First ever male Vietnamese K-Pop star makes international debut
On March 2, Agency YueHua Entertainment debuted boy group Tempest, making history as one member is the very first male Vietnamese kpop star to debut.
Hanbin, who was born Ngô Ngọc Hưng and raised in Yen Bai, Vietnam, is the group’s lead vocalist and lead dancer. Other members include LEW, the leader, lead rapper, vocalist, and composer, Hyeongseop, the vocalist and dancer, Hyuk, the main vocalist, Eunchan, the vocalist, Hwarang, the main rapper, main dancer, and composer, and Taerae, the rapper and maknae (youngest). Their fandom name is IE. They debuted with the song “Bad News.”
According to KBIZoom news, for Hanbin, the road to debuting was a breeze.
“It wasn’t that tough for me, “ said Hanbin. ¨I’m so happy to be able to say hello as Tempest Hanbin. I always think positively, like Let’s work hard today. Let’s have fun. It wasn’t hard because my friends next to me helped me a lot. That is such a relief. Tempest will all dream and work hard.”
Before his history-making debut, Hanbin led a dance group in Vietnam called CAC where they would dance to kpop songs. During this time, his stage name was Hưng Bin and he was a part of the group for three years before he left to Korea to start training in July 2019. He has been training to be a kpop star for 11 months. Hanbin was also on a survival show called I-Land where he was eliminated, but rose up in popularity.
Hanbin embraces his culture and heritage through social media posts. He would often tweet in both Vietnamese and Korean.
Many fans have shown their love and support to Hanbin since his first appearance on I-Land. Although they were disappointed that Hanbin could not debut with boy group Enhypen in Nov 2021, they continued to shower Hanbin with all the best of wishes.
Tempest’s debut song is doing phenomenally well with a whopping 16M views on youtube and 380k likes. Fans seem to really enjoy the music and make it known by leaving lovely comments. “Their energy is so contagious! Just by watching yeosang (ateez) video with them it tempted me to stan! I’m so glad he did it bc [because] I got to meet these boys! I’ll try to research about Tempest soon bc [because] they seem so cute and fun! AND THE SONG dear god, it’s really good, I’m surprised,” said user bada____.
Many fans only watched Tempest for Hanbin at first, but ended up enjoying the band as a whole.
“I was here bc [because] of Hanbin but now I don’t regret clicked[clicking] this video,¨ said user fieleva. “The song is so catchy, I like it [so] much!!! The mv (music video)is fun to watch too, I enjoyed watching this. Maybe I will stan this group?? Haha.”
As Tempest continues to grow and bring change to the kpop community, fans hope they become successful and make more music in the future.
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Janet Boualy is a junior at Parkdale High School. This is her first year on staff as she was recommend by friends to take the class. She is a chief copy...
