#Maybe the flaw lies in my insane artistic process

[great-cats]

Im getting okay with shading I guess, but there's always room for improvement

[idolizerp]

LOADING INFORMATION ON ATLAS’ MAIN RAP NO GUNWOO...

IDOL DETAILS

STAGENAME: Gun CURRENT AGE: 24 DEBUT AGE: 20 TRAINEE SINCE AGE: 16 COMPANY: KJH  SECONDARY SKILL: Music production (hip-hop and r&b)

IDOL PROFILE

NICKNAME(S): gun pd and dj gun (both from his two main career interests, producing and radio hosting), 단호건/danhogun (a play on his name and danhobak, because he’s stern/decisive), 총우/chongwoo (gun in korean + the second syllable of his full first name), 노센스/no sense (play on his surname and the fact that he has no variety sense), 건담/gundam (play on his name and a popular character that he has a moderate collection of) INSPIRATION: several older hip-hop groups and artists that he started listening to back when he was younger, most notably epik high and tiger jk and a plethora of western artists. he says he felt really connected to the music and wanted to make his own that other people could connect to as well.  SPECIAL TALENTS:

freestyle rapping

playing songs on piano by ear (simplistic versions)

good at random games like 딱지/ttakji, 공기/gonggi, and 제기차기/jegichagi (he attributes this to the fact that his little sister always wanted to play them) 

NOTABLE FACTS:

prior to atlas’ debut, he released a few solo tracks and mixtapes that were moderately successful in the local underground scene 

can play the piano, has learned it since he was six, mostly self-taught with a few lessons here and there

he’s very handy, can assemble and fix a lot of random furniture/appliances and things of that nature

his moderate collection of gundam collectibles started due to fans gifting them in the beginning, but he started buying them on his own after as well and has them in display cases in his studio

IDOL GOALS

SHORT-TERM GOALS:

after his solo debut as atlas’ gun essentially flopped a few years back before they really blew up, he wants to attempt another solo release. now that there are a lot more eyes on them, he really wants to show off more of his personal work. in addition, he’s always wanted to be a radio dj and after hosting a few as a special guest, he wants his own radio show in the near future.

LONG-TERM GOALS:

funny enough, despite his short term solo goal, gun’s love for performing live has been fading the more popular atlas gets. getting on stage and hearing screams is still one of his favorite parts of the job, but the side-effects that it comes with (the lack of privacy and stalker fans, the public scrutiny and pressure, the insane work hours and ridiculous amount of traveling, the way his career has become his entire life, etc.) are starting to outweigh all the positives. so, in a way, his long term goal is to get away from all that once atlas is done. he still wants to work with music, but he’d much rather be behind the scenes as a producer and lyric-writer, as opposed to an active performer.

IDOL IMAGE

no gunwoo -- no, gun, is atlas' stone, atlas' rock in more ways than one.

he is: rough around the edges.

they tell him not to lose his daegu accent, not entirely. to let it slip on purpose more often than not. to not let people forget that he's just a country boy at heart who had a dream, a passion for music and risked it all by coming to seoul to pursue it. they say not to censor himself too much, either, let a cuss word or two slip every now and then, let his face betray all his emotions sometimes, even negative ones when he's annoyed or angry or confused or sad. if you're feeling down, post some thoughts on the fan café, maybe go live. obviously, they say not to do it too much or at the wrong time, but just enough to give off the feeling that he's genuine, unpolished, not some cookie cutter idol. he won't be relatable by any means, but real. believably flawed like anyone else. just a daegu boy who happens to rap because he wants to.  

he is: stubborn. or, in nicer terms, strong-willed. immovable.

he's the poster boy for 'if you just work hard and take risks you can do anything you want'. from the country to seoul, from no one to someone, from giving up his artistic integrity for the first few years of their career to risking his entire life to get it back and not backing down, not caring who he threw under the bus. in the end, gun seems to have gotten everything he's wanted and they leverage that, too.

of course, atlas as a whole stands for hard work making the dream work, but gun's inherent stubbornness is played up just that much more. like when they tell him to talk about how long he takes to produce tracks sometimes because he won't let it go until it's exactly how he imagined it. or to talk about how he couldn't dance worth a damn and almost got kicked out of the tentative lineup, but, well, look at him now. he still can't quite dance anywhere near as well as the rest of the group, but that's fine, they say. that's all part of it too, because now his ability to follow choreography as well as he can is the product of pure hard work with no natural talent to back it up.

