The 2021 Melon Music Awards recently took place on December 4, 2021. The thirteenth ceremony the show’s history, it is also the second year it was held without an audience considering the COVID-19 pandemic. It was broadcasted online through KakaoTV, Melon, and 1theK’s official YouTube channel.
As one of the four (4) most prestigious music awards ceremony in South Korea (alongside Mnet Asian Music Awards, Seoul Music Awards, and Golden Disc Awards), the Melon Music Awards’ nominees relies on the Melon chart performance score for each artist. Melon is South Korea’s largest musical platform. It is widely known that only the most popular songs that the general population choose to listen to can break into the Top 100 of the Melon charts. In other words, MMA is, for the most part, an objective awards show that bases its winners on the number of unique listeners on the Melon charts which highlights how much the general population love a song/artist. With a criterion of “60% downloads and 40% streams) for an artist or a song to be eligible to the bigger categories, it is no wonder that the solo singers and most popular idol groups are the ones who were nominated for the Daesangs and Bonsangs as they were the ones listened to consistently by the citizens of South Korea.
IU once again proved to everyone that she is the undisputed Queen of Music in South Korea. The singer-actress won a whopping 5 awards, including Artist of the Year and Album of the Year, and is the most awarded artist of the night alongside BTS. The last time a female won Album of the Year was in 2017, when IU herself won it for her 4th studio album Palette. Once called the “Nation’s Little Sister”, IU is 13 years into her career and is still thriving at the top of a cutthroat industry. Lilac, her 5th studio album released in March 25, was a massive success. Up till now, all 10 tracks of the album are still charting inside various music charts. In late October, she released a digital single called “strawberry moon”. The song is still at the top of Gaon’s monthly streaming chart for November. Her other songs from 2010, 2011, 2014, 2017, are still charting. It can sometimes be frustrating how much international fans downplay IU’s popularity in her homeland. Just recently, she was announced as the second most loved and most popular celebrity in South Korea, just below the Nation’s MC, Yoo Jae Suk. From that alone, it can be inferred that it is the citizens of South Korea, the general population who are not fandom-driven, who consumes her music. That is the exact reason why, even till now, she is still at the pinnacle for she alone stands atop a group-dominated industry.
Butter, meanwhile, was named Song of the Year. Sure, it was not as well-loved as Dynamite was last year, but no one can deny that everyone knows the song. Butter debuted on May 15 and is still consistently ranking high in the charts, with the song currently placing at No. 3 at the Gaon Charts, below IU’s Celebrity and aespa’s Next Level. Butter’s win was well-deserved. Not only did it win the hearts of Koreans but across the waves, it was also a huge success. At the recently-concluded American Music Awards, Butter won Pop Favorite Song and BTS as the Artist of the Year. Clearly, the whole world, not just South Korea, was smitten with Butter.
aespa’s Next Level won Record of the Year, an award whose winner was solely decided by the judges. When you look at the local charts now in South Korea, you can see that Next Level is still charting high even after seven (7) months since it was released. Next Level really did take aespa to the next level because the song made the girl group catapult to stardom. The hand choreography for the chorus of the song has also become an iconic dance move which gripped the whole nation. Almost everyone can bend their hand as they sing the line, “I’m on the next level”. Next Level deserved to win Record of the Year.
Lee Mu Jin was named as the New Artist of the Year (Male) and Best OST. aespa is the New Artist of the Year (Female). These two singers dominated the charts with their respective songs, “Traffic Light” and “Next Level,” “Savage”. Lee Mu Jin is a rookie singer who won 3rd place in the music audition show called “Sing Again”. His debut single, “Traffic Light” spent three weeks at No. 1 in music charts. aespa, meanwhile, followed up their hit song “Next Level” with “Savage” released in October. With “Savage”, aespa became the first girl group to ever achieve a perfect all-kill since Brave Girls did with “Rollin”. Again, from chart performances alone, these two are the Rookie Artists of the Year.
For the Best Solo singers of the year, IU and Lim Young Woong are the winners. If IU is the Queen of Kpop, Lim Young Woong is the King of Trot Music. As the grand winner of the highly popular music competition show “Mr. Trot”, Lim Young Woong is immensely popular in South Korea. Trot is a music genre that is well-loved by all ages. In the pre-show of the awards ceremony, it was revealed that Lim Young Woong is the most preferred artist of the people aged 50 and above (with IU being at No. 2) further solidifying his status as an artist whose songs transcend generations.
