Chapter 28
Chapter 28
[WHEN I WAKE UP]
When I Wake Up
The song ended.
Even after the final piano note faded from the speakers, DJ Cabin could not move for a long while.
“...”
Little K’s photograph hanging on the wall entered his field of vision.
K in the frame was still smiling.
Cabin slowly shook his head, then pressed play again.
“Yo C, we doin’ this?”
Cabin, we doing this?
Even the second time, the intro gave him goosebumps.
The instant Little K’s voice flowed out through the speakers, the very air in the room changed.
Had he answered like this back then, in the control room?
—Just rap, K.
Just spit it, K.
And now, twenty years later—
“Aight, we’re doing it, K.”
He answered that voice once again.
“Shotgun’s going to finish that unfinished track.”
The framework he had built twenty years ago.
K’s playful intro.
Shotgun had added flesh on top of it, and yet the entire song still flowed in a single breath.
“Damn.”
He rose from his chair.
Then he grabbed his phone roughly.
He scrolled down his contacts, then stopped at one name.
[SHOTGUN]
His thumb hovered over the call button.
“...”
No.
He stopped just before pressing it.
This was something he had to go say in person.
It was not something to say over the phone.
Cabin left the room.
It was a mansion in the Hollywood Hills, since the copyright royalties he had earned over the years were no joke.
Thanks to that, even now in retirement, he lived without lacking anything.
He crossed the living room and went down to the garage.
When he pressed the remote, the shutter door rose with a whirring sound.
The moment sunlight poured into the garage, camera shutters started firing in rapid succession from behind the hedges in the distance.
Click-click-click!
“...”
Paparazzi.
(Translator’s Note: Paparazzi — Freelance celebrity photographers who pursue public figures for newsworthy images. The term comes from Paparazzo, a photographer character in Federico Fellini’s film La Dolce Vita (1960), and later became the standard English plural form.)
He had retired from music, but he still made occasional TV appearances and attended industry events.
A legend made the news even sitting at home, and just coming out of his garage was enough to become an article.
As if used to it, Cabin pressed the car key.
Beep-beep—
And before getting into the car, he raised his middle finger toward where the paparazzi were hiding.
“Yo, you little rats! Get a good shot today! Watch real close where I’m going! Imma make history today, motherfucker!”
Flashes burst one after another.
Cabin grinned and stepped on the gas.
He left the Hollywood Hills and headed for South LA.
HOOVER SOUND Studio.
The moment he parked and opened the door, he saw one person sitting in the studio.
Sunglasses.
Expressionless face.
Straight-lined mouth.
“Wassup.”
“...Wassup.”
“I listened to the track.”
“...”
Park Geon swallowed hard.
“I don’t need some long, drawn-out review or anything. Shit. It was just killer.”
“...!”
“Shotgun, you know too, right? [WHEN I WAKE UP] is your work built on top of my unfinished song. Normally, that would make it a co-production, so my name should go on it.”
Cabin shrugged.
“But I don’t think that’s right.”
“...”
“That one-minute demo with nothing but bones—its direction, theme, structure, layers, bridge, outro. You made all of that. All I did was lay down the piano loop.”
Then he placed a hand on Shotgun’s shoulder.
“So [WHEN I WAKE UP] is your song, bro.”
“...!”
“Release it under your name.”
“...?!!”
The studio went quiet.
Shock rippled across the faces of the surrounding composers.
SHEEEESH! Did you hear that?
Then that means this song is getting released under Shotgun’s name?
Nah, no way. DJ Cabin actually approved that?
Shotgun, that crazy bastard. He’s literally writing history in real time.
Damn it, I was going to ask him for feedback today, but now the distance feels even bigger.
And then Cabin continued.
“You just need to put my name and Little K’s name in the song credits. You’ve got that much respect, right?”
“...Thanks.”
“No thanks, Shotgun.”
“...”
Inside the quiet car.
Jamal had his hands on the wheel, and Park Geon was staring out the passenger-side window.
Today, he was not wearing sunglasses.
Jamal had kindly(?) advised him that sunglasses were not appropriate for a law office visit.
“Fucking crazy. I still can’t believe it.”
“...”
“You’re seriously insane, Shotgun.”
“...”
“Your music is killer, and now you do law too? A producer and a lawyer? What is this? That’s the kind of setup you only see in dramas.”
Shotgun gave no answer, as if it were nothing.
He just kept staring blankly out the window.
...Today he was not wearing sunglasses, so he needed somewhere to hide his trembling eyes.
“I went to college too.”
“...I know. You told me before. Said you even took business classes.”
“Yo.”
In the middle of driving, Jamal casually stuck a fist out to the side.
So he remembered all of it while acting like he did not care.
“I never graduated.”
“...Why?”
“You know what the interest rate on student loans was? Twelve percent. Compounded.”