he is: foundation.

when it comes to atlas' music (post 2015), gun is a large part of the foundation it lies upon. he's not the only one, of course, but he is often the one they turn to when questions about their music come up. about the concept. about the lyrics. about the meaning behind it all and the process with which they came up with it. they tell him to go all out, go ahead and answer with technical terms to show he has a deep understanding. this is what he threatened to leave for, after all, so he may as well make use of it. show the people that there was good reason kjh yielded, that he knows what he's talking about. that atlas' music is good because "of course, the members helped write the lyrics" or "of course, the members helped produce it" or "as expected of self-producing atlas~"

he is: well grounded.

with gun, what you see is what you get. he is confident sometimes veering on cocky, he is decisive often veering stubborn. he is real, genuine, flawed, human, just with a particularly strong passion for music. at least, that's the vibe they want him to give off. a real, serious musician.

it's a precarious image, to say the least, still manufactured in its supposed genuineness. an image he has trouble balancing because sometimes he's not quite sure anymore where gun ends and gunwoo begins.

(if he begins anywhere at all anymore).

IDOL HISTORY

FATE PANN TITLE: WOW THEY 'RE REALLY GONNA LET THIS GUY DEBUT? ㅡㅡ

let me start with my proof: i went to school with this b*stard, here's my school id and here's my picture in our yearbook and here's no gunwoo's picture. he looks exactly the same ㅋㅋ

anyway, wow i heard he ran off to seoul but i didn't know it was so that he could train to be an idol... f*ck, this guy used to curse at idol groups all the time and now he's going to be one? ㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋㅋ  i hope his group f*cking flops

he was just annoying? he always made stupid jokes during class and would get so pissed when he actually got in trouble for it. he cleaned our classroom almost all year round because he really got in trouble that much. and he was just such an a*shole so he got into fights a lot even though he was so skinny ㅋㅋㅋ  

but yeah that's all i have to say for now~ i just thought it was annoying that someone who cursed at idol groups so much is now becoming one because ah... i still remember when he spilled his water on my precious midnight album ㅡㅡ

no gunwoo is born in daegu in the middle of winter and spring and this sets the tone for his childhood.

he is the middle child, the awkward transition, the unwanted and accidental. the classic case of the second child of three. he's born when his parents are hoping for a daughter after already having a son, and that foundation of disappointment never seems to disappear as he grows up. everything he does pales in comparison to his hyung of 2 years if his parents have anything to say about it, and this quickly takes a toll.

everything becomes a competition and he's already two years behind. so he just tries that much harder, at least in the beginning. his grades are good, and at six he picks up the piano after minwoo picks it up too. none of it matters, though, because minwoo is first in his grade and can play their mom's favorite classical music while gunwoo's stuck in the middle once again and his little hands can only do so much on the piano keys.

even when gunwoo rises in class rank and bikes back home to their little farm on the edge of the province excitedly to tell them, minwoo's already there with an award for some math competition and a sign-up form for another one waiting for their signature. even when he's now eight and has practiced piano at his grandparent's house for the past year almost every evening to play his mom's favorite songs, minwoo's already there telling them about a recital  he's been asked to play at.

he's always two years too late and his parent's don't expect anything from him. gun is ten years old when he learns how to accept that.

he stops studying in the library after school and explores the city with friends instead. his street smart grows while his grades drop, and his parents just act like they've known it all along, that they're just proving him right, that, as expected, he can't amount to anything anyway.

soon enough, anger replaces his desparation for their approval.

he acts up in class and comes home late, he starts fights and comes home with cuts and scrapes and bloody bandaids, he finds hip-hop music that sounds like what he feels and the seed is planted, watered every day until it blooms later in his life.  

the only thing that stays constant is his love for piano and his little sister. jiwoo, at least, has always been the light brightening up the shadow behind minwoo he stands in. the only one whose eyes sparkles when he plays her favorite songs for her, who congratulates him when he comes home with good news, who is happy, proud even, to be his family. he's just three years older, but he likes to claim he's raised her as much as his parents have, has protected her more than they have (if the guy that ended up with a damn near broken nose has anything to say about it).

and so jiwoo is the reason he still holds onto the name gunwoo to this day, but it's also jiwoo who helps him become gun.

