Lisa faced criticism due to her long long music hiatus after leaving YG
Two months after stopping all her solo activities under YG, Lisa announced the establishment of her personal label called “LLOUD”. However, instead of releasing new music, she mainly appeared at fashion shows and attended events together with her rumored CEO boyfriend Frédéric Arnault. Since her individual contract with YG ended, Lisa was rarely seen in Korea. She mostly flew between her hometown, Thailand, and France, where Frédéric Arnault lives.
This caused some people to criticize the BLACKPINK youngest for not taking care of her music career after leaving YG. Even after the announcement of a collaboration between LLOUD and the famous US record label RCA Records in April for Lisa’s solo projects, Lisa continued to face a backlash due to dating rumors. Some even believe that Lisa doesn’t want to be an idol anymore.
Sudden announcement of a solo comeback expected to go beyond K-pop boundaries
A few days later, on the evening of June 6th, Lisa suddenly uploaded the first video on her newly created TikTok account. She hinted at her solo comeback with the caption “COMING SOON” and an unreleased sound. A week later, Lisa continued to post a 14-second “TEASER” video showing herself doing various poses and singing “Baby I’m a rockstar”.
Instead of uploading comeback teasers on YouTube like other K-pop idols, Lisa decided to promote on another platform TikTok. Without a single concept photo, Lisa was still able to cause a stir globally with her comeback announcement.
It seems like the youngest of BLACKPINK is planning to break the boundaries of K-pop and prove herself as a global star. No one would expect that Lisa’s unusual way of introducing her comeback could help the female idol achieve her 9th Guinness record by being the fastest to achieve 1 million followers on TikTok (within only 2 hours and 18 minutes).
Moreover, the release time of Lisa’s comeback song “ROCKSTAR”, which is 8 p.m. in US time and 9 a.m. in Korean time, made netizens guess that she’s no longer focusing on only the Korean market. It is because BLACKPINK and other K-pop idols normally release their song at 6 p.m. in Korea to get better chart results.
Surprising Everyone With New Image Transformation & Working With New Production Team
Within only 2 days, Lisa shocked everyone with a completely new image that she had never tried before. In the first poster, Lisa appeared with a wolfcut, honey skin, and a Western-like makeup layout. She did a mischievous pose with several props such as goggles, necklaces and charms to highlight the “rockstar” concept. It is rare for even fans to witness such a unique, bold and fearless Lisa. In the second teaser, the youngest of BLACKPINK continued to prove how well she digested this complicated concept.
“ROCKSTAR” marks Lisa’s first comeback after setting up LLOUD. This is also her first album after joining hands with RCA Records, one of the three largest music distributors in the US. Behind Lisa’s comeback this time is a brand new production team with outstanding musicians and producers from the world-famous music label.
Although RCA Records used to face negative reviews for their poor promotion of some artists, Lisa is still giving hope that she won’t disappoint fans. Leaving YG, Lisa is taking steps to form her own team with her influence and careful decisions.
As she knows what her fans like and want to see, this comeback with “ROCKSTAR” is expected to be very explosive with many achievements.