Twelve percent compounded... that’s basically predatory lending. That’s almost to the point of being a Truth in Lending Act issue.
“You’d have to lend money to a countryside farm during a foot-and-mouth outbreak to find terms more decent than that. Fucking bastards.”
“...!”
Suddenly, Jamal slipped a hand into his back pocket.
Thankfully, what came out this time was just his phone, and a moment later he showed a photo.
“Look at this.”
He seemed proud enough of it to have kept the picture.
“My grades were decent. I got an A in accounting.”
What?
Park Geon was genuinely shocked.
Who would have expected an A in accounting from a gangster with a teardrop tattoo?
“So I help Big Joe sort out the money flow sometimes. When I run Excel, Dustin asks if it’s magic.”
“Dustin?”
“He struggles with multiplication. Anyway.”
Jamal lowered his tone again.
Just moments ago, when talking about college, he had seemed briefly human, but now Park Geon felt as though he had already shifted back into emotionless mode.
“You make great music, and you do law too. You’re cool as hell.”
The car stopped.
A glass office building stood before them.
Morrison & Reed Law Offices.
The place Professor Marshall’s recommendation letter had gone to.
Meanwhile—
“Hmmm...”
Laura Chen, a senior at Morrison & Reed, was standing at her desk flipping through documents.
[Park Geon, completed second year at UCLA Law. Applicant for California Law Reader Program.]
As she read the paperwork, she did not feel particularly good about it.
A legal apprentice.
To be honest, they had almost never taken one before.
Most law offices preferred law-school graduates, and apprenticeships through the Law Reader route were a fringe path in the industry.
But Professor Marshall wrote this recommendation personally?
Professor Marshall.
The chaired constitutional-law professor at UCLA Law.
A former federal Supreme Court clerk and former examiner for the California Bar.
For someone like that to write a recommendation for a second-year law student was something Laura had never heard of in all her time at this firm.
That was why she had accepted him.
A company assignment had not yet been finalized, but there was one newly launched label formation case on the docket.
It was small enough to hand to a junior.
LK Records...
Entertainment law was one of the less profitable areas in the firm and was usually ignored, but when litigation hit, it could become a jackpot.
Just as Laura was taking a sip of coffee, she happened to look down at the street in front of the building through the window.
A black car pulled up.
The first man to get out from the driver’s seat—
thin build, tattoo beneath the eye.
... ?
Then an East Asian man stepped out from the passenger side.
She recognized the face from the paperwork.
Park Geon.
But—
...What is that man beside him?
The man with the teardrop tattoo was escorting Park Geon all the way to the building entrance.
There was nothing ordinary about the way he moved.
Sweeping the surroundings, checking behind him, his hand drifting toward his back pocket out of habit, and especially that loose, swaying way of walking.
...A gangster?
Park Geon was saying something to that man with an expressionless face.
Laura could not hear his voice through the window, but from the shape of his mouth and his gesture, she could roughly infer it.
Only this far. Go back now.
To a gangster with a teardrop tattoo.
With an expressionless face.
As if issuing an order.
A chill ran down Laura’s back.
A second-year law student is giving orders to a gang member?
And even more shocking—the man with the teardrop tattoo turned back obediently.
He gave a single nod, got into the car, and left without any friction at all.
...What exactly is going on here?
A few minutes later.
A call came in from reception.
“Laura, Mr. Park Geon has arrived.”
“...Send him in.”
Laura hurriedly set down her coffee cup and straightened herself.
The door opened, and Park Geon walked in.
A neat shirt, cotton slacks.
“Hello. I’m Park Geon.”
“...”
“I look forward to working with you.”
His voice was low, but somehow—it felt oddly different from the image she had just seen through the window.
“F-first, sit down.”
Laura stammered slightly, as if tense, and pointed to the chair across from her.
“To be honest, I was surprised. As far as I know, this is the first time Professor Marshall has written a recommendation letter for a legal apprentice.”
“Thank you.”
“This will proceed under the Law Reader Program, and the apprenticeship period is four years. As you probably already know, the assigned company is scheduled to be LK Records, a new music label, for incorporation and legal advisory work.”
“...”
The instant the words LK Records entered Park Geon’s ears, the switch flipped once more.
...The death switch.
Being assigned to LK Records meant officially stepping into a label run by the Crips gang.
Corporate formation, artist contracts, music distribution.
And if he made a mistake?
If legal risk splashed back onto Big Joe?
Gang law had no appeals court.
Judgment and sentence were carried out simultaneously.
That fear once again released the limiter in Park Geon’s brain.
The fear-of-death study method.
The switch he had thought applied only to music had just turned on in the legal realm as well.
The result was immediate.
“Has there been any discussion yet about what corporate form LK Records will use?”
“No, not yet. But.”
But?
Laura blinked.