FATE PANN TITLE: DOES ANYONE ELSE KNOW WHO THIS GUY IS?

i went to hongdae this weekend and saw this guy busking there, he looked really young but i was so impressed with his rapping??? i waited around until he was done to talk to him a bit and i found out he's a kjh trainee! his name is gun and he's seriously so impressive for his age.. i was shocked when i found out he's the same age as my seventeen year old little brother... ㅠㅠ

anyway, if anyone else wants to listen to his music he has a soundcloud and he's posted a few of his tracks on there! i'll link it here ~ soundcloud.com/n0gun

when gunwoo is fourteen, the seed blossoms. his love for hip-hop evolves into something more than just an interest in the music, but in an interest for the process of creating it, too. performing it, writing lyrics, producing the beats.

he spends the time he used to spend studying and playing piano penning his own lyrics to already made songs. he picks up odd jobs from his neighbors and from the grandmas he’s gotten to know in the city to pocket as much under-the-table income he can come by and buys second-hand music equipment he can then call his own. he uses free online tutorials to teach himself how to use the software then just goes at it. he creates and creates and creates.

it's all rough, of course, but it's something. it's his and his only. it's something his brother's never done before and it's something he loves, something he's done for his own personal interest only, something he wants to keep doing.

he's sixteen when jiwoo shows him a way for him to keep doing it by way of a kjh audition flyer. he resents the idea of becoming an idol, but after one particularly bad argument with his dad gets all of his hard-earned music equipment thrown out the window and broken beyond repair, he bikes into the city, into an audition he’d been subconsciously been preparing for for years.

when they present him with an offer, he signs right away.

when he presents the same to his parents, they sign even quicker.  

to get him out of their lives, he assumes. but not without one last comment about how he would probably fail this too, anyway.

he tries to forget their words when he moves up to seoul, tries to ignore it, but it stays with him for years

otherwise, the move to seoul is just as difficult. miles away from all his friends and jiwoo and the city streets he knows by heart, the river, the isolated farm, he feels more alone in the most populated city of the country.

so he throws himself into training. they all do, of course. but for the second half of his teenage life, it is almost all he knows. the company makes it clear that their next group will have a heavy focus on their dancing, and gunwoo is anything but a dancer. what takes others minutes takes him hours to learn. he gets frustrated easy, remembers those words he keeps trying to forget, and it's the anger that boils every time he remembers them that motivates him to never stop. he practices in the tiny dorm until others tell him to shut up. he sits outside the doors, the windows of dance classes provided at other dance studios that he can’t afford and tries to mimic them on his own time. he stays up at night with his stomach grumbling and his eyes heavy producing song after song after song to show the company that he has something to bring to the group, despite his weakness.

it never gets easy, but it becomes routine and seoul is no longer scary. no longer lonely. he finds friends, he finds his passion in music like he’s never done before and with proper equipment and training at his disposal, he prospers.

he busks at hongdae, he performs at café open mic nights, he throws together a soundcloud account and gives himself the stagename gun. he posts tracks whenever he can and when he posts his first mini mixtape at eighteen, the response is more than he expects. it’s nothing much in the grand scheme of things, but it gets passed around a little, and when he requests to book performances, some organizers recognize his name, his music. it’s euphoric, getting on stage and hearing a few people sing along to his lyrics. his music. his work. it fuels him, drives him to release another mixtape the following year to the same amount of moderate success, drives him to train, train, train because if this is what it feels like to be on stage, to make everyone know your name, then so be it.

he’ll be an idol.

he'll be gun. if gunwoo is fated for failure, at least gun doesn't seem to be.

FATE PANN TITLE: DO YOU GUYS REMEMBER THIS GUY FROM THOSE PICTURES OF VIXEN?

i heard from my uncle's friend that he's a trainee at kjh and he really did date one of the members. i can't say which member, but i'm sure everyone can guess which one~ apparently, aside from the main rapper's mess... another reason kjh dropped vixen was because of all those pictures and rumors about him dating that vixen member.

kjh is about to debut his group soon and they wanted to make sure his name's not attached to someone like her ㅋㅋ so they're just getting rid of the group entirely ㅋㅋ kjh is really sly... i bet they made them break up too or something like that~ it's funny though, this guy's already making trouble and he hasn't debuted yet... kjh is really a mess right now aren't they

that is, until he makes a bit of a mess and even gun is at risk of failing.

he does as he's always done and breaks the rules. specifically, he dates. and not only that, but he dates one of the company's active idols. his own debut is right around the corner around when they're caught and vixen is already in a mess of their own. there's talk about dropping him from the lineup entirely, but they do the opposite instead. all the rumors about him and the vixen member are just that anyway, rumors with blurry photographic proof that can easily be denied and they'd already been on the verge of disbanding all of vixen.

so, they take this chance and do. they keep gun on track to debut (with a tighter leash around him now) and try to drown out all his rumors, then disband vixen instead.

this is the first real taste he gets of the company's stronghold on him and his anger starts heating slowly within him again.  

he stays, though, because what else does he have?

