This year‘s K-pop song that took the world by storm, ‘Apartment’(APT.) Even though this word, which is ‘Konglish’, has become a major threat to standard words such as apartment and flat, the public has never seen a full stage with Rosé or collaborating singer Bruno Mars.

In the midst of all this, Rosé and Bruno Mars are finally standing on the same stage. The stage that will be recorded as the true ‘world premiere’ is MAMA, which is considered Korea’s representative popular music awards ceremony.

The joint stage of ‘Apartment’(APT.)‘s main characters Rosé and Bruno Mars has finally come true. The Mnet year-end awards ceremony ‘MAMA AWARDS’ will be held in relay in LA, USA and Kyocera Dome Osaka, Japan on the 22nd and 23rd (Korean time).

Mnet announced that the ‘Apartment’ live performance by Rosé and Bruno Mars on the 21st, the night before the awards ceremony, “will be held in Kyocera Dome Osaka, Japan on the 22nd.” Despite being a mega hit that dominated the global pop scene this year, Rosé and Bruno Mars’ ‘Apartment’ stage had never been performed before MAMA.

Since MAMA has been renewing its own expression of ‘all-the-best’ every year with great anticipation, attention is focused on how the two will decorate their live performance, which will be recorded as a worldwide premiere. Even now, the global influence of the hottest song, ‘Apartment’, plus the rarity of a ‘world premiere’, means that security is being maintained more thoroughly than ever before regarding the descriptions of these stages. Even K-pop officials in Japan are on edge about the two‘s appearance, such as checking the rehearsal time, which refers to the practice stage before the actual performance.

Even without mentioning the high rankings on Billboard, the UK Official Charts, etc., you can easily see that Rosé-Bruno Mars’ ‘Apartment’ is the hottest trending song just by turning on SNS. ‘Apartment’, which originated from a game to promote friendship among the younger generation, has now become a true ‘global meme’, and one of the most famous K-pop songs since PSY‘s ‘Gangnam Style’.

Meanwhile, this year’s MAMA is receiving more attention than ever, with the world premiere of ‘Apartment’ by Rosé and Bruno Mars, a live performance of G-Dragon‘s comeback song ‘Power’, and the possibility of a full Big Bang stage with Daesung, Taeyang, etc. In particular, this year, it has been heavily armed with the largest scale ever, to the point of simultaneously performing on stage in two major K-pop meccas, the US and Japan. Specifically, the award ceremony will be held consecutively on the 22nd at the Dolby Theater in LA, USA, and on the same day and the 23rd at the Kyocera Dome Osaka in Japan.


Reporter Heo Min-nyeong mignon@donga.com