HISTORY Exclusive: The Backstage Concert Experience
So I've been thinking carefully how I would structure this post. Should I be formal? Should I be professional? I decided I'm gonna try my best to be informative, try to be as professional as I can but I wanna be myself and include my own personal experiences through this post. I'm actually really behind with posts recently, but it has been a very busy month. February was only 29 days yet I did so much that I don't even know how I manage to recollect it all.
I feel like quite a few people know by now, but if you didn't, I was given the opportunity to work at the HISTORY concert. This includes working as a concert photographer as well as backstage with the members themselves. Here's an overview of the day working backstage, a personal exclusive from me to you!
So I started my day arriving at 1PM with my volunteer group, Charlotte and Tom, excluding Kat who was going to arrive later on. We had a bit of a struggle let's be honest... We didn't know how to open the door and we were told to enter the back door... Which was actually the stage door... But I won't go into too many details to be a complete drag. We were standing in the office watching the CCTV camera, when suddenly a large group of fangirls ran out of the queue and we knew there and then HISTORY had arrived.
Now what can we say about first impressions? Well to be honest, we were all a bit awkward at first since we didn't really know what to do or say, but who would when you were only a few metres away from Korean idols. Sihyoung made an interesting first impression as he asked in English whether there was a smoking room, yeah... I found out a lot of the members smoke which was interesting... But from what I've heard a lot of idols smoke so I shouldn't be too surprised.
Anyways, we went off to complete some errands from collecting lunch from a Korean restaurant which I had ordered from a couple of hours beforehand, but yet we still managed to have a miscommunication, but hey Bibigo I still appreciate your service, you managed to prepare all your food in 15 minutes and the members seemed to have demolished the food by the time we went off to buy drinks for them.
So who did we actually interact properly with out of the HISTORY members? Turns out Charlotte and I made our first encounter with Yijeong who happens to be the youngest member. You might be wondering, what did you even talk about? I can't exactly say it was much of a conversation due to the language barrier but it did start off with Korean greetings before Charlotte managed to work out Yijeong plays Heartstone - Shout out to all those Heartstone players aha! He managed to point and show us the game on his phone and he seemed rather happy about it aha!
Kat arrives meaning we have our whole team here so we begin sorting out the merchandise to sell for the concert, good teamwork guys. I think our Maths skills are on pointe! Can't forget the awkward encounter with the guy who we thought worked at Vue but actually he was working at the O2... Oops.
By this time our group had split once again, Kat and Charlotte going to get change for the merchandise, and Tom and I getting medication for the one of the members - Don't worry they were fine, just some minimal muscle pain and headaches, the usual. By the time us two had gotten back, Katy the interpreter had arrived - also another friend of mine aha! But, the Korean concert agent was offering drinks to us in Korean, but we politely declined. He responded, with the help of Katy saying "Why would you decline something that I offer to you?" and told Katy to pull a straight face whilst doing so, Tom replied smoothly saying "well we bought it for you guys to enjoy" - Well done Tom, you saved us aha!
Grabbing some lunch at Ed's Burgers before the concert was due to begin. I returned preparing my camera for the interviews. Let's say the interviews were incredibly eventful. We had a mix bunch of interviewers and I also got to learn a lot about the HISTORY members through the process of each interview.
I think the most memorable interview question from me, would have to be from the interviewers of BeatCraze. Why may you ask? Well, for one of the questions they asked about whether HISTORY knew about any British slang... The responses weren't what I was expecting and I couldn't stop laughing, and the follow up to the question made me emotional indeed. The HISTORY members mentioned phrases like "water" and "Harry Potter" in British accents, to what they deemed to be British slang. BeatCraze eventually taught them some British slang, and a phrase which they could possibly use for their fans (which HISTORY had asked about). They learnt "init" "bruv" and the phrase for their fans was "wassup, bruv".
You can check out the BeatCraze interview here below:
As well as another interview by KultScene with HISTORY:
After the interviews, we had a short break before the concert began, the members started getting ready in their concert outfits and makeup with the help of their stylist and makeup artists. Kat and Charlotte were getting ready at the merchandise stall whilst Tom and I got ready to follow the members for the start of the concert.
As we followed the members out, the members entered through a separate door whilst Tom and I walked to the front of the stage, standing in between the barriers holding back the fans and the stage. One of the benefits of working as a photographer is probably having the best view of the stage.
I was really happy to have the opportunity the be able to listen to all the songs I really wanted to listen to, that included all their main songs as well as additional songs from their album and their latest Japanese single.
