History
Pre-debut
The first trainee to be revealed as a member of Cube Entertainment‘s new girl group was Son Na-eun, who was featured in labelmate Beast‘s “Soom” (숨; “Breath”), “Beautiful” and “Niga Jeil Joha” (니가 제일 좋아; “I Like You the Best”) music videos in late 2010. The second member revealed was the group’s leader, Park Cho-rong, who was shown at the end of Beast’s “Shock” Japanese music video. It was later revealed that the new girl group would be managed by a sub-division of Cube Entertainment known as A Cube Entertainment. On February 21, A Cube set up an official Twitter account and revealed Oh Ha-young as the third member of Apink. Jung Eun-ji was the fourth member revealed through A Cube’s Twitter through a video of her singing a rendition of Jennifer Hudson‘s “Love You I Do“. Hong Yoo-kyung was similarly revealed through an online video where she was playing the piano. Yoon Bo-mi and Kim Nam-joo were the last members to be revealed through Twitter.
Prior to the group’s debut, the documentary Apink News aired on the Korean cable channel TrendE. The show chronicled the debut process of the members of Apink. The pilot episode of Apink News was aired on March 11. Each episode featured a different celebrity guest as its anchorman. Among the celebrity guests of the show were G.NA, Mario, MBLAQ‘s Seung Ho and G.O, Beast, 4minute, 2AM‘s Jinwoon, Infinite‘s Sunggyu and Sungjong, and Secret‘s Sunhwa and Hyoseong.
2011 – Debut : – Seven Springs of A Pink and Snow Pink
On April 13, the music video teaser for Apink’s debut EP, Seven Springs of A Pink, was released. The theme of the teaser was the spring and the idea of innocent beauty. The group released the album and the music video for its lead single, “Mollayo” (몰라요; “I Don’t Know”), on April 19. The album featured five songs, including “It Girl” and “Wishlist”. The music video for “Mollayo” featured Beast’s Lee Gi-kwang. Apink made their debut stage performance with “Mollayo” on Mnet’s M! Countdownon April 21 to promote their album. During the group’s first official fanmeet, it was revealed that their official fan club name is ‘Pink Panda’, a play on the name of the group and the Korean word for ‘fan’ (팬, paen). Following their promotions for “I Don’t Know”, the group promoted “It Girl” on the weekly music shows. Apink also recorded the song “Uri Geunyang Saranghage Haejuseyo” (우리 그냥 사랑하게 해주세요; “Please Let Us Love”) for the popular SBS drama, Protect the Boss. The soundtrack was released in September 2011.
In November 2011, Apink began recording a new reality television show called Birth of a Family with boy band Infinite. The show followed the journey of the two idol groups in taking care of abandoned and mistreated animals over the course of eight weeks. The first episode aired on November 12.
The group released their second EP, Snow Pink, on November 22, featuring the lead single “My My”. The album featured five tracks, including “Yeah” and “Prince”. The music video teaser for “My My” was released on November 21. Promotions for “My My” began on November 25, on KBS‘ Music Bank. The song was particularly noted for having a sound reminiscent of girl groups of the early 2000s, such as S.E.S and Fin.K.L. During their promotions for “My My”, the group opened up a one-day idol tea cafe, serving visiting fans to raise profits for charity and preparing food and drinks themselves. The members also auctioned off some of their personal items for charity.
On November 29, Apink were awarded the Best New Female Artist award at the 13th Mnet Asian Music Awards.
Apink released a song with Beast called “Skinny Baby” for the school uniform brand Skool Looks on December 26. The track was written by Kim Taewan and Yoon Sangjo.
2012: Une Année
On January 5, 2012, the group won their very first music show award on Mnet’s M! Countdown for “My My”.
Jung Eun-ji and Beast’s Yoseob released the music video for their duet song “Love Day” on March 13, which was from a project titled ‘A Cube for Season # Green’, with the full single being released the next day. Jung Eun-ji and Yoseob performed the song on the April 7 episode of MBC‘s Show! Music Core.
The group performed at the Kool Haus in Toronto, Canada, to about 1,000-1,600 fans on March 21, 2012. On April 19, they released “4 Wol 19 Il” (4월 19일; “April 19”) as a gift for their fans to celebrate their one year anniversary. The song was composed by Kim Jin-hwan, and the lyrics were personally written by the group’s leader, Park Cho Rong. “April 19” was included on their first studio album, Une Année, which was released on May 9. The group promoted the album by making weekly appearances on several music programs and performing their title song “Hush”. Apink released their third single from the album, “Bubibu”, on July 6. The single was chosen by fans through an internet polling on Mnet’s official website. The group began follow-up promotions for “Bubibu” on July 7.
Fans had great respect for Apink who performed in front of a massive crowd despite the pouring rain in the MNET One Asia Tour 2012 Smile Thailand concert at the Rajamangala National Stadium in Thailand on October 4.
2013: Line-up Changes, Secret Garden
Jung Eun-ji and Kim Nam-joo featuring Jang Hyunseung of Beast released the single from the project “A Cube For Season #White” on January 3 to commemorate Apink’s win the year before and Jung Eun Ji, Jang Hyunseung and B2STs successes that year. Later in January, Apink recorded a second collaboration single with Beast, titled “5! My Baby (Oh! My Baby)” which was for the school uniform brand Skoolooks. On January 5, Apink appeared at the AIA K-POP 2013 concert in Hong Kong and performed several of their hit songs along with other Cube Entertainment groups 4Minute and Beast.
