K-Pop groups come and go, but for the girl group AILA, their debut success proved exceptionally short-lived.
Hyunda Company, the same agency that later debuted Babyboo, revealed AILA members Rahee, Siyeon, Yena, and Kelly in 2013 and made their official debut with “Pretty Pretty Pretty Girl.” Based on their Turkish group name, meaning the moon, AILA members expressed their strong ambition, commenting, “We’re four moons and together we’ll form one full moon to light up the darkness.”
But light up the darkness, AILA could not. The girl group ultimately disbanded immediately after their debut. While the four members had already been booking schedules as a cover group for about a year, their “official” promotion as an actual girl group lasted just one hour.
As later revealed by MBC‘s True Story, AILA’s disbandment came after the members were scolded by their agency’s CEO immediately following their first music show performance. And because their stage performance was “unsatisfactory,” the group was no more.
AILA members also revealed on the program that at their dorm, water leaks and power outages happened frequently. Plus, the rice provided by the agency sometimes contained mold—illustrating how their basic human rights were not protected.
Korean press Ilyo Sisa noted, “It’s assumed that the CEO made a hasty and harsh decision to disband the girl group simply because he never had any real intention of supporting their activities.”
After the disbandment, members demanded that the CEO terminates their contracts. In response, the CEO tried suing the members. Fortunately, the court sided with the members who, only then, were able to receive payment for all of their activities.
To AILA’s most devastating K-Pop endeavor, K-Pop fans reacted with rage toward the CEO of Hyunda Company (out of business since 2020) and other small entertainment agencies who pull similar schemes to exploit desperate idol trainees.
- “The agency didn’t even support the members, so who do they think they are to say the performance was ‘unsatisfactory’ and disband them?!”
- “Can’t believe there are still shady agencies run like back-alley operations.”
- “The CEO forced the group to disband, then when the members wanted to terminate the contract, the agency tried to sue them to get money out of it.”
- “At least support the members before saying stuff like that, LOL. The agency provided zero help and then disbanded them for putting on a ‘bad performance’? LOL.”
- “They must have been so upset.”
- “That agency had zero sense of shame, LOL.”
- “Can’t really call them an agency, can we? No matter how desperate you are to debut, you should at least check if the company or its CEO is trustworthy or has any credibility…”
- “Honestly, among small to mid-sized entertainment companies, there are a lot that are actually gangster-run shell agencies used for money laundering and shady business. In the past, they used to do this through construction companies, but nowadays they use the entertainment industry for laundering.”
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