An American woman who spent nearly two years immersed in the South Korean music scene is shedding light on the realities of life as a K-pop star.
Alexandra Reid, now 36, made history in 2015 as the first Black K-pop idol when she joined the established girl group Rania. Her journey into the world of K-pop began after she was discovered during a songwriting session in Los Angeles.
At the time, Reid was crafting K-pop demos when an A&R representative approached her with an intriguing proposition: join Rania as they sought to refresh their image with an American member.
“They said it would be like the Pussycat Dolls, and I would be the Nicole Scherzinger,” Reid shared with the Daily Mail.
“So, we arranged a Skype call for my audition with the company head, and he immediately asked, ‘How soon can you get here?'”
Within ten days, Reid was on a flight to South Korea to officially join Rania and become a K-pop star.
An American woman who spent almost two years as part of a South Korean girl group has opened up about the reality of life in the K-pop industry
Alexandra Reid , now 36, became the first ever Black K-pop idol when she joined the long-running girl group Rania in 2015
Before leaving the US, she recorded vocals for the group’s songs while her lawyer negotiated her contract with the group’s Korean record label.
Reid was excited to join the group and was looking forward to forming a sisterhood with her new members, but there was one big problem – she didn’t speak a word of Korean.
‘You don’t realize what a language barrier really is until you’re in a K-pop dance studio where nobody speaks English and you don’t speak Korean,’ she told Daily Mail.
Reid wasn’t provided a translator by her label, which made for a ‘very awkward’ first meeting with her new bandmates.
‘I was hugging them, but that’s not a thing over there. I probably should’ve been bowing and I should’ve taken my shoes off,’ Reid explained.
In Korea, it is customary to greet your superiors with a 30-degree bow, and as Reid was the new girl in Rania, she was automatically at the bottom of the pecking order in the already established girl group.
‘They were polite, but it was awkward,’ she recalled. ‘I felt like they didn’t want to get to know me.’
Reid also found out that the group’s name was being changed to BP Rania, with the ‘BP’ standing for ‘black pearl’ – a reference to Reid’s Swedish, African and Hungarian heritage.
After Reid joined, the group’s name was changed to BP Rania, with the ‘BP’ standing for ‘black pearl’ – a reference to Reid’s Swedish, African and Hungarian heritage
‘My manager was like, “It’s you! You’re the black pearl,”‘ Reid recalled. ‘I didn’t find it offensive, I thought it was funny.’
Highlighting her race in the otherwise all-Asian group was a way to garner Rania some much needed publicity in the overcrowded and notoriously competitive K-pop scene.
Before she’d even officially debuted in the group, Reid’s entry into the South Korean music market sparked a media frenzy as K-pop fans waited to see how the first African-American K-pop idol would do.
Unfortunately, as eager fans waited for Reid with bated breath, things behind the scenes were a disaster.
Not only was Reid unable to communicate with her bandmates due to the language barrier, she wasn’t even taught choreography for the group’s live performances until five days before the release of their comeback single, Demonstrate.
As a result, her role during the song’s promotions was reduced to a glorified cameo, with Reid strutting out to rap a few bars during the intro, before exiting the stage while the rest of BP Rania performed the entire track together.
While Reid was begging to be properly included in rehearsals and recordings so she could be fully incorporated into the group, she said she was often excluded by BP Rania’s choreographer.
Eventually, things reached a boiling point and Reid ‘clashed’ with the choreographer during a brutal dance practice.
‘There was a big blow up where, essentially, she had done something that was so unacceptable, not to me, but to somebody else,’ Reid shared.
‘I ended up having the girl’s back and protecting her,’ she added.
Despite not speaking any Korean and barely receiving any training from her label, Reid did her best to assimilate to Korean culture and fit in with the group
The fight ultimately brought Reid closer to her bandmates, especially member Kim Jiyoo, who could speak some English and had been added to the group’s revamped lineup shortly before Reid was.
‘We got really close because I think me standing up for another member is something that they hadn’t seen before,’ she explained.
‘It took us to a new level where everyone understood, like, “She’s not just here for The Alex Show, she’s here for us.”‘
With the women finally getting along, BP Rania came together to release their next single, Start a Fire – and that’s when the real work started for Reid.
A typical day would begin with a wakeup call of around 3 or 4am. The members would head to a local beauty parlor to have their hair and makeup done so that they’d be in full K-pop glam for the day’s activities.
Unfortunately, Reid was often forced to do her own glam while her bandmates got theirs done professionally, as the Korean stylists weren’t familiar with the texture of her hair or Western makeup styles, especially when it came to darker skin tones.
‘If we were getting up at four, I was getting up at two to wash and dry my hair, and then I would sit in the beauty shop for three hours while everyone else got their K-pop glam,’ she said.
