» Super Junior

Super Junior (Korean: 슈퍼주니어), often referred to as SJ or SuJu (슈주), is a boy band from Seoul, South Korea, produced and managed by Lee Soo Man, the founder of SM Entertainment. The group initially debuted with twelve members in November 2005, but after Kyuhyun"s addition in May 2006, they have since become to consist of thirteen members, becoming the largest boy band in the world. The members are Leeteuk (the leader), Heechul, Han Geng, Yesung, Kang-in, Shindong, Sungmin, Eunhyuk, Donghae, Siwon, Ryeowook, Kibum, and Kyuhyun. The Chinese member, Han Geng, was chosen among three thousand applicants through auditions held in China by SM Entertainment in 2001.

Super Junior has released and contributed in over 15 different kinds of records since 2005 with varying degrees of success. According to the Music Industry Association of Korea, their most successful album, Don"t Don, was the second best-selling album of 2007. Over the years, the group has also been divided into several smaller sub groups, simultaneously targeting different music industries and audiences (specifically the trot industry for Super Junior-T and the Mandarin Chinese industry for Super Junior-M). In addition to their commercial success, Super Junior has earned four music awards from the M.NET/KM Music Festival, another four from the Golden Disk Awards, and is the second singing group to win Favorite Artist Korea at the MTV Asia Awards after jtL in 2003.


Pre-debut

Since the late 1990s, Korean talent agency and record label SM Entertainment has been holding annual auditions to scout new talents that complemented the success of pop groups H.O.T, Shinhwa, and S.E.S, all of which were created by Lee Soo Man in the mid 1990s. Leeteuk and Eunhyuk were the first two members of the group to be recruited in 2000 under SM"s Starlight Casting System in Seoul. In 2001, Yesung was recruited and a year later, Heechul. Siwon was then discovered under the same casting system in 2003. The company held their first oversea casting auditions in 2001 and discovered Han Geng in Beijing, who was chosen among three thousand applicants. A year later, Kibum was discovered in Los Angelos.

Sungmin and Donghae were selected to be trainees after their appearance in an SM-sponsored contest in 2001. Kangin was selected a year later, and Shindong in 2005. Ryeowook, however, was discovered through the Chinchin Youth Festival singing competition in 2004.

Not long after boy band TVXQ"s debut in 2003, news about Lee"s unprecedented plans of forming another boy band quickly spread on the Internet. In early 2005, Lee confirmed the news and announced that an all-boy project group of twelve members would debut near the end of the year, promoting this singing group to be "The Gateway to Stardom of Asia." Lee announced that unlike most debuting pop groups that has members with no pre-debut experience, the members in this group were chosen because of their performing experiences as actors, MCs, models, and DJs prior debut. Heechul and Kibum made their first appearances in dramas and films; Leeteuk, Yesung, Kang-in, Shindong, Sungmin, Eunhyuk, and Siwon made cameo television appearances, and Han Geng made his first media appearance as a model. Heechul also became an established DJ and MC after his television drama debut in early 2005.

For a while the group was rumored to be called O.V.E.R, the acronym for "Obey the Voice for Each Rhythm."[a] However, before the group settled with their current name, the company simply referred to them as Junior, a representation of the members" young ages when they first became SM trainees. However, after the members" showcased their different talents to the company during an SM-sponsored picnic, the company finalized their concept name to Super Junior. Soon the group became officially Super Junior 05, the first generation of Super Junior. Super Junior was therefore known as the infamous line-up group, a concept being very similar to Japan"s girl group, Morning Musume. Intended to be a rotational group, there was to be new members replacing some of the old members each year, forming a new Super Junior generation every time. However, this concept was abandoned when a new member was added in May 2006.

Super Junior 05 made their pre-debut appearance on the Korean channel M.NET on September 11, 2005.[b] At the showcase, they performed various styles of hip hop dancing. The group danced to B2K"s "Take It To The Floor." Han Geng, Eunhyuk, and Donghae also performed a separate dance away from the group, dancing to Usher"s "Caught Up." However, the performance did not air on television until May 16, 2006 as a segment in the Super Junior Show, the group"s first television documentary.


