Finding Their Sound
Seoha and Kang Min sat in front of the monitor, getting ready to record, while the three who were in a studio for the first time just sat on the sofa and stared blankly, waiting.
Today’s job was to record every instrument except the drums.
If time allowed, I wanted to rerecord the vocals too.
“All right, first up: Heo Junseong. Get in the booth.”
“Hey, why am I always first?”
“You’re always the one who jumps in. Don’t you want to go first?”
Heo Junseong looked back and forth between Lee Doyeong and Kim Jihoo.
For reasons he couldn’t explain, even he felt like going first was probably the right call.
“Ugh... Fine. I’ll do it.”
“Good. Go on in, Junseong.”
Heo Junseong grumbled as he walked into the booth.
“I’m really glad Junseong’s here. I’d be too nervous to go first.”
“You’re good at it too, so why are you acting so scared?”
“I’m still not as good as the rest of you.”
“By the end, you’ll be the best one.”
“Huh?”
“Nothing. Looks like he’s starting.”
While Kim Jihoo and Lee Doyeong were chatting, Seoha pressed the record button.
Heo Junseong nodded, counted in the beat, and began to play at exactly the right time.
“Oh, what the hell is that?”
“He’s good.”
“Seriously. Why is he good?”
Lee Doyeong and Kim Jihoo were both shocked by Heo Junseong’s playing, which was far better than they had expected.
Seoha had been sure his friends would make mistakes in this recording.
“Okay. Good, Heo Junseong. Nice playing.”
“This much is a piece of cake. Next!”
Heo Junseong nailed the next part too.
He slipped once or twice, but those were just ordinary mistakes.
“Good. Solo part next.”
“Okay.”
Watching Heo Junseong pull off the recording so well, Seoha was impressed.
No, he was scared.
The first time they had gone to Hyeon-ui Ullim, Heo Junseong’s skill had been at school band level.
Of course, it had been a high-level school band, but still nowhere near the level where the phrase “competing with professionals” even made sense.
But on the day they all gathered and showed what they could do, he had already grown stronger.
Then there had been the busking at Banwol Park, and now, during the recording.
Heo Junseong was growing frighteningly fast.
He was becoming closer and closer to the Heo Junseong Seoha had once known.
Why?
Normally, Heo Junseong was the kind of player who relied on instinct, which meant that unless he ran into a wall, he didn’t improve very quickly.
And yet now he was growing at a terrifying pace, even though he hadn’t hit any obvious wall at all.
Was the regular performing helping?
In his previous life, OKTOP had been less driven than they were now.
Because they were a group of horizontally connected friends, there had been no leader with a vision to push and whip them forward.
That was what Seoha thought, but it was only half right.
The regular performances and the hard training that went beyond a school band had definitely helped, even if Seoha didn’t think of it that way.
But unlike Seoha believed, Heo Junseong felt a wall every time.
The wall called Cha Seoha.
Whenever he watched Seoha play, all he could think was that if he stayed still, he’d fall behind on his own.
Seoha, unaware of any of that, only nodded with a satisfied look on his face.
And so, after a little bit of correction, Heo Junseong finished recording.
“Nice work. You can come out.”
“Yes!”
Heo Junseong came out of the booth and looked around at everyone.
He wore an obnoxious expression, as if to say, That was nothing.
“You’re annoying.”
“Jihoo. Is that really how you talk to a friend?”
“You’re seriously fucking annoying.”
“...Fair.”
Heo Junseong’s recording, surprisingly devoid of anything to criticize, was over, and now it was Lee Doyeong’s turn.
“Doyeong, let’s record.”
“Okay.”
Lee Doyeong went into the booth with a voice that trembled almost to pieces.
“Why is he so cute?”
“Oh? Kim Jihoo, that your type?”
“Heo Junseong, say that again and you’re dead.”
“Heh-heh-heh...”
“I said that wasn’t a metaphor.”
“...!?”
Kim Jihoo glared at Heo Junseong with a look sharp enough to freeze him solid, then turned his gaze forward again.
“Doyeong. Are you ready?”
“Yeah!”
