BANG Jun-seok, born in 1970, is a singer, songwriter and music producer. Having spent most of his childhood in Chile and the USA, he teamed up in 1994 with a fellow expatriate Korean he met at New York State University, YI Sung Yol, to form the modern rock duo U&Me Blue. Despite two albums released in Korea, the group failed to find its audience and was ultimately disbanded in 1997. However, by that time, two of their songs had found their way into movies, namely the crit...More

BANG Jun-seok, born in 1970, is a singer, songwriter and music producer. Having spent most of his childhood in Chile and the USA, he teamed up in 1994 with a fellow expatriate Korean he met at New York State University, YI Sung Yol, to form the modern rock duo U&Me Blue. Despite two albums released in Korea, the group failed to find its audience and was ultimately disbanded in 1997. However, by that time, two of their songs had found their way into movies, namely the critically-acclaimed social drama film <A Single Spark> (1995) and the melodrama <Man with Flowers> (1997). Fascinated by the synergy created between his music and these movies, BANG decided to pursue a career in the film industry and completed his first scoring assignment in 1999, for the horror thriller <Tell Me Something> (1999). At a time when the industry would generally simply use preexisting songs, BANG won wide acclaim for his effective and enjoyable compositions. Among the most famous original soundtracks he composed in his early career are those for <Joint Security Area / JSA> (2000), from PARK Chan-wook, and <You Are My Sunshine> (2005). In 2006, as he was tasked with writing the songs of a fictional rock star from the 80s for LEE Joon-ik’s <Radio Star>, he came up with the power ballad “The Rain and You”. The song, performed in the film by PARK Joong-hoon and punk band No Brain, took the country by storm following the success of the movie and has inspired many cover versions up to this day. BANG would work with LEE again for the two other instalments in his trilogy about music, <The Happy Life> (2007) and <Sunny> (2008). As more films were being produced with music as subject, he started gaining wider recognition as well as more important roles. For the musical drama film <Go Go 70s> (2008), not only did he compose all of the songs, which are considered among the best in Korean film music, he also co-wrote the screenplay. Among his works in recent years, his score for <The Throne> (2014) won Best Music at the Blue Dragon Film Awards and the Korean Association of Film Critics Awards, and <The Battleship Island> (2017) was recognized for Best Music Award by the Korean Film Producers Association. He was reunited again with LEE Jun-ik in 2017 for <Sunset in My Hometown>, which is set in part in the hip-hop scene.Less