IU once again won the Best Songwriter award. She alone was credited as the sole lyricist of all 10 tracks in her album. Koreans always mention that IU’s lyrics are hard to convey when translated into English because there are no words that could fully grasp the poetic meaning behind her lyrics. Her lyricism has become a huge part of her artistry that, apart from her voice and philanthropy, it is her lyrics that continues to endear her to the masses. The award was presented to her by no other than celebrated lyricist Kim Eana, the lyricist of some of her most popular songs during her earlier years and whom she considers as the one who taught her the love for writing her own lyrics. For me, it felt as if it was a full circle moment for IU to be presented the Best Songwriting award by the person she considers as her “writing teacher”. When she won the same award in 2017 MMA, she also credited Kim Eana as her mentor.
The cool heroines of 2021, Brave Girls, won the Hot Trend Award. It was such a shame that their hit song “Rollin” was not nominated for the Bonsang and Song of the Year award as these categories only nominates songs that were released the past year. “Rollin” was a 2017 song from Brave Girls which belatedly received insane amount of popularity after their fancam while performing it in the military went viral earlier this year. Had “Rollin” been nominated as Song of the Year, it would prove to be a serious competition for “Butter”. Like “Butter”, “Rollin” is still charting high in the local charts. However, since it was impossible for “Rollin” to be nominated in those categories, the Hot Trend award suited them very well for they really are “the moment” in South Korea. Their rise to success, from nearly disbanding due to underwhelming popularity to being one of the most famous girl groups now, is inspirational not only to other K-pop groups who are also dreaming to achieve the same level of popularity they are receiving now but also to ordinary, normal people who sometimes feel that the effort and hard work they exert to produce an amazing result is not enough. Brave Girls is the perfect example that dedication and perseverance are the key factors that play a huge role in success.
The Netizens’ Choice award went to BTS and the Best Collaboration went to the song “My Universe” by Coldplay and BTS. One must not be surprised anymore whenever BTS wins anything because the group (or any other group, for that matter) deserves it more than anything in the world. The seven Bangtan boys are the pride and honor of South Korea.
The fourth-generation artists, TXT, ENHYPHEN, and THE BOYZ won Music Video of the Year, Global Rising Artist, and Best Performance respectively. Evidently, these three groups are some of the new leaders of the K-Pop industry. As these three groups are still somewhat new artists, I cannot wait for them to grow and be the rightful heirs in continuing the legacy of the ever-evolving Korean music industry.
Rookie girl group STAYC won 1theK Original Contents. Now with this award, some people might argue that this is one of those categories that can be understood as an “attendance award”, an award given to artists who really did not win anything in the major categories but had to be given one as a show of gratitude for their attendance and performance in the actual show. However, I am of the agreement that this award was rightly given to STAYC. The girl group really did put out a lot of video content in the 1theK YouTube account and that’s not to say that their videos were mediocre. On the contrary, the video content they put out can, I daresay, be pitted against the original video content of some of the major labels’ idol group videos. STAYC was also one of the contenders in the Rookie Female Artist of the Year and they sure did have a good chance of winning if only aespa did not sweep the records with Next Level and savage. ASAP by STAYC was only one of the three songs released by a fourth-generation idol group to penetrate the Top 10 of the Melon charts. From here on out, I believe STAYC will only continue to become more popular because they are already in the radar of the general population. All they need to do now is to maintain it and soar higher and higher every comeback.
Hangout with Yoo’s MSG Wannabe (M.O.M) won Best Project Music and there is no other group in the industry who could win that award more than the four guys from MSG Wannabe (M.O.M). This seasonal subgroup formed in the show Hangout with Yoo scored a perfect-all kill in the charts with their song “Foolish Love”. Their popularity may be contributed partly to the popularity of the show (and Yoo Jae Suk) but no one can also deny that “Foolish Love” is a song beloved by the people all over South Korea.
And lastly, “Siren Remix” by Homies won Best Music Style while HYBE’s very own Son Sung Deok won Best Performance Director. Two artists who, once again, rightly deserves the awards they were given.
All in all, I can confidently say that the 2021 Melon Music Awards was a fair and just awards ceremony. They awarded the artists who performed magnificently well in the Melon charts and did not take fan votes into consideration. After all, they could do it and be regarded as a popularity vote but they still chose to look at the chart performance of the songs and artists, tinged with some votes from reputable judges.
