‘doe eyes’; tallest among SHINee members; most athletic

Name: Lee Taemin

Stage Name: Taemin, or Youngest Taemin

Nickname: Maknae (literally means youngest), Taem, Adeul (Son; read above for explanation in Key’s description) etc.

Birthday: 7/18/93 (16 years old, 17 years old by Korean standards)

Position: Lead Dancer, Sub-vocalist, Sub-rapper

Discovery: 2005 SM Open Weekend Audition Casting

Solo Activities: Participated in SMTOWN (’08) LIVE’s Dance Battle, SBS Gayo Daejun’s Dance Battle; member of the Wonder Boys (parody of —->Wonder Girls), (a group including Super Junior’s Shindong and Sungmin, Big Bang’s Seungri, and 2AM’s Jo Kwon) which is an idol boy group that parodies popular girl group songs. Wonder Boys have performed twice so far, once in a special performance for Mnet in the summer of ’08 (performing Wonder Girls’ So Hot and SNSD’s Girls Generation) and the second time for a special performance at ’08 SBS Gayo Daejun (performing Wonder Girls’ Nobody and SNSD’s Kissing You). Another project boy group was formed, consisting of members from SuJu, 2PM, 2AM and SHINee, and they performed SNSD’s Gee on 6/26/09. Again, Wonder Boys version 2, consisting of 2PM’s Taecyeon and Wooyoung, MC Mong, Key, and Taemin, performed SNSD’s Tell Me Your Wish on 8/9/09; acting debut as Junsu in the sitcom TaeHee, HyeGyo, JiHyun.

Commonly Known For: Cuteness (aegyo); being the youngest; clean, innocent, friendly, polite personality; impressive dancing skills; known as the ‘adeul’ or son

*About SHINee’s Background Page and SHINee’s Schedule Page Coming Soon!