Oh yes. We’re going there.

We’re coming at you with the first episode of a series where we’ll dive deep into South Korea’s “Big Three” entertainment agencies, the current frontrunner, and a final episode that highlights a few smaller agencies that we believe you should know about.

Episodes:

1. YG (23/05/15)
2. JYP (23/05/29)
3. HYBE (23/06/19)
4. SM (23/07/03)
5. Smaller Agencies (23/07/17)

We want to let you know that some of these episodes might deal with delicate subjects like child labor, body autonomy, grooming, personal freedom, disorderly eating, prostitution, money laundering, body dysmorphia, and a lot of other serious and potentially dark topics, so please be alert to our content warnings to skip a section. You’ll also find these warnings in the description boxes under the episode on your preferred listening platform, so you’ll know when it’s time to jump forward.

Listen here:

YG Entertainment – A Brief History

• Established in 1996 by Yang Hyunsuk (from Seo Taiji and Boys) + brother Yang Minsuk
• It is a: record label, talent agency, music production company, event management, concert production company, and a music publishing house. 
• Majority owners (as of May 2023):
  • Yang Hyunsuk – about 17% 
  • Naver – about 9%
• Publicly traded (as of 2011, tried in 2010 but failed) Back Up
  • Currently a “regular mid-sized business” no longer “blue chip” [A blue chip is stock in a stock corporation (contrasted with non-stock one) with a national reputation for quality, reliability, and the ability to operate profitably in good and bad times]. – Wikipedia
• Current CEO: Hwang Bo-kyung, and as of July 1st 2022, Yang Minsuk was reinstated as Co-CEO

Yang Hyunsuk, The Man

When your name is the source of the company name, it’s impossible to separate the dealings, especially when things are as murky as they have been for YG Entertainment and YG the man.

YG the man is a controversial figure for his many shady dealings both personally as well as professionally.

From his wife (12 years his junior and whom he admitted to being first attracted to when she was in eighth grade) whom he wooed as she debuted in a group under his management, to how he allegedly crashed that group to keep her from becoming too popular, to his defense of the indefensible happening with his artists, to his other shady business dealings trying to pass nightclubs off as restaurants for tax evasion purposes, to the gambling (which is illegal for any South Korean person to partake in, even if abroad)… it’s hard to talk about every controversial and just plain wrong thing he’s done, but we did our best during the segment a timestamps 07:04-16:18 of our episode.

YG Entertainment Controversies

This is the most triggering section of our episode, covering the Burning Sun Scandal at minute 16:19, his handling of controversies with idols at his company (and clear show of favoritism and sexism in the contrast of how he tackled B.I’s controversy versus Park Bom’s).

YG’s Roster (old and new)

We took a look at the list of artists who have passed by YG Entertainment and the few ones still left. An important note is that it’s been said most of the artists who left YG did so because they were not allowed to make music and promote as much as they wanted to, due to the company’s alleged belief that in order to maximize an artist/album’s success, they needed about two months of focused attention, and so only five artists from the roster got to make comebacks within a year.

Here’s the YG roster of current and former musicians:

• (former) Jinusean (last drop in 2015, Sean is Board Member, Jinu is doing his thing)
• CURRENT: SechsKies (debuted on April 15, 1997, disbanded on May 20, 2000, reunion concert in 2016 led to re-signing on May 11, 2016)
• (former) 1TYM (where Teddy – Blackpink’s PD came up) – went on hiatus in 2006 and never came back or disbanded.
• (former) Wheesung (2000-contract ended)
• (former) Swi.T (2002-2004, his wife’s group)
• (former) Gummy (left YG in 2013)
• (former) Se7en (until 2014 after enlistment controversy)
• (former) BigBang – their first idol group, debut 2006 until 2022 (all members left except G-Dragon, who is still signed to YG)
• (former) 2NE1 – until 2016 (Dara stayed signed until 2021) 
• (former) PSY – until 2018
• (former) Epik High – first only Tablo, and then the group was signed as a whole after Stanford controversy until 2018
• (former) Lee Hi 2019
• (former) iKON until 2022
• CURRENT: WINNER (renewed in 2021 for 5 more years until 2026)
• CURRENT: Treasure (debuted 2020, late, lost 1 member before debut and 2 members in 2022)
• CURRENT: Blackpink (contracts expire 2023. Will they renew?)
• CURRENT: BABYMONSTER (debuting 2023)

The good news is that because they have a very small roster of signed musicians, they don’t have to keep anyone in the perpetual basement of not being able to release music…

YG Actor Representation

There are a number of actors signed under YG, and some of them left us very surprised knowing they were part of YG either currently or formerly, including:

• Current:
  • Lee Soohyuk (Tomorrow)
  • Lee Sungkyung (Weightlifting Fairy, Shooting Stars)
• Former:
  • Nam Joohyuk (Weightlifting Fairy, Start-Up) 
  • Lee Jongsuk (Doctor Stranger, Secret Garden, W) aka IU’s boyfriend

YG Subsidiaries

YG has a number of subsidiaries or sub-divisions that deal with specific areas of the entertainment business, including:

• The Black Label – Taeyang, Park Bogum, Loren, Jeon Seomi 
• YG Plus – media and advertisement company, HYBE is majority shareholder, distributes HYBE artists’ material. In turn, YG artists joined Weverse.
• YGK Plus – subsidiary of YG Plus, modeling agency, turned models into actors. 
• YGX – Seungri former CEO. Currently only manages a dance group and Viini.
• YGEX – Avex and YG – only to manage YG artists in Japan. 
• Moonshot – cosmetics brand.

Is YG the worst K-Pop label?

At the risk of spoiling the remaining episodes in our series, I’d say if there’s one company that should be erased off the face of the planet, it’s YG Entertainment. There is absolutely no redemption big enough to counter all the wrongdoing by YG the man, and the Burning Sun Scandal should’ve been bad enough to tank the entire company. How it didn’t, it’s still beyond us.

Don’t forget to watch along to get our facial expressions of disapproval every step of the way.