Where Are They Now? The Only K-Pop Group On A 10+ Year Hiatus
While many K-Pop groups debut and disband shortly after—or several years later—some groups are a special case.
Rather than disband, they decide to take a hiatus. Among all the boy groups and girl groups with the longest hiatuses, one group hasn’t had a Korean comeback in over ten years.
In 2007, Mnet Media (now Wake One Entertainment) debuted its six-member boy group Supernova (also known as Choshinsung) with the members Geonil, Yoonhak, Sungmo, Jihyuk, Kwangsoo, and Sungje.
They released their first full-length album, The Beautiful Stardust, with the debut track “Hit”, which was received well by fans. They followed it up with the 2008 single “Superstar” before making an unexpected collaboration.
Supernova made a comeback in 2009 with the girl group T-ARA. They promoted the song “TTL (TIME TO LOVE)” which was popular enough to receive the remix “TTL Listen 2”. Although the songs shined the spotlight on Supernova once again, it didn’t last long.
Despite making a few comebacks afterward, they couldn’t keep up with famous groups like 2NE1, Girls’ Generation, SS501, SHINee, and 2PM at the time. Supernova made their last Korean comeback in 2012 with “She’s Gone”. That wasn’t the end for the group, though.
Fortunately for the group, Supernova didn’t only focus on Korean promotions. During the same year they were promoting with T-ARA, they debuted in Japan. Their Japanese debut song “Kimidake Wo Zutto”, and other singles from their first album Hana, quickly topped the charts.
Supernova was so successful that they consistently released full-length Japanese albums from 2009 to 2021, with their singles and albums often charting in the top ten. They also held Japanese concerts, which sold out in as little as five minutes. The group eventually created its own company SV ENT after their contracts expired with Maroo Entertainment—except Sungmo, who left the group in 2019 following the expiration.
Continuing as a five-member group, Supernova’s latest album Cloud Nine was released in 2021 with the title track “Amanogawa”. However, despite their last group release being two years ago, that doesn’t mean they aren’t keeping busy.
Between Sungje’s solo promotions, leader Yoonhak’s musical, and the Funky Galaxy unit (Geonil, Jihyuk, and Kwangsoo), all five members are still active in 2023. Although they haven’t released Korean music in over ten years, they’re one of the country’s longest-standing groups since they’ve been together for sixteen years.
And since Supernova made a rare appearance on M Countdown for a special stage of “Stupid Love” in 2015, maybe they’ll surprise fans again in the future with another Korean performance.