“Good. Then I’m starting the recording now. Let’s try the intro first.”
“Got it.”
Lee Doyeong was pretty stiff.
Seoha pressed record, and before long the moment for Lee Doyeong to play came around.
But Lee Doyeong missed the timing and failed to play at all.
“Ah! Sorry, Seoha. I’ll do it again.”
“It’s okay. Let’s take it slow.”
Once, twice.
After hitting record again for about the tenth time, Lee Doyeong called out to Seoha.
“Seoha. I don’t think I can do this...”
“It’s hard, isn’t it?”
“Yeah. I thought I was playing it right, but I’m missing the beat, it doesn’t have the right feel, and I don’t get why it keeps happening...”
It was only natural that he wasn’t playing well in an environment he wasn’t used to.
They weren’t professionals.
And before playing, there was a process of adjusting to the environment, which Lee Doyeong didn’t seem to have gone through properly.
But it wasn’t impossible.
Seoha had figured out a way while Lee Doyeong had been redoing the take over and over a moment ago.
“Doyeong. When you record, the first thing you need to focus on is your ears, not your hands.”
“My ears...”
“I’ll play the song. Listen carefully and just play along roughly.”
“Okay.”
Seoha started the track, and Lee Doyeong played the bass.
“Listen to the other instruments, not just the bass.”
Lee Doyeong listened closely to the music and played loosely, as if he were practicing.
“That’s the kind of thing you need to hear in the monitors. When people record for the first time, they tend to focus only on their own playing instead of what they’re hearing.”
“Yeah. I think that’s what I was doing.”
“Now that you know that, you need to get used to this environment.”
“The environment...”
Everything about playing needed to feel comfortable.
Only when he could relax, when he could even feel the air around him, would his senses truly come alive.
Only then could he hear the music well even while playing it.
Lee Doyeong looked around the room for a moment.
It wasn’t as though I had meant only the physical environment, but it looked like he was finding his own way to understand it.
“And loosen up your posture a little.”
A little time passed, and then Lee Doyeong spoke up.
“Seoha. I’ll try again.”
“Good. But this time, would you record while looking at me? I’ll direct you like a conductor.”
“Okay, got it.”
“All right, starting.”
Seoha pressed the record button again, then stood up from his seat and looked into the booth.
He met Lee Doyeong’s eyes.
The rising slide was the cue to begin.
Seoha opened and closed his fist, drawing an upward curve in the air with his right hand.
Then came the intro, held out in long quarter notes.
Seoha nodded to the rhythm, and with his right hand he traced the bass line Lee Doyeong needed to play.
At the exact moment he needed to rest, he clenched his fist tightly, giving a clear signal to stop, and Lee Doyeong understood perfectly and played accordingly.
Seoha didn’t press the talkback button, so Lee Doyeong couldn’t have heard his voice.
But the way Seoha looked made it obvious he was satisfied.
Lee Doyeong’s face had already brightened.
He had definitely gained confidence in his playing.
He was listening with his ears and playing with them.
A guy who just needed to be shown the way.
There were a few small mistakes, but Lee Doyeong eventually produced a result Seoha was happy with.
“Okay. Doyeong’s done! You can come out.”
As soon as he heard the end signal, Lee Doyeong practically fled out of the booth.
“Seoha!”
“Huh?”
“Recording is seriously fun!”
“Hahaha! It’s that fun?”
“Yeah! This is actually really fun!”
Watching the clearly thrilled Lee Doyeong, Seoha felt all kinds of emotions mixing together.
Pride and guilt.
Those two were probably the biggest.
He liked it this much...
“Wow, that’s the first time I’ve ever heard Lee Doyeong get that loud.”
“Right? He’s cute.”
“Oh, Kim Jihoo, that your type?”
“Do you want to die?”
“Kikikikikik...”
“I said it wasn’t a metaphor.”
“...”
“All right, enough talking. Kim Jihoo, get in there. We don’t have time.”
Unlike the other members, Kim Jihoo had only a very short section to record.
Seoha planned to record only the piano part that would be used as a live instrument and replace the rest with MIDI.
These days, most synth virtual instruments were excellent in quality.
