DAMONS YEAR Wants You to Fall Apart Instead of Pretending You’re Fine

The Quiet Power of DAMONS YEAR’s Emotional Honesty

Browsing through the YouTube comment sections for DAMONS YEAR’s songs is fascinating in itself. Beneath the music, listeners leave deeply emotional reflections about memories, lost relationships, and moments from their past that the songs unexpectedly brought back to the surface.

“I happened to hear this song you once told me you loved, and it made me want to put a few feelings into words.”

“No matter how hard I try to forget, why are you the only person I can’t let go of? Even when I look back on this year, it feels completely filled with thoughts of you.”

DAMONS YEAR never hides emotions like anxiety, regret, or emotional instability. Instead, he turns them directly into song. Even feelings often dismissed as weakness — dependency, obsession, attachment — are portrayed without denial or shame. Memories of former lovers are not reduced to bitterness either; he quietly revisits the good moments they shared, sometimes even allowing traces of gratitude to emerge.

What runs through his music is not an attempt to neatly overcome pain or resolve emotional wounds, but a willingness to simply carry them as they are. His songs are not built around messages like “you’ll get through this” or “everything will be okay.” Instead, there is a deeper feeling underneath them all: if you are about to fall apart, maybe it is okay to fall apart.

That is why his music feels so comforting. It gently affirms listeners even while they are still holding emotions that feel close to collapsing.

“A Work Means Something When It Fully Reflects Who You Were at That Moment”

I heard that you were originally quite shy. Despite that, your lyrics are incredibly direct and emotionally exposed. Was there a particular turning point that led you to start expressing yourself that openly?

DAMONS YEAR: Ever since I was young, I’ve been very introverted. I was never the type to openly reveal my emotions in front of other people. Because of that, there were many times when I couldn’t say what I truly wanted to say in the moment. And the more experiences like that pile up, the more those unspoken feelings refuse to disappear. Instead, they stay with you as regret — like, “I should’ve said this back then.”

That’s why, at least when I write songs, I try to let those emotions out. For me, it felt like the most natural way not to remain trapped in the past. Over time, my lyrics naturally became more and more personal, and I started writing my feelings exactly as they were in that moment.

When I release those emotions through music, they begin to untangle themselves. It makes things feel a little lighter, and it helps me move forward. So for me, music isn’t just a form of expression. It feels more like a process for surviving life itself.

Would you say that “being honest” is one of your core principles when writing lyrics?

DAMONS YEAR: Yes, I think so. To me, music feels like a direct reflection of a person’s way of thinking. When I write lyrics, I try to preserve my emotions exactly as they were in that moment as much as possible. No matter how personal the subject matter is, I usually don’t hesitate to write it honestly. A lot of the music I loved growing up was like that too, and I always wanted to make music in the same spirit.

Which musicians influenced you in that kind of emotionally honest expression?

DAMONS YEAR: In Korea, there are legendary senior artists like Yoo Jae-ha and Kim Kwang-seok. When I was in middle school, I also listened to The Black Skirts a lot. And because I started music relatively late, the influence of Frank Ocean — whom I discovered in my twenties — was especially huge for me.

His music feels extremely personal, but I think that’s precisely why it reaches so many people. Even if a song isn’t glamorous, I believe there’s value in work that clearly captures who you were in that exact moment. And honestly, I think creating music like that is what makes someone an artist.

Emotions like anxiety, obsession, and attachment appear frequently in your lyrics. It almost feels as though those emotions themselves are what drive your creativity.

DAMONS YEAR: I think those emotions are part of my energy too. Everyone is born with different tendencies. Some people naturally carry positive energy, while others carry negative energy. I’m very clearly the latter.

When I was a teenager, I didn’t know how to deal with that darker side of myself, and it was honestly painful. At first, I didn’t want to accept who I really was, so I tried writing songs while pretending to be someone else. But when I listened back to those songs later, they felt embarrassing. I couldn’t even bear to hear them.

At one point, I went through a complete emotional collapse. After that experience, I realized, “I can’t lie in my music anymore either.” Since then, I’ve only written about the emotions I genuinely felt in that exact moment.

The song I wrote during that period became my debut single, Couldn’t Sleep. It was the first time I could truly say, from the bottom of my heart, that I liked one of my own songs. Before that, I think I had always been trying to decorate or stylize my music somehow. But writing that song made me realize, “This is how I should express myself.” In a way, it also felt like the song saved me a little.

