Lee Hyori
Lee Hyo-ri is a South Korean singer. She debuted as a member of group Fin.K.L in 1998, which became one of the most popular girl groups in South Korea during the late 1990s and early 2000s. Aside from Fin.K.L, she has also participated in several project groups, including the Refund Sisters and SSAK3 in 2020.
Lee made her solo debut in August 2003 with the release of Stylish.... The album sold over 150,000 copies and spawned the hit single "10 Minutes". The song received widespread recognition in South Korea and led Lee to win numerous grand prizes at domestic year-end award ceremonies, including at the KBS Music Awards, SBS Gayo Daejeon, Mnet Music Video Festival, and the Seoul Music Awards. Her significant popularity in South Korea at the time was dubbed the "Hyori Syndrome" by Korean media, with some also deeming 2003 "the year of Hyori".
Lee's sophomore studio album, Dark Angel, spawned several singles including "Get Ya!". The album was a critical failure, however, with "Get Ya!" receiving accusations of plagiarism. Her third studio album, It's Hyorish, was better received critically and became the best-selling album by a female soloist in 2008. Its single, "U-Go-Girl", ranked atop the music program charts for multiple weeks. Lee once again faced plagiarism accusations with her next album, H-Logic, when composer Bahnus was found to have plagiarized seven of the album's tracks. She subsequently took a temporarily hiatus from the entertainment industry, and became a spokesperson for various causes such as animal rights.
On television, Lee was dubbed the "Nation's Fairy" during her days on variety show Family Outing, and received the Grand Prize at the 2009 SBS Entertainment Awards for the program. In 2006, Lee became the highest-paid female singer in South Korea when she signed a contract with Mnet Media. The Korea Times named Lee one of the top 10 Most Influential Women on the Cultural Scene since 1950. Mnet ranked her number 42 in their Legend 100 Artists list in 2013.
Biography
1979–1997: Early life
Lee was born on May 10, 1979 in Osong-ri, Cheongwon County, North Chungcheong Province, South Korea, as the youngest of three daughters. Lee grew up impoverished, in a barbershop of about 8 pyeong. After being expelled from middle school once, Lee worked part-time at a restaurant and was scouted by an agency and cast by the manager of H.O.T.. Lee was discovered while taking sticker pictures with her friends. She prepared for a girl group debut while living as a trainee of SM Entertainment before eventually debuting as the leader of Fin.K.L.1998–2002: Career beginnings in Fin.K.L
Lee began her career as part of South Korean pop girl group Fin.K.L. As the eldest member, she was the leader of the group. She was the last member to join Fin.K.L, just before their debut in January 1998. Fin.K.L debuted officially on May 22, 1998, with their first single "Blue Rain". The second release from their debut album, "To My Boyfriend", became the first of their multiple number one hits. Fin.K.L became one of the most popular and successful South Korean pop groups of all-time, rivaling fellow popular girl group S.E.S.2003–2005: ''Stylish...''
A year after Fin.K.L's fourth studio album Forever, her solo debut album was released in August 2003, entitled Stylish.... The lead single "10 Minutes" became one of her signature hits and the singer nearly swept the daesangs, the most prestigious South Korean music award, winning more than seven of them, including three of the four most prestigious daesangs. Stylish... sold 144,182 copies in South Korea alone, according to the Music Industry Association of Korea in 2003. Her popularity in her various activities eventually was dubbed as the "Hyori Syndrome" in South Korea, and the Korean Media nicknamed 2003 "The Year of Hyori" as she was rarely out of the news all year. She won numerous awards for "10 Minutes" at the end of the year, including Most Popular Music Video at the 2003 Mnet Music Video Festival, and the grand prizes and the SBS Gayo Daejeon and KBS Music Awards.In January 2005, Lee made her acting debut in the SBS TV series Three Leaf Clover, starring opposite Ryu Jin, Kim Jung-hwa, Kim Kang-woo, and Lee Hoon. However, the 16-episode drama received low ratings and Lee was criticized for her acting, with viewers saying she was miscast as a downtrodden but cheerful steel mill worker. On August 8, 2005, she co-hosted the annual Korean Music Festival for the second year running.
2006–2007: Signing with Mnet and ''Dark Angel''
In February 2006, Lee released her follow-up album, Dark Angel. The first single, "Get Ya!", was accused of being plagiarized by the songwriters of Britney Spears' single "Do Somethin'". It was reported that Lee had signed a three-year contract with Mnet Entertainment for, becoming the highest-paid female singer in South Korea.Despite the failure of her previous drama Three Leaf Clover, in 2007, Lee starred opposite Lee Dong-gun in the mini-drama If in Love... Like Them. Although originally announced as being only one episode long, it aired for four episodes on Mnet. An edited two-episode version of the drama also ran on SBS. During filming, part of a roof Lee was standing on collapsed. Only her foot fell through, but reportedly the fall might have been fatal if co-star Lee Dong-gun had not rescued her.
In February 2007, Lee announced her new digital single which would essentially be the soundtrack to If in Love... Like Them. She performed all three main tracks from the single on Inkigayo on February 25, 2007. The lead song was "Toc Toc Toc". Despite the single's genre being R&B, Lee began to sing more ballads afterwards, slowly moving away from her "sexy superstar" image. The single, although initially given a digital-only release, was given a limited retail release of only 30,000 copies. It was released on March 6, 2007, and in addition to the three tracks found in the digital single, it included a reworked version of "Toc Toc Toc." It was the best-selling album for that month, selling 27,845 copies.
