A day with Kisu
South Korean singer Kisu (former member of boy group 24K) recently wrapped up his American tour performing in places that are usually left off other tours. I was able to attend his stop in Clemmons, NC. Each stop of the tour Kisu was able to bring something special to make sure everyone had a night to remember and Clemmons was no different. The event in North Carolina was held in a K-pop store in Clemmons called Kingdom. I had never been able to visit the store prior, but it made a wonderful first impression based on their album selection, books, and pastries that filled the shop.
As fans began to line up outside the shop waiting to enter, Kisu popped out and started talking to everyone and asking where everyone was from. It was so nice to see him spending a few extra minutes with the Kiss U (Kisu’s fandom name) that showed up to the event even though he was working on sound check for the performance aspect of the event at that time.
The event in Clemmons wasn’t quite like the rest of the stops on his tour because there was a cake decorating session as well since Kingdom also deals with tasty treats as well as K-pop albums. The fans that purchased a ticket to get to decorate a cake with Kisu were lead into a back room of the shop that is used for cake decorating classes and prospective Korean language classes in the near future. As each fan entered Kisu would make sure to greet each person and shake their hand before sitting down. He sat at a small table in the center of the room so everyone could watch him as he decorated his cake. The staff at Kingdom was phenomenal and helped show everyone how to use the piping bags before letting everyone start creating their cakes. An edible image of Kisu was provided to be the main decoration of a cake as well. I had no prior experience with cake decorating, but the staff along with Kisu made it so fun that I didn’t care if I ended up messing something up. Kisu would also walk around the room watching everyone work and telling everyone how good their decorating was. Throughout the event fans would ask Kisu questions and he would even ask the fans questions about their own lives as well. Kisu was attentive to details and though it was a smaller crowd than some of his other stops, he still remembered pieces of what people said throughout the day and would bring parts up again. I enjoyed being able to decorate the cake as the first part of the event because I feel like it was a good ice breaker to make everyone there comfortable with each other. Before the cake decorating started all the Kiss U were nervous to meet their idol, but you could tell that Kisu himself was nervous as well. I think the cake event made everyone be able to let some of the nerves go and act like we were all just a big friend group hanging out instead of idol and fans.
After the cake decorating portion of the day, Kisu took a small break and we were let back out into the main part of the shop to look around and talk amongst ourselves. Everyone had so many positive things to say about the store and Kisu himself. This event brought people together that were from many different backgrounds and ages through their love of Kpop and Kisu.
Once Kisu had refueled and was ready to go again he began the performance part of the night. Since it was a K-pop store there wasn’t a stage so the fans gathered in a semi circle around him, leaving a lot of room for him to roam around. Throughout his songs Kisu would interact with the fans through holding their hands, pointing at their cameras, or making promises for people to come see him again. The fan favorite song of the night was definitely ‘Cheeseburger’ which you can watch the official MV here. He performed for almost 40 minutes and tried to interact with everyone at least once.
It was time for selfies with Kisu after the performance and I was a little bit terrified of getting my picture with him since it would be my first picture with an idol and I didn’t know exactly how to go into the situation. I don’t know if he could tell I was nervous or not because he took my phone to begin with and started to take a photo but before he did he asked another question or two relating to something that we had talked about prior in the day. I liked that it didn’t feel rushed and he got to have the little interactions with all the fans instead of just taking a photo and moving on. It felt like he wanted to spend time with his fans and get to know them a little better. As soon as everyone had cycled through photos he started the fan sign. Each person was provided a poster for him to sign since he didn’t have any physical cds for his solo career. He personalized each poster with the fans name and he even drew a little smiley face on mine. During the fan sign he was still talking to each person individually or asking them something else.
Once that was completed he surprised us all by taking us out to the parking lot and filming the ‘Drive’ challenge. We had to keep filming it over and over until he got a take that he liked. I liked that he included the fans in his challenge instead of just filming it alone and he posted the finished version on his Instagram.
Overall it was such a nice day with an idol that seems to care about making his fans happy and enjoying the time spent together with his Kiss U.
A few weeks after seeing Kisu in Clemmons I had the opportunity to see him again in Seoul, South Korea. I knew Kisu was going to be performing at MU:CON 2024 in Hongdae at the end of September, but there were not any tickets available for foreign fans so I was disappointed that I wasn’t going to get to see him again at first. The day before the concert I checked Kisu’s Instagram stories and saw that he was giving away three tickets to fans to come see him perform the next day so I messaged him and was lucky enough to secure one of the tickets which I am still very thankful for.
This event was completely different from the one I had attended back home in North Carolina since it was a full concert and not more of a fan meeting type setting. Kisu put on a wonderful performance at MU:CON with a 30 minute set. I was able to hear a few more of his songs live that he didn’t perform on his American tour, though sadly he cut Cheeseburger from the setlist this time around.
Since it was a multi artist festival the whole venue was not full of Kiss U and he was able to spot his fans and would try to interact with them the most from the stage by standing in front of them the longest or looking at them during certain parts of the songs. It was a lot less intimate than the setting of the performance back in America, but it was still special to see how he performs in a different setting on a real stage.
After his set, the Kiss U ran outside to meet him after the concert. Kisu stayed with his fans for about an hour despite the chill to the air. Some of his fans even brought him a birthday cake to celebrate his birthday early. One of the other foreigner girls that had got a ticket from him the day prior was from France so he would tell the local Korean fans about how he saw both of us in our respective countries. I was shocked that he still remembered that we had met before though it had only been a few weeks. Kisu introduced us to one of his friends that had came to support his performance who was none other than GreatGuys member Donghwi.
I am not fluent in Korean, and neither was the other foreign fan that was in attendance so I thought it was so nice of him to still include us in his conversations with the Korean fans by stopping and translating some of the things they said so we wouldn’t feel left out. He kept closer to us as well to make sure we felt more comfortable since we couldn’t fully understand everything that was being said around us. The local Kiss U were nice as well and tried to talk with us too despite the language barrier. Kisu made sure to sign something for every fan, I was lucky enough to have brought an old 24K album I had in hopes that I would see him for him to sign. He also took selfies with the fans as well before he finally left.
Though the two events were so different from each other, I feel like the love Kisu has for Kiss U was able to travel across oceans so that he was able to put on amazing shows in two different countries. If you haven’t yet make sure to check out Kisu as well as 24K so he can be able to do more events like this in the future in other countries.
I would like to thank Kingdom of Kpop for hosting the Clemmons event as well as Kisu and Janghyun for making it possible for me to be able to attend MU:CON.