2005?2006: The Super Junior project

Super Junior 05 debuted in SBS"s Popular Songs on November 6, 2005, performing their first single, "TWINS (Knock Out)." A digital single with "TWINS (Knock Out)", "You are the one", and three additional tracks were released online on November 8, 2005. A physical CD single was scheduled to be released in November but a more complete album, SuperJunior05 (TWINS), was released on December 5, 2005 instead. Their debut album sold 28,536 copies in the first month of release and debuted at #3 in the monthly chart of December 2005.[c] In that same month, they released "Show Me Your Love," a collaboration single with TVXQ. "Show Me Your Love" became the best-selling record of December 2005, selling almost 50,000 copies in less than thirty days.

After "TWINS (Knock Out)" and "Show Me Your Love" promotions were finished, Super Junior 05 promoted their second single "Miracle" in February 2006. "Miracle" was the group"s first single to peak #1 in online music charts of South Korea as well as the international music chart of Thailand.

As promotions for "Miracle" came to an end, SM Entertainment began selecting new members for Super Junior"s second line-up project, Super Junior 06. The company even prepared a list of chosen members that were to graduate from the group. However, no members were taken out and a thirteenth member was added instead in May 2006. The line-up project has been abandoned since then, and the group became known as just Super Junior, without the suffix "05".


2006?2007: "U" and breakthrough success

On May 23, 2006, SM Entertainment revealed the thirteenth member Kyuhyun, who was discovered through a singing competition in 2005. The newly polished Super Junior released their single "U" online for free download on May 25, 2006 in their official website. "U" had over 400 thousand downloads within five hours of release and it ultimately exceeded 1.7 million downloads, crashing the server. The physical single of "U" with a total of three tracks was released on June 6, 2006, eventually selling over 81,000 copies by 2007, selling more than their first album. During this time, an official fanclub was created for the group, E.L.F., an alphabetism derived from the phrase "Ever-lasting Friends." Super Junior"s official color became pearl sapphire blue.

"U" yielded number-one spots for five consecutive weeks on two of Korea"s top music programs for the first time in the group"s career. It was crowned as SBS Popular Songs Mutizen Song on the second week of release, being the first award for the group since debut. The song then stayed as Mutizen Song for three consecutive weeks, and for two weeks on M.NET"s M!Countdown. A new song "Dancing Out," the single for SM Town"s annual summer album, was released on July 20, 2006, which grabbed two awards in August. "U" gained critical success, and Super Junior collected over seven awards in five of South Korea"s top music award ceremonies as 2006 came to a close, winning Best New Group and popularity awards.

As 2007 approached, the group began to branch out to different splinter groups. Super Junior-K.R.Y, the first subgroup of Super Junior that debuted on November 5, 2006, began to give separate performances away from the group to promote their new songs in the latter months of 2006. In February arrived a second subgroup, Super Junior-T. In March, several members of Super Junior participated in an original soundtrack for the first time, singing the opening and ending themes "Success" and "H.I.T" for the Korean miniseries, H.I.T. On April 19, 2007, four members of Super Junior, Leeteuk, Shindong, Eunhyuk, and Kyuhyun, were injured in a car accident that deeply affected the group"s schedules and progress throughout the year. Being the most injured, Kyuhyun was not discharged from the hospital until four months later, therefore unable to participate in the group"s second single for SMTown, "Full of Happiness" (행복) that was released in July. Nonetheless, the cover from former boy band H.O.T accelerated quickly in singles charts in both South Korea and Thailand and soon became a number-one hit in Thailand"s international charts a month later.