Although her single was commercially successful, her drama was heavily penalized for violating advertising guidelines, as If in Love... Like Them had several instances of overt product placement, in addition to using Lee's songs in the soundtrack. The Korean Broadcasting Committee ruled that the drama should not be aired in South Korea again, and that the network must apologize to its viewers.
Lee also did promotions in Japan when Japanese network Fuji TV aired If in Love... Like Them, where Lee was given the same VIP treatment offered to other international stars. The drama was broadcast on CS Fuji, a smaller satellite channel that Fuji TV owned.
2008–2009: TV hosting and ''It's Hyorish''
During breaks in her solo music career, Lee also hosted various television programs, including Time Machine and Happy Together, which she co-hosted with Yoo Jae-suk in 2006. On April 8, 2008, she joined KBS's Sang Sang Plus as a co-host alongside Country Kkokko members Shin Jung-hwan and Tak Jae-hoon. She was one of the original co-hosts of Change, a show on SBS's Good Sunday line-up, before leaving in early July. She is also a former cast member of the variety show Family Outing, appearing in only the first season. Mnet ran a 12-episode show called Off the Record: Lee Hyori, which documented Lee's life on-set for three months; the show's purpose was to lessen the gap between the singer and her fans/anti-fans by letting them see that she is just another human being like everyone.Her third studio album, It's Hyorish, was released on July 14, 2008. "U-Go-Girl", the first single from the album, peaked at number 1 on online and offline charts, including various television music shows. On December 20, 2008, Lee held her first solo concert Lee Hyori the Invincible at the Jamsil Arena. Upon release, tickets to the concert sold out in five minutes. In November 2009, her contract with Mnet Media was set to expire. Lee planned to sign a contract with Gil Entertainment and work with Gil Jong-hwa, Fin.K.L's co-manager who had worked with the group since its debut. However, her 2010 album was released under the label of Mnet Media.
2010–2015: ''H-Logic'', Album plagiarism controversy and ''Monochrome''
Almost two years after her previous album, Lee returned with H-Logic on April 12, 2010. The album has 14 tracks, including collaborations with Daesung from Big Bang, Jeon Ji-yoon from 4Minute, Bekah from After School, Gary from Leessang, and Sangchu from Mighty Mouth. The singer worked also with E-Tribe, the team behind "U-Go-Girl", the lead single from her previous album. A music video was released for "Swing", featuring Gary from Leessang, on March 31, 2010. The lead single "Chitty Chitty Bang Bang" and its music video were released soon after. The self-penned song, which features Ceejay, was released the same day as her album. She won two Mutizen Song awards on The Music Trend for her lead single within two weeks.Soon after the release of the album H-Logic, seven of its songs, composed by Bahnus, were accused of plagiarism. On June 21, 2010, Lee admitted that the plagiarism accusations against her album were true, saying she had been "deceived"; she temporarily stopped all her activities as a singer and suspended her TV appearances.
While on hiatus, Lee began to grow as a cultural influence. She wrote online columns for vernacular newspapers such as The Hankyoreh that mixed her thoughts on life and career with social commentary, and was well reviewed for her simple prose, humor and intelligence. She also became an increasing presence in the civic community, emerging as one of the country's most high-profile animals rights activists. In 2011, Lee released two charity songs for donation to animal shelters, "Please Stay Behind" and "Remember".
Beginning March 4, 2012, she and singer-songwriter/pianist Jung Jae-hyung hosted the music show Jung Jae-hyung & Lee Hyo-ri's You and I on SBS. The show aired its final episode on October 14, 2012, ending its ten-month run due to low ratings. After her comeback was pushed back several times throughout 2012, it was announced that Lee would return to the stage with her fifth full-length album in May 2013. Five video teasers were released on YouTube on April 23, 2013. On May 6, 2013, she released her pre-release track for the album, titled "Miss Korea". Lee herself wrote and composed the sophisticated retro-jazz song, and the full-version music video released on the same day was a black-and-white video depicting Lee as a circa 1950s-type glamorous Miss Korea pageant crown holder. She personally selected 30 non-celebrity women "with love and respect for themselves" who she saw as the genuine Miss Korea's to perform the song with her on stage at the 2013 SBS Gayo Daejeon televised concert.
Her fifth studio album, Monochrome, was released on May 21, 2013. Lee wrote the lyrics for eight of the 16 tracks on the album, and reportedly used a full band instead of using electronically generated sounds for the songs. Upon its release, eight tracks were ranked in the top 10 on Bugs, Olleh and Naver Music, while its lead track, "Bad Girls" topped the charts on Melon, Naver, Olleh and Bugs. She performed "Bad Girls" as part of a highly praised collaboration stage at the 2013 SBS Gayo Daejeon televised concert along with CL from girl group 2NE1, who had also released a bad girl themed song that year called The Baddest Female. On April 2, 2014, SBS announced she and actress Moon So-ri would host a talk show Magic Eye. The show started filming in April. Due to low ratings, the show aired its final episode on November 18, 2014.