[동아닷컴=곽현수 기자] BLACKPINK hosted “BLACKPINK PREMIUM DEBUT SHOWCASE” at Budokan on July 20. All the 14,000 tickets were sold out.

It was an unusually large-scale showcase for a foreign rookie artist, which was sponsored by Japan’s biggest fashion event “Tokyo Girls Collection”. Notably, more than 200,000 application tickets for attendance at the showcase were received, proving BLACKPINK’s explosive popularity in Japan.

The showcase venue was filled up with the passion of the audience, from even before the beginning of the show. Despite the scorching heat of the summer season, fans were waiting in long queues in order to see BLACKPINK. Local fans showed their affection for BLACKPINK by wearing black and pink clothes and holding a variety of goods for rooting for BLACKPINK.

Notably, most of the fans who came to the showcase were girls who were captivated by BLACKPINK’s “girl crush” appeals. Nippon TV, one of the major TV stations in Japan, reported about BLACKPINK’s showcase in the morning on the day to analyze the reason for BLACKPINK’s popularity and draw keen attention.

Not only BLACKPINK’s fans but also people from five major TV stations including Nippon TV, NHK, Fuji TV, TBS, and TV Asahi, as well as six major newspapers in Japan including Tokyo Chunichi Sports, Sports Hochi, Daily Sports, Sports Nippon, Nikkan Sports, and Sankei Sports flocked to report about BLACKPINK.

In addition, more than 50 fashion and culture magazines including Elle, Nylon Japan, and mini, as well as Internet media and celebrities in the fields of sports and entertainment showed great interest in BLACKPINK’s debut.

BLACKPINK came upon the 360-degree round stage, with a fancy and grand sound. BLACKPINK marked the beginning of the showcase with performance of “BOOMBAYAH” and “PLAYING WITH

ＢＬＡＣＫＰＩＮＫ、日本デビューショーケース満席…８月末にアルバム発表

FIRE” in Japanese. The girls fascinated all the people at the arena, with perfect live performance and sophisticated manners on the stage.

BLACKPINK went on to reveal their talent by performing total six songs including debut song “WHISTLE” and the latest hit “As If It’s Your Last”. The audience rooted for every small gesture of BLACKPINK, shouting the name of each member.

YG’s head producer YANG HYUN SUK directly visited BLACKPINK’s first show in Japan. YANG visited BLACKPINK’s makeup room after the end of the show, to encourage the members.

The showcase was live-broadcasted on LINE Live and the number of viewers surpassed 350,000, proving BLACKPINK’s remarkable popularity in Japan.

After the successful end of the debut showcase, BLACKPINK will release their official debut album in the country on August 30. Music fans are showing keen interest in how big achievement BLACKPINK will make after their rapid growth in Korea since debut in August last year.

2017. 7. 21.