SHINee was originally made up of five members. It used to be one of the most popular K-pop male bands in South Korea. The band which was created by South Korea’s biggest entertainment company, SM in 2008 released several award-winning albums and singles both in Korean and Japanese languages. The band also headlined several tours both within Asia and globally, held multiple sold-out concerts, and even appeared in some films and television programs including reality shows.
Everything seemed to be going right for them until 2017 when tragedy struck the group. What actually happened to SHINee and what are the band members doing now? Find out here.
Here’s What Happened to SHINee
It is normally assumed that creativity comes from a place of intense emotions – maybe love, pain or grief. With regard to the aspect of pain, the artists usually use his creativity as a means to ease the pain. However, most times fans or those close to such a person may not even know what is wrong until it is too late. The case of SHINee’s lead singer and songwriter, Jonghyun, acclaimed as one of the best vocalists in South Korea is a perfect example of creativity borne from pain as he is known to have suffered from depression for his entire life. However, after wallowing in silence, Jonghyun decided to put an end to it (and himself) on 18th December 2017.
Naturally, his death came as a shock to friends and fans, but most of all to his family and band members. The pain that comes with the loss of a dear one is not one that just goes away, it might be dulled with time but one never fully recovers from such loss. The remaining members of the group tried to keep the band alive after the death of Jonghyun but SHINee just never remained the same.
It is also known that prior to Jonghyun’s death, SHINee had scheduled a series of concerts in Japan that were supposed to come in February 2018. However, after his death, they considered whether to cancel, postpone or just go forward with it.
They eventually decided on the third option and went to perform, as scheduled. One of the remaining four members, Key, said they chose to do the concerts in order to accept their reality by themselves and not be forced by others to move on. He also added that they stood on stage for Jonghyun, to send him to a better place.
However, some of the fans weren’t buying it and they expressed concern that the group was riding on the death of their member to max out on marketing, and these comments broke the hearts of the other 4 members – Taemin, Key, Minho, and Onew. They later revealed their predicament on the South Korean Talk Show, Radio Star while they discussed their career post – Jonghyun. The four made it known it was not an easy ordeal for them to cope with and they all had to attend therapy. They were still in recovery when they held the tour in Japan.
What are the Band Members Doing Now?
Due to the fact that the band has not been officially disbanded yet, SHINee still lives as a four-member band. In late March 2018, after their promotional Japanese tour, the band released a Japanese single titled ”From Now On”. Less than a month after that, they released a compilation album in Japanese titled ”Shinee The Best From Now On”. The album has 20 tracks including ”From Now On” and it featured Jonghyun, posthumously.
Shinee The Best From Now On was well received in Japan, attaining gold status and selling close to 96,000 copies there. It also reached No. 1 on the Japanese Oricon Charts.
Between the following May and June, the group released a three-part EP in Korean, The Story of Light. This was their first Korean album since they released 1 of 1 in 2016 and since Jonghyun’s death.
On 1st August, SHINee released their fifteenth Japanese single titled ”Sunny Side” featuring a track written by the members as well as the Japanese versions of two lead singles from their previous Korean EPs – ”Good Evening” and ”I want you”.
The group repackaged three of their previous albums and released it on September 10 as ”The Story of Light-Epilogue”. This was the last release from SHINee, as a band.
Individually, however, Onew signed up for his compulsory military service in December 2018. Key and Minho followed suit in March and April respectively. As for Taemin, on August 7, 2019, he was announced to have joined a K-pop supergroup, SuperM made up of seven members from three SM male groups. He is the only SHINee member in the supergroup which debuted on October 4, 2019.