“For a music label, an LLC would be standard, but if they plan to bring in outside investment later, a C-Corp could be more advantageous. That said, a C-Corp creates double taxation issues, so in the early stage it would be better to establish it as an LLC while inserting a conversion clause into the Operating Agreement.”
(Translator’s Note: LLC — Short for Limited Liability Company, a common U.S. business structure that combines liability protection with pass-through taxation. It became widely available in the United States from the late 20th century onward.)
(Translator’s Note:Operating Agreement — A foundational internal document of an LLC that governs ownership, management, and operational rules.)
“...”
Admiration spread across Laura’s face.
“And I already brought a draft of the standard artist exclusive contract.”
Park Geon pulled out a stack of documents from his bag and placed it on the table.
“The scope of the restrictive clauses, ownership of the master in music distribution agreements, royalty settlement periods and audit rights, and even the treatment of unreleased works in the event of contract termination—I’ve already laid out the broad framework.”
Laura picked up the draft and turned the first page.
The arrangement of the clauses was clean.
The legal terminology was precise.
There were even footnotes citing relevant cases.
A legal apprentice wrote this?
When Laura looked up, other attorneys were peeking in through the glass door from the hallway.
“Did you... prepare this in advance?”
“Yes.”
“...Why?”
Park Geon’s answer was brief.
“Because I want to finish it as quickly as possible.”
So he’s the efficiency-first type.
The orientation went on for the next two hours.
Whenever she tried to explain the corporate registration procedure, Park Geon would first recite the filing order of the California Secretary of State’s online registration system from memory.
He had even already familiarized himself with the U.S. Copyright Office’s eCO submission system, including the distinction between the SR form and the PA form.
(Translator’s Note: SR form / PA form — U.S. Copyright Office registration categories. SR is generally used for sound recordings, while PA is used for performing arts works such as musical compositions, scripts, and choreography.)
(Translator’s Note: eCO system — The U.S. Copyright Office’s electronic filing system for copyright registration.)
Outside in the hallway—
“Wow... what is that new legal apprentice?”
“A monster just walked in.”
“Isn’t he just a second-year law student?”
“Then how is he like that?”
The juniors whispered among themselves.
One of them slipped into the office under the pretense of delivering a document, though the real reason was curiosity about Park Geon.
“If you need a template for a music distribution agreement, I can—”
Park Geon turned his head.
“Thank you. But I think it would be better to customize the distribution agreement to fit the label’s particular circumstances rather than rely on a standard template.”
“...?”
“Especially with digital distribution, the royalty settlement cycle differs by platform, so specifying a minimum settlement-period clause separately in the contract would reduce the risk of disputes.”
(Translator’s Note: Digital distribution — The process of delivering music to streaming platforms and digital stores through a distributor or service partner. This became a central industry model with the rise of online music platforms in the 2000s.)
Jesus.
“...”
Laura gave the junior a slight nod.
A look that said, You saw that too, right?
The junior set down the papers and quietly left.
The whispering started up again in the hallway.
“Wow, a complete lunatic came in this time.”
“But did you see him arrive with a gangster earlier? A Black guy with a teardrop tattoo escorted him.”
“...What?”
“But what’s even crazier is that he told the gangster to go back with a completely expressionless face.”
“He gave orders? To a gangster?”
“...What kind of background does he even have?”
Near the end of the orientation—
Laura spread out the checklist.
Review of incorporation drafts.
Review of artist contracts.
Preparation for copyright registration.
Research on distribution contract terms.
Design of royalty settlement structure.
Preparation of paperwork for opening a corporate bank account.
Ordinarily, this much work would take a full week for an apprentice.
Even if assigned to a junior attorney, it would take at least two days.
“We’ll stop here for today, and the rest next week—”
At that moment, Park Geon opened his laptop.
Every item already had a draft attached, with reference statutes and case citations in footnotes.
“I’ve already prepared all of it.”
Laura’s coffee cup rattled against the desk.
“...All of it?”
“Yes.”
The attorneys pressed against the hallway-side glass door all opened their mouths at once.
The incorporation of LK Records was completed in two weeks.
The investment funds under Big Joe’s name had come in, the legal review of the artist exclusive contract had been completed, and even the business plan identifying Lil D’s album as the first project had been organized.
On paper, LK Records now existed as a company.
So far, so good.
The problem came next.
A new label needed a distributor in order to release an album.
Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, Tidal, and so on.
To upload music to those platforms, they had to go through a distributor, and distributors looked at the label’s track record.
A brand-new label without a single full-length album yet?
It would not even qualify to sit at the table with a major distributor.
At best, it would be forced to sign with a small distributor.
In other words—normally.
Big Joe had names in his phone built up over decades.
What they called homie culture.
“Yeah. It’s me.”
Big Joe, Crips OG, made a call.
The paparazzi were curious.
Why—that day—had retired DJ Cabin visited HOOVER SOUND Studio?
“Hmmm...”
“Ah, wait.”
They began forming a hypothesis.