Daesung talks about his new Japanese album ‘D'sLove’

From YGEX:

The album that we have been waiting for, D-Lite’s first original album “D’slove” will be released on July 16th.

Four songs that were released to celebrate the beginning of “D-Lite DLive 2014 in Japan ~D’slove~”, “Rainy, Rainy”, “Awake, Asleep”, “Try Smiling” and “Look At Me, Gwisun” were ranked first on iTunes’ album chart and also ranked #1~#4 on mu-mo's real time chart, which shows the anticipation for his new album. The album will contain 10 songs including these four and all of them are sung in Japanese.

In his J-pop cover album “D’scover”, which ranked #2 on Oricon’s weekly chart and became a big hit, we were able to enjoy D-Lite’s one and only outstanding singing. This time in “D’slove”, he wrote the lyrics to most of the songs, which showed his exceptional skills and ability not only as a singer, but also as a creator. His preciseness of the sound is also shown in this new piece like the last one, and you are able to see his “real”, high quality music that he had worked for.

DAESUNG: “At first, I chose the album theme to be ‘LOVE’ and decided on the name ‘D’slove’ and started making the album. It was around February. I started out by selecting the songs and I didn’t think about the genres but kept immediately selecting the ones I simply felt I want to sing.”

Rainy Rainy and Dress were exclusively made in Japan. D-Lite says if he didn’t meet these two songs, the direction of the album making would've probably been different.

DAESUNG: “I received 2-30 demo songs from the Japanese production side and listened to them dividing them into 3-4 sets, but I couldn’t find any good songs. I was thinking I should just select songs from the Korean production, but in the last sets of Japanese songs, I found these two and immediately thought I want to sing them.”

The songs that appealed to D-Lite were both coincidentally made by the same writer MITSU J. Then D-Lite added his phrases to add his senses.

DAESUNG: “I thought that the writer who wrote these songs matched my ‘color’. There were initially temporary lyrics to the melody, but they were already very good so I tried not to break those lines and added my lines that I imagined. I wrote “Rainy, Rainy” in a dark room during the night only with one lamp on, so it ended up being an earnest song. But the sound of this song is not dark, but rather something that you can feel the warmth and the strength from the bottom of the heart.”

Other than “Rainy, Rainy”, “Feelings Deepened” and “Awake, Asleep” also speak about a heartbreak but there is that dynamic band-play and D-Lite’s sensitive voice that lingers to that sound.

DAESUNG: “A song is a story of 3~5 minutes, right? If the lyrics and the melody are both sad, myself who sings it will become very sad. I thinks it’s good to have those sad songs once in a while, but if there’s too many of them, my heart will break (laughs). That is why I wanted to make the sound to something that helps from being too sad and something that can be saved from the sadness. I think that there are different sides of sadness. Such as feeling of sadness that is beautiful; I wanted to express those various types of feelings in my songs.”

As for “Two? Alone!!”, there is the groove sound, hand clap, and various sounds which makes us imagine all of the audiences becoming one and enjoying. “Shut Up”, written by G-Dragon, shows the freedom by starting off with the acoustic guitar and piano and changing the sound to show the excitement into a punk sound. As for ballads “Even When the World Ends“ and “Dress”, you can feel his voice wrapped around you— the fascinating emotions.

DAESUNG: “You will be able to listen to various genres from this album. But, one thing I had in mind was I wanted to show some sort of “rock” vibe. Rock that I can enjoy while singing. It is probably unexpected, but I believe that I have the ‘roots’ of music in rock. I was listening to trot music because of my parents, but rock was something I liked to discover listening to English artists, and I really got into them as I watched the live performances. The most inspiring band is QUEEN. I still watch their live performances and get inspired.”

The mic stand with roses and designed like chains, and his mic performance do resemble Freddie Mercury, and you can see his ‘roots’ of music during D-Lite’s solo tour. Like last year’s tour where he had his most important concept of “warmth”, it continues into this year’s tour.

DAESUNG: “Even when I am singing a sad song, there is ‘warmth’ to it as long as my feelings are carried on into the song. This is because, in my mind, I want to become ‘one’ with the audience through my music. During recording, I imagine I am having a conversation with everyone.”

This is his first time D-Lite takes a major part in writing the lyrics and he says “I was able to have fun with it.” And smiles.

DAESUNG: “There were limitations to my schedule so I did have troubles and worries, but making my own pieces from zero was a very fun process. It’s been 10 years since BIGBANG;s debut, Bbut it is still tough when I record (laughs). My throat is weak, but my songs are all in high key, and I also have to sing for a long time while watching my pronunciation so it is very tough. This time, I was recording everyday for one week straight, so as soon as recording was over, I went home and slept. I didn’t eat spicy food for my throat and tried to drink water frequently from 2 hours before recording.

But this time many of the songs were written by me and singing while remembering all the past experiences, I was able to get into the world of my music. What I kept important was how I start singing and how I end the singing of each song because I believe that the start of the song and the end of the song stay in people’s minds.”

D-Lite’s lyrical singing voice expresses the character’s swinging mood changes. You can feel the his breathing and the story of each song is portrayed vividly in its organized manner. The listeners will probably reflect those characters in his songs with themselves, bringing the overflowing emotions.

Another important topic about the album is “Look At Me, Gwisun” that shows his trot skills and which Hyadain (Japanese composer) wrote the Japanese lyrics. Hyadain portrayed D-Lite’s funny side and was able to keep the song fun and powerful like the original. And the fact that he brought “I Love You” to the final track of this album is very interesting.

D-Lite’s solo activity in Japan started out by releasing a cover album. He frequently says that he is not confident in himself, but he definitely gained the confidence with the 1st cover album; as a expressionist and as a singer, you can see that D-Lite’s evolution in D’slove again this time. You are able to see his future as a solo artist.

DAESUNG: “I hope people feel that way. There are countless songs about love in this world, but I believe that there are so many stories of love. In this album, I portrayed few of those love stories that I have been able to feel. As for the last cover album, I had pressures because there were already the initial memories of the people on the original songs, and I had to put my own understanding of the songs. But this time, all of the songs are about my thoughts and they are all original songs that I worked from zero. So I worked on them thinking I want everyone to listen to them soon. This is my first original album so there were more pressure and worries than the last one; I really want people to let me know your honest reactions to it. As I've said before, I wish to become ‘one’ with all of you by this album. Please look forward to my future.”

Translated by mmvvip. Please keep full credits when taking out and inform the translator (@mmvvip) if you want to translate it into another language.