YOUNG POSSE Dishes on XXL, Macaroni Cheese, & Exciting Collaborations

YOUNG POSSE, a fifth generation Gen-Z girl group, has just made their comeback with a new EP album “XXL”. YOUNG POSSE consists of members: SUNHYE, YEONJUNG, JIANA, DOEUN, and JIEUN and debuted on October 18, 2023.

The members of YOUNG POSSE all write their own lyrics. YOUNG POSSE also has become the youngest models of MURASAKI SPORTS, the largest action sports brand in Japan.

Their debut track “Macaroni Cheese” created a buzz in the KPOP scene and by the end of 2023, they were invited to perform at New Zealand and Taiwan’s grand festivals. They’ve also collaborated with legendary Korean hip-hop artists such as Verbal Jint, as well as American hip-hop artist Token.

The new album contains five songs including the title track “XXL,” and “DND” which features labelmate BM of KARD. YOUNG POSSE pays homage to the song “Come Back Home” from the legendary trio group SeoTaiji and The Boys.

Check out the music video for their latest song here and our interview with the group below!

Please introduce yourselves to HypnoticAsia Readers! 

• Hello, I’m all-rounder leader SUNHYE. I’m into writing lyrics and doing MIDI these days.
• Hi! I am Yeonjung, the main dancer of YOUNG POSSE! I have a very unique voice. 
• I’m Jiana, the lead vocalist of YOUNG POSSE. I love to eat salmon.
• Hi, it’s Jieun the youngest Maknae in YOUNG POSSE. 
  • As I wrote in the lyrics of “Roty”, suddenly, I made my debut. But I’m calmer and more passionate than anyone else here! lol
• I’m DOEUN, and I’m the tallest. I love to cook delicious dishes for my members!

Could you share the story behind the name “YOUNG POSSE” and how it reflects your group’s identity and goals?

There are certain things that we can’t do individually, but when we work together as a team, it becomes possible. It could be a story of music or a very trivial routine. POSSE means anything is possible in Latin, so it’s a word that we like to dream about all the time.

We are Young & Playful at Heart, But on the stage we have Charisma!_

As the youngest girl group in K-pop history, what challenges have you faced and how have you overcome them?

We are having exciting experience[s] every day. However, we sometimes make mistakes because we don’t have much experience yet.

We [are] just always on stage with the mindset that we are here to have fun!

“Macaroni Cheese” garnered a lot of attention globally. Can you tell us about the inspiration behind the song and its message?

In our record company, we had time to write a song together once a week. We were doing a song camp with one of our producers Rick Bridges, and suddenly, we remembered the macaroni cheese hamburger poster we saw on the bus station that day. So we started writing a story about macaroni cheese, and the debut song was born! oh no, nobody thought it became YOUNG POSSE’s actual debut song at that time. lol we think hip-hop is a really interesting genre. Hip-hop music doesn’t have to follow the format like the first movement and the second movement, and it is so attractive that we can tell any kind of story.  

We just wrote a song that we want to cook and eat a whole lot of macaroni cheese (in America it is mac and cheese we heard). Because the diet is so hard for girls like us. There’s no other deeper meaning.

Writing your own lyrics sets you apart. How do you draw inspiration for your music, and what themes do you often explore?

We don’t try to write anything too special. If we do that, the cool lyrics don’t seem to come out. Maybe we have to experience more and more but it seems like there is no secret recipe. 

It doesn’t seem to work out better when the five of us come together and say, “Let’s make a song today!” Good sentences are written when you don’t try to think about something and just create it.

Collaborating with renowned artists like Verbal Jint and Token must have been an exciting experience. Can you share any memorable moments from these collaborations?

Verbal Jint! We love hip-hop music so we have been a big fan of his for a long time. Korean is different from English, it is not easy to rhyme. Verbal Jint is the rapper who writes the best rhymes in Korean, and he is highly respected. It was so fun to have such a rapper shout out our five members’ names in his verse. It was a high level of lyrics and it became a driving force for us to grow.

Token was a huge extra large fire! nobody expects him to collaborate with us. Our music video director, Ben Proulx helped a lot. Thank you and we love you, Ben!

We are thrilled that the coolest YOUNG POSSE UP! remix has been completed.

Being the youngest model for MURASAKI SPORTS is quite an achievement. How do you balance your music career with other opportunities like modeling?

Working as a model was challenging. The first photo shoot overseas was nervous haha. But if we could spread our music through the fashion brand, we would be willing to work hard in any kind of role.

Your EP “XXL” has been officially released. Could you give us a bit about the themes and messages explored in this album?

Our producers, KIGGEN and JERRY SHIN used to talk about timeless music. They told us that there is a great timeless energy in the music before we were all born, and when the gen-z generation YOUNG POSSE embodies it, a very new chemical reaction is likely to occur. The result is a song called XXL- means that we want to grow our dreams into a double-x-large size. We debuted with ‘MACARONI CHEESE’ and we felt that we were very small in this huge K-pop scene.

So, we wanted to challenge ourselves to a bigger and larger dream. This is a bit of an abstract story, but also a realistic feeling at the same time. All of our emotions are expressed in the XXL music video!

Performing at festivals in New Zealand and Taiwan must have been thrilling. How do you prepare for such large-scale performances?

We were invited to such a big festival without much experience as a team. I think we got this opportunity because of the many senior artists who worked hard and made K-pop popular. So we practiced every day to show good performances, and tried to communicate by studying the local language and culture in advance. You can easily find our overseas performances on YouTube. Please check it and POSSE UP!  

“Scars” seems to delve into deeper emotions. Can you share the story behind this track and it’s significance to you?

There is an awkward moment when you are happy, but at the same time you feel a little sad, and when you are so angry, but suddenly you become calm. We tried to capture those feelings in the lyrics.
We don’t think people can avoid or overcome wounds like the main character in a movie or drama. So we started thinking maybe even that hurt and pain was for us to glow. So we wrote it in the lyrics of ‘scars’.

“scars” Is like an old friend to us who wrote it two years before our debut. The choreography has changed several times, and we recorded it countless times. That’s why we’re even more attached. We couldn’t be more excited to play it for you as the first track of this XXL album.

With your rapid rise in the industry, what are your aspirations for the future of YOUNG POSSE?

We like to become big…extra extra large so that we can share our feelings all over the world. On the other hand, we just want to have fun on the stage! Someday we’d like to perform a really good performance without regrets. We hope!