BY MANILA BULLETIN ENTERTAINMENT
By Lee Gyu-lee/The Korea Times
The top four K-pop powerhouses — YG Entertainment, HYBE, SM Entertainment and JYP Entertainment — are preparing to take 2025 by storm with full group comebacks and large-scale world tours, ensuring an exciting year for fans worldwide.
YG Entertainment
It has been about three years since YG Entertainment’s girl group BLACKPINK released its last album, “Born Pink.” Though the girls renewed its group contract with YG, the four members — Rose, Jennie, Lisa and Jisoo — have been focusing on their solo act under separate agencies, releasing hit songs like “APT.” for Rose, “Mantra” for Jennie and “Rockstar” for Lisa, while Jisoo is set to star in series and movies.
This year, BLACKPINK is finally slated to reunite as a full group, garnering high anticipation from its global fans.
YG Entertainment’s chief producer and founder Yang Hyun-suk announced in July that in 2025, many of its artists will pick up their act simultaneously. “It will be the year that BLACKPINK's comeback and world tour begins,” he said.
The details and timeline of the group’s new album release and world tour have not yet been revealed, but the group’s comeback is expected to contribute significantly to YG’s financial success this year.
The agency is also set to roll out new releases for its boy group TREASURE, following a leadership shake-up. In a recent video on the agency’s YouTube, Yang revealed that Choi Hyun-suk and Jihoon will pass their leadership positions to Junkyu and Asahi. The group has a new mini-album planned for February and a full-length album in July or August.
“TREASURE plans to showcase a different concept than before … It is preparing an album that can express (the members') honest feelings and approach you more comfortably,” the producer said, adding the group will have various events, including a world tour in October.
HYBE
Since the members of K-pop juggernaut BTS began their mandatory military service one by one in 2022, HYBE’s label BigHit Music has been putting its best effort to fill the void of the members’ hiatus, releasing solo albums the members worked on before enlisting.
Jungkook and Jimin have been dominating domestic and global music charts with their albums “Golden” and “Muse,” respectively, even while serving in the military. Jin and J-hope picked up their solo acts after getting discharged last year.
After about three years, all seven members are to have completed mandatory service, with RM, Suga, V, Jimin and Jungkook being the last to be discharged this June.
When the agency announced the group’s hiatus upon serving in the military, it said it “hopes for BTS to resume activities as a full group in 2025.”
As 2025 also marks the 10th anniversary of “The Most Beautiful Moment in Life” series, BTS' musical trilogy released under the theme of young adulthood, the band is expected to return with a full group release this year.
Another HYBE label, Pledis Entertainment, will have its boy group Seventeen wrap up its "Right Here" world tour in the first half of this year. The band is slated to perform at Mexico's music festival Tecate Pa'l Norte in April.
NewJeans from another HYBE subsidiary, Ador, is expected to go through legal battles with its agency after the members declared the termination of its exclusive contract in November — a claim the agency refuted.
SM Entertainment
SM Entertainment has been known as one of the most crucial pillars in K-pop history since it was founded in 1995. The company produced first-generation K-pop artists like H.O.T and S.E.S and continues its success with fifth-generation stars like aespa and NCT.
The agency is celebrating its 30th anniversary this February with a two-day festival, “SM Town Live 2025.”
The concert, which will be held on Jan. 11 and Jan. 12 at Gocheok Sky Dome in Guro District, Seoul, will invite major artists who have been under the agency over the decades, like Tony An from H.O.T. and Bada from S.E.S., BoA and TVXQ as well as Red Velvet, NCT 127, aespa and its first virtual artist Naevis.
The concert will start in Seoul and tour in four different cities — Mexico City, Los Angeles, London and Tokyo — until August.
This year, the agency plans to take another step toward debuting its first new girl group in five years.
JYP Entertainment
JYP Entertainment will be running major concert tours worldwide for its big-name artists like Stray Kids and Day6.
Stray Kids, which had historic success as the first artist in Billboard's 69-year history to top the Billboard 200 six consecutive times last month, will be picking up its world tour on a bigger scale. The group is scheduled to begin the second leg of its “dominATE” world tour in March, adding five Latin American and five European destinations for the first time since their debut, alongside 10 cities in North America.
The tour is expected to draw an average audience of 50,000 per show, with a total attendance of almost 1 million people.
JYP’s breakout band Day6 is also slated to hold its world tour to expand its global fan base, traveling to cities like Jakarta, Osaka, Manila, Sydney, Los Angeles and New York throughout May for its third world tour, “Forever Young,” which kicked off in September in Incheon.
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