Once that was done, the group would head to soundcheck and camera blocking for whatever K-pop music show they’d be performing on that afternoon.
Instead of getting a break for lunch, the group would then do a fan event, whether it was an in person meet-and-greet or something on social media, like a live stream.
From there, it would be time to record their performance, which would often require multiple takes so that the crew could get different angles and make various adjustments to ensure that it was perfect.
By this time, which was well past lunch, Reid would have a moment to grab a quick bite to eat – usually a vegetarian kimbap.
When it came to getting food, Reid said that idols ‘are at the beck and call of their managers’.
‘Whatever they get you, that’s what you’re eating,’ she said, adding that it was usually some form of protein with rice.
‘And we’d eat jelly gummies all day to keep us going,’ she added.
Reid would wake up at 4am most days and wouldn’t get to bed until around midnight
After that, the group would usually have another promotional activity at night, before heading to practice for a few hours so that they could continue training and rehearsing.
After practice, they’d stop at the convenience store on the way home to grab a snack, before getting into bed at around midnight to catch a few hours of sleep before starting the day all over again.
In addition to the heavy work schedule, Reid was surprised by how little freedom and privacy idols received.
During promotions, the group were accompanied by a manager at all times, and things were so strict that she couldn’t even go to the bathroom alone.
‘You don’t go anywhere without the manager,’ Reid said.
‘You can’t just get up and walk to the bathroom. You tell the manager and they’ll ask, if anybody else needs to go, and then you’ll all go together, which I found really shocking at first.’
Once she adjusted to the rules and work ethic, Reid was able to find ways to get more freedom – which included secretly dating a fellow K-pop idol.
While it’s virtually impossible for idols from different groups to interact backstage at music shows, Reid revealed that a member from a popular boy band discreetly handed her one of his group’s CDs, which contained a slip of paper with his KakaoTalk ID. (KakaoTalk is the Korean equivalent of WhatsApp.)
The pair started communicating with the help of translating tools and eventually met up for secret dates when their busy schedules allowed.
The relationship eventually fizzled out, and after more than a year living the K-pop lifestyle, Reid started getting burned out.
Reid said that the group had zero privacy and that they were followed around by manager who would get them food and accompany them to the bathroom
Issues at her record label, constant lineup changes within BP Rania and the language barrier all started to take their toll.
‘I was just constantly anxious, and things had gotten so out of hand with the language barrier and people leveraging the language barrier that I felt like I just had no allies,’ she said.
‘And it’s scary to be alone. It’s in that situation where you rely on other people to do everything for you, and I felt like nobody liked me.’
While Reid didn’t go into specifics, she said ‘it felt like there were certain people at the company who didn’t want me to be there, and so they were leveraging the language barrier and basically making it sound like I didn’t want to be there.’
Although she had ups and downs with some of her bandmates, Reid said she didn’t blame any of them for the drama in the group.
‘I think the girls themselves were manipulated more than anything,’ she said.
‘There’s just very clear and strict rules that idols have to adhere to, and me not being from that, not training and not coming up in Korean culture, so much of me is just clashing with what is expected.
‘So I think in a lot of ways, where I thought I was doing nothing wrong, it came off as disrespectful. And a lot of times I was standing up for things that I wasn’t supposed to stand up for as an idol.’
Despite wanting to leave, Reid found it difficult to pull the plug because of how close she had become to the head of her label.
‘The head of my company was my biggest champion and my biggest fan. He wanted my hair to stay curly and for me to stay different. He had my back,’ she said.
‘I didn’t want to let him down and I didn’t want to let the community down. I didn’t want to let my parents down because they were so proud of me and were collecting every little fancam they could find. So I felt really conflicted about leaving.’
Reid eventually returned to Los Angeles, while BP Rania’s label went on to completely reboot the group – this time rebranding them as Blackswan with a diverse new member lineup that does not feature any Koreans.
The group is now comprised of Gabi (Brazilian), Sriya (Indian), NVee (African-American) and Fatou (Senegalese-Belgian).
Reid is now back in Los Angeles and is working on a scripted series about her time as a K-pop idol
Reid arguably paved the way for Black women in K-pop, and despite her struggles in the industry, she has no hard feelings against her bandmates, her record label or K-pop itself.
Instead, she blames how rushed her debut was, along with the lack of support she was given around the language barrier, for why things ultimately went haywire.
Despite the hiccups, Reid is proud of what she has accomplished and loves being part of the K-pop community.
She is now working on a novel about her time as a K-pop idol, which she is already developing into a scripted project.
Growing up, Reid said she was always branded a ‘weirdo’ among her friends for liking K-pop.
‘I didn’t know that there were all these other Black girls and people all over the world who loved K-pop, too, and that were looking up to me,’ she said.
‘I love K-pop. I still love K-pop, and it’s definitely the coolest thing I’ve ever done.’
