Dreamcatcher’s Rising Wolf: Siyeon’s Singing Success

It’s “Siyeon Day” as far as Dreamcatcher fans are concerned over in South Korea, as the group’s main vocalist and self-professed wolf fan celebrates her October 1st birthday. The 25-year old, like the rest of Dreamcatcher, has seen her share of bumps on the road to success and stability in the often volatile K-Pop industry, and her admitted difficulties in dealing with the failure of Dreamcatcher’s past incarnation as MINX are certainly well known among the group’s supporters.

But in 2020 (and arguably before that), Siyeon, in particular, appears to be finally turning a corner after all that earlier hardship. On Siyeon Day, let’s take a quick look back at how Dreamcatcher’s main vocalist has carved a path for herself (and for her fellow members).

Musically, nothing probably tops Siyeon’s achievements in 2020 more than her solo album debut, “Paradise”. An electronic pop song with both soft vibes and a powerful, heady chorus that shows off Siyeon’s vocal skill, “Paradise” was partially written by Siyeon herself and sends a message of togetherness despite being bogged down by routine and difficulties, according to her description of the song at 24:00 and following on Idol Radio episode 490.

The song did respectably well on the charts, debuting at number 10 on the Billboard World Music chart and also at number 2 on the US iTunes K-Pop chart, trailing only powerhouse BTS’s “Black Swan”. The latter achievement was so unbelievable to Siyeon herself at first that she stated on Idol Radio that she thought the photos being sent to her of it were faked somehow. Dreamcatcher fans were obviously ecstatic over such a strong performance.

But that wasn’t the only singing engagement Siyeon had in 2020. In July, Siyeon was asked to sing a track off of an OST for a Korean TV series, “Into The Ring”, a 16-episode romantic/political comedy starring Goo Se Ra, a fiery-tempered concerned citizen whose constant civil complaints in her local ward office lead her to throw her own hat into the political ring. Siyeon sang “Good Sera”, a bright rock track with a generous amount of guitar that, not surprisingly, reflects the character’s determined, passionate nature.

While Siyeon stated in an interview that at first she seemed nervous about having to carry a song for a K-Drama for a full four minutes, it’s pretty clear from the recording that Siyeon had nothing to worry about — especially since this wasn’t the first time Siyeon had had to sing a track for an OST.

In November 2019, Siyeon covered an all-English track off of the “King’s Raid” mobile game OST, “Blind Days”, a high tension rock song with a ton of energy behind it. This certainly wouldn’t have seemed unusual, given the fact that Dreamcatcher’s highly successful September 2019 comeback collaboration with “King’s Raid” developer Vespa was already in the books. The collaboration’s mini-album title track, “Deja Vu”, is arguably the track that would begin an upward trajectory of popularity that has persisted into their latest track “BOCA” and put Dreamcatcher on the map. But what Siyeon did was put the icing on the cake here, singing with an energy and depth that lends strength to what is meant to be an inspiring rock-based track for the game — made even more impressive by the fact that Siyeon isn’t singing in her native language.

But even this wasn’t the first time Siyeon had sung in English that year. In the midst of Disney’s attempted renaissance of its animated classic movies into live-action films, “Aladdin”, one of the latest entries, drew a bunch of attention for new song “Speechless”, sung by character Princess Jasmine as a defiant declaration of independence from oppression and hardship. In that sense, it was entirely appropriate for Siyeon, known for her outspoken independence and tendency to break the mold, to sing the song in near-impeccable English pronunciation, and with a vocal power so noticeable that even Disney Music’s official YouTube account gave it a commented set of applause. At close to 5 million views as of this writing, it remains one of the most popular covers of the song from K-Pop artists.

To be honest, all this time spent in Siyeon’s 2019 work just shows to Dreamcatcher fans that Siyeon has been a wolf on the rise since before 2020. A short appearance on the popular music show “King of Masked Singer” that impressed judges (as they had pegged her as an older, experienced singer rather than a vocal powerhouse in her prime) led to an opportunity to compete on vocal survival show “V-1”, where she rocketed all the way to the finals on the back of her powerfully impressive vocal talent, capped by a memorable rock version of EXO’s “Overdose”:

All this proves is that the myriad of things that Siyeon has achieved in just 2019 and 2020 as far as individual moments are a veritable waterfall of validations that show that there are people out there in the Korean music world that are finally recognizing her singing talent and stage presence. For the Dreamcatcher member who arguably feels closest to their now-trademark sound due to her love of the rock genre, these achievements can only be things that have made all the hardship and the long years she’s spent training and performing finally worth it. And if Dreamcatcher and Siyeon’s track record in 2020 can speak to anything, we’re likely to hear the group’s resident wolf howling at the moon and at us with her amazing vocal power and skill for a long time to come.

Happy Siyeon Day!