HISTORY Concert Song List
(from what I can recall and reference - in no particular order):
- Dreamer
- D-Day
- Easy/Torn Apart
- Tomorrow
- Why Not
- Because I Love You (Dokyun's Solo)
- What Am I To You
- Psycho
- Lost
- Beautiful, My Girl
- Might Just Die
- Goodbye Please Stop (Yijeong Solo)
- Nobody Nowhere
- The Manual (Dokyun x Jaeho) (Eddy Kim cover)
- Baby Hello (Sihyoung x Kyungil x Yijeong)
- Liar
- Ghost
- Tell Me Love
Do comment below if I've missed any in my list! It would be great to have the full list aha!
Honestly, I've really enjoyed listening to HISTORY and knew of them since debut, however I never actually became a massive fan but after listening to them live I can't fault them and I feel like it has opened my eyes to a lot of their songs. Especially their album songs, I think my new favourites include: D-Day, Easy and Baby Hello. Personally, I also loved Dokyun and Jaeho's cover of Eddy Kim's The Manual aha.
You can view a slideshow of the photos I collected during the concert below:
I actually took over 1000 photos in total, and narrowed it down to just over 200 photos which I considered the best, I had to pick "Might Just Die" as the slideshow soundtrack - I literally can't seem to get it out of my head at the moment since 2 weeks ago aha!
Can't forget the selfie that the group took with the London audience, credits to the HISTORY Facebook page:
You can find me sitting in the front on the right by Sihyoung's hand aha...
I think the HISTORY talks were also incredibly interesting, from the talk of ideal types with some very awesome fan service - the hug between Yijeong and Kyungil was so cute omg... And we can't forget Jaeho being called out for being a casanova back in Korea aha!
HISTORY's Ideal Types
(from the London concert):
- Dokyun: A nice girl with a pretty smile
- Yijeong: The leader is my ideal type (referring to Kyungil)
- Kyungil: I like girls... I like someone who likes me
- Jaeho: I think British girls are pretty...
- Sihyoung: I like girls who look good in denim jeans
After the concert ended, the merchandise group were incredibly busy, they managed to make over £2000 selling the t-shirts and posters. Well done team! Meanwhile, I proceeded to preparing for the Meet & Greet shoot, as the VIPs were getting ready to in groups of 10 to have their photograph taken with the group.
From hugs, to holding hands and gift exchanges, the fans seemed to have a great experience having their group pictures. Although it was very busy and we were limited for the time, the girls including me, Katy, Kat and Charlotte managed to handle the Meet & Greet session whilst Tom covered merchandise. I think the moment which scared me the most was the possibility of my camera running out of battery... Although it was very close to running out I was incredibly fortunate as my camera just survived till the end of the Meet & Greet.
The volunteers excluding Tom, had an opportunity to also take a picture with the group. It was a great privilege as the manager took a picture of the group with me, Kat, Charlotte and Katy. Everyone more or less got to stand next to their favourite members whether it was by coincidence or it was organised I'm not too sure myself aha, but it turned out great.
Here's a picture of us 4 with HISTORY:
From hugs, to holding hands and gift exchanges, the fans seemed to have a great experience having their group pictures. Although it was very busy and we were limited for the time, the girls including me, Katy, Kat and Charlotte managed to handle the Meet & Greet session whilst Tom covered merchandise. I think the moment which scared me the most was the possibility of my camera running out of battery... Although it was very close to running out I was incredibly fortunate as my camera just survived till the end of the Meet & Greet.
The volunteers excluding Tom, had an opportunity to also take a picture with the group. It was a great privilege as the manager took a picture of the group with me, Kat, Charlotte and Katy. Everyone more or less got to stand next to their favourite members whether it was by coincidence or it was organised I'm not too sure myself aha, but it turned out great.
Here's a picture of us 4 with HISTORY:
After the Meet & Greet we went back downstairs towards the dressing rooms as we began getting ready to leave. Before we left, we had a few laughs here and there, at one point Yijeong was laughing at Charlotte laughing hysterically... Oh my! Kyungil managed to catch on to me and Kat making stereotypical British accents towards Charlotte which resulted in him laughing as well. And of course, we can't forget Kat's joke about it being past Charlotte's bedtime, and Charlotte freaking out over the time that she had to awkwardly ask Kyungil for the time on his phone aha!
Overall it was a great experience, the volunteers even managed to get a selfie each with Kyungil excluding myself. I don't think I could be more grateful for the opportunity, especially as an individual I managed to gain so much experience and develop many skills through this opportunity. Thank you so much to the promoters and Arpeggios Entertainment!
Thank you for reading, but don't miss out on a second exclusive with HISTORY coming soon! I hope you enjoyed reading my eventful concert experience with my friends and I hope you check out HISTORY if you haven't already! Catch you guys again soon!
3 comments
Love it
ReplyDeleteAhaha thank you so much <3
DeleteGreat post! How did you get an opportunity like this?
ReplyDelete