On April 23, it was announced that member Hong Yoo-kyung would leave the group to focus on her studies. A Cube announced that she would be replaced by a new member, who was expected to start promoting with the group for their comeback, expected to be in July, with the date confirmed in an interview at a university event.
On May 31, Jung Eun-ji and labelmate Huh Gak released a song from the “A Cube For Season #Blue” project titled ‘Short Hair’, which received an all-kill immediately upon its release to online music charts.
On June 23, A Cube Entertainment revealed teaser for “Secret Garden”. On July 3, it was revealed on A Cube’s official YouTube channel that the group’s upcoming title track would be named “NoNoNo” off their third mini album Secret Garden, to be released on July 5. The group would be promoting as a six member group after the leave of previous member Hong Yoo-kyung. The music video for “NoNoNo” and the mini-album was released simultaneously, one day after the group performed their title track on Mnet’s M! Countdown on July 4.
On July 11, Apink were appointed honorary ambassadors of the Seoul Character & Licensing Fair 2013.
On July 17, Apink won their first trophy on Show Champion for their title song “NoNoNo”, followed by their first network win on KBS Music Bank. Promotions for “NoNoNo” concluded on August 16, 2013. A Pink also released the music videos for the tracks “Secret Garden” and “U You” of their 3rd mini album which concluded their promotions of Secret Garden. On August 31, Apink held their first official fan-meeting in Korea. Apink successfully held their first fan-meeting in Taiwan and Singapore on 20 October 2013 and 25 October 2013 respectively. On November 22, 2013, Apink attended the 15th Mnet Asian Music Awards where they received the Next Generation Global Star award.
On December 2, Apink collaborated with fellow Cube Entertainment acts Beast, 4Minute, BTOB, G.NA, Roh Ji-hoon, Shin Ji-hoon and Kim Kiri to release “Christmas Song”. In the same month, Apink recorded a collaboration single with B.A.P, titled “Mini” for the school uniform brand Skoolooks.
2014: Good Morning Baby, Pink Blossom, Sub-unit PINK BnN and Japan debut
On January 9, Apink posted photos of themselves on Apink’s official fancafe. It was later revealed that they would be releasing a digital single to commemorate their 1000th day since their debut as well as to thank their fans for their support. The single, titled “Good Morning Baby”, was released on January 13 at 12:00 PM KST.
On March 14, Apink was appointed as the “Public Relation Ambassadors” of the Military Manpower Administration. They were the first female idol group to become an ambassador.
A Cube released Apink’s fourth EP teaser on March 17. It was revealed that Apink will make their comeback with their fourth EP “Pink Blossom” on March 31. On March 26, a teaser was released showing Apink attending a tennis match for their MV, “Mr. Chu” as a continuation of Pink Blossom. On March 31, A Cube Entertainment uploaded “Mr Chu” music video via YouTube. The song received many positive response and achieved #1 in 9 music charts as soon as it was released. On April 4, Apink performed their first comeback stage of Mr. Chu on KBS’s Music Bank. Apink won 6 music awards with “Mr. Chu”, made the song become the most successful Apink’s song until then.
Apink planned on launching a second fan meeting in celebration of their third anniversary on April 19. They would perform in front of 2,000 fans in Kwangwoon University. A Cube stated, “The event with the title ‘Apink Picnic’ sold out 1,300 tickets in five minutes on the first round of tickets sales on March 20 and the tickets were sold out again for the second round. Apink will be holding a mini concert along with a talk show for the upcoming fan meeting, performing NoNoNo, Mr. Chu, Good Morning Baby, April 19 and more”. But on April 16, A Cube Entertainment said, the fan meeting would be postponed due to the sinking of the MV Sewol and would be held later, no sooner than May. Finally, the fan meeting was held successfully on June 14.
Because of the Sewol incident, promotion for “Mr Chu” and Pink Blossom album was halted abruptly on April 16, and Apink resumed the promotion on music shows on May 8 with the song “Fairytale Love (사랑동화)”. The promotion successfully concluded on May 25, at music program SBS’s Inkigayo. On June 16, the second MV, “Crystal” was released on YouTube.
Apink participated in many music events: MBC show “New Life for Children”, to help children with leukemia and childhood cancers, on May 5 (Children’s Day of Korea); ‘World Cup Cheering Show – Let’s go to Brazil’ on May 28 and the 20th anniversary ‘Dream Concert’ on June 7, with other idol groups.
On June 14, it was revealed that Apink is set to debut in Japan. Their official Japan blog was opened for registration on June 15. They successfully held their showcase in Japan on August 4 and it was revealed that they will be releasing their first Japanese single on October 22.
On June 27, PINK BnN, Apink’s sub-unit, released the debut single, My Darling.
On July 3, A Cube released a video teaser for “Break Up To Make Up” for the project “A Cube for Season #Sky Blue”. The duet consists of Jung Eun-ji and labelmate Huh Gak. The single was released on July 8 and topped several charts upon its release to online music charts.
Source : http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Pink
A PINK 