“Whoa, it sounds like a machine is playing.”
“He’s been like that since he was little.”
“Wow, Jihoo is really good.”
Kim Jihoo played like a machine.
There wasn’t a single place where he slipped.
“I think this is going to be an okay on the first take.”
“What can I say? I’m not worried about him.”
“I hope I can get that good soon.”
Heo Junseong, Kang Min, and Lee Doyeong all thought Kim Jihoo’s recording was perfect, and figured they might as well start packing up and head out.
Then Kim Jihoo finished playing every part he was supposed to play.
“Kim Jihoo.”
Seoha’s voice was cold.
“Yeah?”
“If this is all you’re going to do, there’s no point in recording.”
“...Huh?”
Kim Jihoo looked genuinely stunned.
He couldn’t figure out what, exactly, had gone wrong.
And he wasn’t the only one surprised; the three behind him were just as shocked.
“Wasn’t it perfect?”
“Seoha’s voice is scary.”
“Hidoi na...”
“Kang Min, what did you just say?”
“N-no, nothing.”
Seoha spoke again.
“That’s no different from just programming it into MIDI, is it?”
“What?”
“A third-rate player is worse than MIDI. A second-rate player is the same as MIDI. A first-rate player is beyond what MIDI can do. That’s a famous saying in the composing world.”
Kim Jihoo winced at Seoha’s words.
Kim Jihoo’s playing was exactly like a machine.
As Seoha had said, if the performance was that perfect, it was far more efficient to just sequence it in MIDI and be done with it.
Getting a live player to perform wasn’t only about chasing a sound that was precise to the point of coldness.
“Show me something only you can do. Even if it’s messy, that’s fine. If you keep embracing the rough edges and moving forward, you’ll end up with something that belongs only to you.”
“Even if it’s messy...”
Kim Jihoo started tapping out notes on the keyboard by himself.
When Seoha said messy, he obviously didn’t mean he should play badly.
Even if countless philharmonic orchestras performed the same Beethoven symphony, each one would still sound different.
Where did that difference come from?
Maybe from the performer’s rubato, maybe from the conductor’s interpretation, maybe from one instrument running wild.
But whatever the reason, there was always a human being inside it.
It wasn’t a performance with not even a single millimeter of error, like a machine.
Kim Jihoo fell into thought for a moment.
The piano competitions he had entered as a child.
Those moments where he had to show delicacy and precision while, at the same time, giving everything he had on the spot.
Once, that had bored him.
That’s why I quit classical...
As Kim Jihoo followed Seoha’s words back into his childhood memories, he suddenly realized that.
Maybe I should bring a little of that old feeling back.
For some reason, he found that idea interesting, and decided to try again.
“Fine, I’ll do it again.”
“Good. We’re going again.”
Seoha pressed the record button.
Listening to the music through his headphones, Kim Jihoo imagined himself playing rock music in front of distinguished judges and elegant audiences.
He imagined showing both precision and delicacy.
And, at the same time, freedom.
It was an absurd picture, but for some reason that scene kept forming in his mind.
And he poured that scene into his fingertips as he pressed the keys.
Flamboyantly.
Delicately at times.
With a feeling that could be fierce or lonely, or even full of longing for someone.
He expressed himself by layering all kinds of emotions into the performance, pouring in the endless feelings he himself could sense.
“Whoa... That’s it!”
“Wow... Jihoo is really good.”
“It’s just a small part, but it becomes something incredible like this.”
The three sitting on the sofa were all impressed in their own way.
Hearing their conversation, Seoha felt strangely grateful.
Grateful to Kim Jihoo for carrying out the direction so well.
And grateful to the other three, too, for being able to notice and appreciate it.
“Nice! Kim Jihoo, that was perfect.”
“Thanks.”
And with Kim Jihoo done as well, the instrument recording was finally over.
“Boss...”
“Yeah, I’m watching. Keep it down.”
The sight of the OKTOP members recording was being monitored by Jo Hyeonseop and the part-timer Park Minji.
Jo Hyeonseop was suffering from such intense cognitive dissonance that his vision was slowly going blank.