FATE PANN TITLE: CAN YOU GUYS BELIEVE KJH WENT FROM VIXEN TO THIS?????

i was a fan of that gun guy's old mixtapes before so i was looking forward to his debut but... what is this sh*t... ah, why did he have to debut as an idol, what a waste..  the group seems so f*cking try hard...  

maybe because i knew of him before but gun especially made me cringe, he was trying too hard to seem cool but ㅋㅋㅋ his chain necklaces look like they weighed more than him....

after the mess is cleaned up and atlas debuts, he gets to keep his stage name because it fits their image at the time and with his moderate success at least around the hongdae scene, they think it may bring in some fans.

they're wrong.

when he sees their debut concept, he’s –

well, he’s upset. but he’s an idol, so what can he do but go along with it?

the seeds of doubt have already been planted, though, and they only grow the more they prep. the choreography is hard, the styling feels gimmicky, and the music video does too. it feels like everything he never wanted to do, it feels like tarnishing what he’s done so far as gun underground, and it just feels. miserable. he feels miserable.

useless, too, like his father always said. because nothing he suggests gets taken into account, waved off instead. because he’s just a prop, or at least that’s what he feels like and everything in him sinks.

they debut the day after he turns twenty to little fanfare but plenty of criticism, those who were fans of his mixtapes commenting he’s sold himself out, that they’re not looking forward any longer. he agrees.

but he’s an idol.

he performs on stage because that’s his job, but the euphoria isn’t there like it had been underground. replaced instead with some sinking feeling he doesn’t know how to define at twenty years old. doesn’t know how to get rid of except with anger, with alcohol.

his drinking starts with just a shot or two of soju upon returning to the dorms, snuck into his room and hidden from their managers. then shots turn into bottles, and dorms turn into convenience store fronts. then his anger bleeds into his work environment and some staff leave blind items about him on pann.

no one ever guesses his name, though, because who is atlas anyway?

two years into their career and the public still refuses to respond well to their releases. two years, and the company still refuses to listen to his, and the other atlas members’, ideas. and so two years is how long it takes for gun and the rest of atlas’ rap line to band together and threaten for what they’ve wanted the most, what gun has always dreamed of: having more creative control with the group direction.

it’s a huge risk, he and the other boys know this. going behind the other half of the group’s backs, risking their contracts, their livelihoods, their chance in this industry because if they fail they know there’s no chance in hell anyone will take them in anymore. but it’s a risk they’re willing to take, and one that pays off massively, because to their surprise: they get what they want.

and the public loves it too.

suddenly, they’re thrust right into the spotlight.

suddenly, there’s more responsibility shoved onto his shoulders.

but gun loves it, thrives in it. the stage feels better, now, the feeling he’s missed from all those years ago returning in full force. the music feels good, too, the lyrics. because they’re now actually his in part, songs he can proudly put his name on, songs he will gladly ramble on and on about on vlives and interviews.

there’s a crack in the atlas infrastructure, but gun thinks it’s all been worth it. even if they are running a marathon now, and have been for three straight years. it’s not without consequences, of course. what used to just be small pann rumors and blind items of some nobody idol being an asshole to work with, or of some nobody idol supposedly dating around the stylists and flirting with fans, with other idols and every girl he ever collaborates with are now rumors of an idol everyone in the business knows and have become very real threats to the image he and atlas have built up. 

now the pressure and stress keeps building and building, weighing heavier with not only the threat of those rumors blowing up, but now also with every new milestone reached, every comeback, ever growing expectation.

and so slowly but surely, the euphoria fades again, replaced with worry, with burden, with feelings of not being able to meet impossible expectations. with his parents words from all those years ago resurfacing and reminding him that he's never good enough. 

now, it’s only a matter of time before gun cracks, because even atlas shrugged while holding the weight of the world.