South Korean singer IU has revealed that close collaborator Suga of K-pop septet BTS was not the member of the boyband she initially wanted to work with.
IU recently made an appearance on Suga’s online talk show, Suchwita, where she and the BTS member recalled the creation of their first-ever collaboration and the steps leading up to it.
“The first song we worked on together was ‘Eight’ in 2020. Why don’t we talk about this in more detail. Our fans may want to know more,” Suga said, adding that he wasn’t IU’s “first choice to do a collab with”.
“Oh, you want the details?” IU said jokingly, before revealing that she had initially asked Suga is she “could have RM’s number” in order to collaborate with him instead.
BTS’ RM in 2023. Credit: Han Myung-Gu/WireImage
“If you had done a collab with RM, what kind of song would it have been?” the BTS member asked, to which IU replied: “I think it would’ve been something really serious.”
“Because mentally, at the time, I wasn’t in the best place. I wanted to bring out those emotions in a song,” she added. “So, I asked you if I could have his number, and got it. But I never called him.”
IU added that asking Suga for RM’s number had taken her “a lot of courage”, but later backed out after realising that RM was “a total stranger” at the time. “I couldn’t get up the courage to just call someone I didn’t know at all.”
“In the end, I never called RM And after that, I just kind of lost interest in doing that song,” she added. “Then I suddenly thought of ‘eight’. I came up with the title first [because I was 28 at the time].”
The singer then noted how the rest of ‘eight’ came about very “naturally” after she decided that was the direction she wanted to go with. “I thought, it’d be better to do it with someone my own age. That meaning was important to me. And of all the producers our age the best is [you].”
Earlier this year, IU and Suga reunited to collaborate on the song ‘People Pt 2’, which was featured on the latter’s debut solo album ‘D-Day’. The duo also performed it live on IU’s YouTube talk show, IU’s Palette.
Elsewhere, BTS member V will star in as the male lead in an upcoming music video by IU. The singer is currently working on her new album “with the aim to be released in the first half [of 2024]”.
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