2007: Don"t Don

Heechul"s fracture of the femur from a car accident on August 10, 2006 and the April 19 car accident prevented the group"s second official album, Don"t Don from being released until September 20, 2007. The delayed progress of their second album created more promotion, and within the first three days of release, offline album sales for Don"t Don passed the 11,000 unit mark, debuting as #1 in all available offline charts, and was in close competition with Lee Soo Young"s Set It Down and Wheesung"s eternal essence of music that were released earlier in September. It finished the September monthly album sales as number one, surpassing both Lee and Wheesung. 60,000 units were shipped by the first week of release and additional copies were printed.[26] After three months of release, Don"t Don sold 164,058 copies, making it Super Junior"s best-selling album. It was also the second best-selling album of 2007, falling 26,940 copies short of SG Wannabe"s The Sentimental Chord.

Super Junior performed their first performance for the album on September 21, 2007, promoting the first single "Don"t Don" at KBS"s Music Bank. It was their first performance in which the group performed together as thirteen after a whole year. The single rose quickly in music charts a week after release, winning its first recognition, the SBS Popular Songs Mutizen Song, on October 21, 2007 and later on M.NET"s M!Countdown, sharing the #1 song of the week along with "Everyday" by V.O.S in November. Super Junior quickly moved to their second single, "Marry U", in November. However, that single did not meet the achievements that "Don"t Don" had set.

Supported by the release of Don"t Don, Super Junior was nominated in seven separate categories at the 2007 M.NET/KM Music Festival that was held on November 17, 2007. Super Junior won three of those categories including Netizen Choice Award and Mobile Popularity, being the biggest winner of the night. The group also won Best Artist of the Year (Daesang), termed by many as the highest recognition of the ceremony. Super Junior collected two more awards on December 14, 2007 at the 2007 Golden Disk Awards, an awards ceremony based on record sales success. Although defeated by SG Wannabe in winning the Daesang, Super Junior won a Bonsang and the TPL Anycall Popularity Award, which were reported as expected wins for the group by the media after the success of Don"t Don.


2008?present: Beyond Korea

On October 2, 2007, SM Entertainment announced a third Super Junior sub-unit Super Junior-M, a subgroup designated for the Chinese market. This announcement had created a controversy between the fans and the management as fans did not support new members for a Super Junior subgroup.[e] Nonetheless, Super Junior-M were successful in China, having the opportunity to hold two sold-out concerts in Hong Kong, top weekly ratings with their appearance on variety programs,, and were given endorsement contracts, notably Semir and Pepsi. With the absence of almost half of the members in Korea, a fourth Super Junior sub-unit was created that same year to prevent Super Junior from disappearing in the Korean music industry. With five members from Super Junior-T and Yesung, they formed the subgroup, Super Junior-Happy. Super Junior-Happy released the EP Cooking? Cooking! on June 5, 2008, and promotions ended on September 7, lasting for four months. In November 2008, Super Junior-T returned, this time having their brief comeback as a singing group in Japan, called SuperJunior-TxMoeyan; this group added Moeyan, a famous two-woman comedy group in Japan.

Super Junior"s first major tour, Super Show, commenced on February 22, 2008 in Seoul. The tour covered three countries and had shows on six different cities, including Bangkok, Shanghai, and Beijing. On August 2, 2008, Super Junior expanded their routes to Genting Highlands, Malaysia, being one of the top guest performers at the MTV Asia Awards 2008 along with other international performing artists such as OneRepublic and the Jabbawockeez. They are the third SM artist to win Favorite Artist Korea at the MTV Asia Awards after Kangta and BoA, and the second musical group to win the award after JTL in 2003.

Super Junior"s third album, Sorry, Sorry, was released on March 12, 2009. Intitial preparations for the album started as early as July 2008 while Super Junior-Happy activities were still active. The title single off the album, "Sorry, Sorry" was digitally released on March 9, 2009.[45] In less than a week after preorders were announced, over 150,000 copies were pre-ordered. Sorry, Sorry was their first album to debut at #1 on the Hanteo Charts, and it sold over 29,000 copies the first day, defeating Seo Taiji"s record of 25,000. Promotions for the album started March 13 with the performance of "Sorry, Sorry" and "Why I like you" on Music Bank. Two weeks later, "Sorry, Sorry" became the No. 1 song of the week on the same program.