Quotes of All Topics . Occasions . Authors
I'm a very blunt person.
It's always good to dream big, right?
Nobody looks good getting out of bed.
I know people love Supreme. I never got on the wagon.
Sunbae-hoobae seniority is a very tricky, weird kind of thing.
One of my first interviews was Robert Downey Jr. for 'Iron Man.'
What works in the States doesn't easily translate to the Korean market.
On any collaboration, you want to respect your music and the other's music.
I've done commercials and won awards, but I know that this won't last forever.
No matter what you do, you should enjoy it. You should really find passion in it.
Oftentimes you're breaking out because your face is lacking moisture or hydration.
My actual goal when marrying in real life is to live like friends even after marriage.
Asian-Americans are fighting for space and fighting for visibility and for acceptance.
I think K-pop bands rock, and their success raises my spirit to perform better on stage.
Whenever I write my music, it's always been in English first and then I take it into Korean.
I'm just looking for that one song that I know everybody's going to be like, 'Damn, that's a good song.'
So I don't have a normal, regimented schedule at all, but on a normal day, I'd say I wake up around 10 A.M.
I'm active on social media because that's such a big reason why K-pop and Korean music performs the way it does.
When people outside Korea think of 'K-pop,' most of them expect 'idols' with several members in a group, dancing in sync.
I've always been very passionate about trying to have Asian-Americans or Asian faces be more prominent in mainstream media.
It's become hard for me to trust people and though I'm the type to go, 'everybody is born good,' you come to question that.
You've just got to believe that people will see and appreciate the value in the music and the artistry that we bring when they hear it.
So Mandarin, I picked it up, I spent a year in Beijing studying but then when you don't use it, languages, you just kinda forget it all.
I was born and raised in the suburbs of Atlanta, which as you can imagine, was not the most diverse place to grow up in as a Korean American.
I think K-Pop is something that sucks people in because it's open. I can do pop, EDM, rock, R&B and it doesn't matter, K-Pop embraces them all.
I have a very complicated relationship with my skin. It is sensitive, I think, to just changes in water, particularly because I travel so much.
I would be criticized, like, 'You don't talk Korean enough. You sound very American. You sound very white in your music.' And I'm like, 'Whoa.'
Typically in Korea when I perform I have a full band, a ten-piece band, and that's a completely different monster in itself to prepare and rehearse.
You know, we never grew up with Asian American role models in the entertainment industry, unfortunately. I'd never seen an Asian face singing on TV.
Living in Korea was a big adjustment because a coffee is going to be a little more pricey than what it is in the States. Wages aren't as high either.
I actually received a lot of messages from Central and South American artists who complimented my songs and showed interest in collaborating with me.
So the first thing I do when I get out of bed, I will check my phone real quick because I live in Korea, but my stuff is split between L.A. and Korea.
When you think of Gallant's music and his voice, you don't automatically think, 'Oh, Eric Nam would be great a fit' or 'Hey! Tablo would be an amazing fit.'
It's so wild to be able to say that I can do shows in front of thousands of people and have them sing my songs in Korean and in English - that is wild to me.
I feel like I've always been drawn to a very diverse range of music and I've always enjoyed experimenting, so I'm not quite sure where exactly my music will go.
Korean-Americans, Asian-Americans are so unbelievably underrepresented in the U.S. entertainment and media industries and I don't think we are given a real shot.
Being a hungry artist, you don't have the luxury of buying whatever you want. There were years of me doing a lot of odd jobs, this and that just to make ends meet.
In a way, I'm overly ambitious, selfish in a way. I think because I am so active, I think that's what keeps my brain going and I can bounce things off of each other.
I look like a 'Sesame Street' character in real life when I wake up. But not like the cute ones, like kind of like the ones that look a little rough around the edges.
Even if you look at 'American Idol,' or 'X-Factor,' or 'The Voice' or anything, it was always difficult to see an Asian or an Asian-American make it to a certain point.
In the States I might be an Asian face, look different from everyone else in TV and in music, but in Korea I look like everybody else, in Asia I look like everybody else.
Even throughout college and post-college, I've always been incredibly hyperactive. Even at Boston College, I was involved in so many different organizations and initiatives.
No matter what job or industry you're in, life is hard, but we're all going through a difficult time and the best thing we can do is pick each other up and move on together.
It's easy to talk about how great love is or how you feel heartbroken after a breakup, but it's not as easy to talk about the process of going through the end of a relationship.
I know people are going to be like, 'why do you have so many songs with the word 'you' in it? 'Idea Of You,' 'Into You,' 'Like You,' 'You-Who'... Well, sorry, but it just works out that way.
People around me tell me that I need a bigger persona and to act a little more A-listy because 'that's where you are but you don't act that way, so people undervalue you.' But that's not me.
I was criticized a lot when I was singing in Korean. The producers and people from my agency would point out my accent and tones, and would tell me I sound too American to fit the local market.
I view myself as a musician and I focus on music - other people may try to focus on the music, but the emphasis is heavily on visuals and performance. They're both equally valid, but different.
From a strictly business perspective, it's like, 'Even if you leave Eric alone, he'll do stuff. He puts his own album together, he gets his own gigs, he does everything on TV. Let him be, he's fine.'
I'm grateful that the public think of me as a sweet guy, but there are times when I get worried that my behavior would disappoint the public. I'd like to show them that there are different sides of me.