Earlier, you mentioned that you began writing your emotions exactly as they were in the moment. On your latest album “CORPUS 0,” I was especially struck by how THE BEACON OF HOPE portrays the feeling of being unable to let go of an almost impossible possibility within a romantic relationship. Generally speaking, emotions like anxiety or obsession are often treated as weaknesses people are supposed to overcome, but this song feels more like it embraces those feelings instead.

DAMONS YEAR: In today’s society, whenever people point out someone else’s flaws or mistakes, it often feels like there’s an unspoken assumption that human beings are supposed to already be complete and emotionally perfected from the very beginning. I’ve always felt slightly uncomfortable with that idea.

Personally, I don’t think human beings are capable of fully controlling their emotions. When you truly love someone, attachment naturally follows. And I think it’s also completely natural for people to experience impulsive emotions that others might not understand. To me, those contradictions are part of human nature itself.

Working on this album especially made me feel that even more strongly. That’s why, in THE BEACON OF HOPE, I didn’t want to forcibly reject or overcome negative emotions. I wanted to express them exactly as they existed.

“CORPUS 0” Was Built on the Belief That No Emotion Lasts Forever

The title “CORPUS 0” feels very conceptual, especially with its use of the Latin word “corpus,” meaning “body” or “physical form.”

DAMONS YEAR: I chose the title with the meaning of “a body that doesn’t exist.” Personally, I actually prefer having bad dreams over good ones. Good dreams often show you things you can never truly have again, and when you wake up, reality feels even more painful afterward.

At some point, I started wondering, “Is there a way to keep dreaming forever after having a good dream?” (laughs). That led me to imagine a state where there is no physical body left to wake you up — where the body and consciousness separate while dreaming, allowing only the consciousness to remain trapped inside the dream indefinitely. That image eventually became the concept behind the phrase “CORPUS 0.”

The album begins with “+,” and the first half is filled with songs that portray hope and memory in a beautiful light. But then the title track CORPUS 0 seems to pull the listener back into reality before the album ends with “-.” The flow felt very deliberate. What kind of structure were you aiming for?

DAMONS YEAR: I wanted to express the way human emotions shift from positive, to zero, to negative. At first, there’s still desire, or a small sense of hope. Then, by passing through “zero,” you begin to recognize and accept reality, and eventually your emotions descend into something darker.

But at the same time, I also wanted the album to work in reverse — starting from negativity and gradually rising upward again through memory. No matter where you begin, the structure is designed to eventually loop back into itself.

The image I had in mind was like placing two mirrors face to face, creating an endless reflection. One mirror is “plus,” the other is “minus,” and they continue reflecting each other infinitely.

Throughout the album, the phrase “when morning comes” appears repeatedly. I was struck by the way you seem to connect the passage of time with emotional states. Is that something you consciously think about?

DAMONS YEAR: I feel like emotions are what move time forward. Once a certain emotion appears, it causes you to repeatedly revisit the past, and in doing so, you begin reconstructing those memories and experiences in your mind.

There’s a line in Interstellar that says, “Love is the one thing that transcends time and space,” and I really connect with that feeling. Emotions are what allow the present to connect itself to both the past and the future.

At the same time, I also think emotions are constantly transformed by time itself. For me personally, anxiety tends to become much stronger at night, and then eases slightly once morning arrives. That’s why the phrase “when morning comes” started appearing naturally in my lyrics. I don’t believe any emotion lasts forever, so I want to preserve those shifts while they still exist.

Another thing that stood out to me was your relationship with memory. Painful memories are often framed as things people should forget or overcome, but your music feels more like an attempt to hold onto them. What does writing about memory mean to you?

DAMONS YEAR: I think I’m simply trying to preserve memories that matter deeply to me. In the end, memories are things we can never truly return to.

Even with close friends, when someone leaves your life and you can never see them again, there are moments where they almost begin to feel like someone who has died. Because of that, I want to keep them alive somehow inside myself.

When I write songs like that, it usually means I’m still not ready to completely let go of those memories. I want to preserve them as vividly as possible. Of course, I know there will eventually come a day when I have to release them too. But until then, I want to continue carrying them with me.

That said, I’m also someone who often only realizes how important something was after I’ve already lost it.

Looking through the comment sections under your songs, there are so many people recalling memories and moments tied to someone important in their lives through your music. How do you feel about people connecting with your songs in that way?

DAMONS YEAR: I try not to offer comfort that I can’t personally take responsibility for. So rather than saying, “Everything will be okay,” I’d rather tell people, “If you feel like you’re about to fall apart, maybe it’s okay to fall apart.”

I think people often try to suppress their emotions because they want relief as quickly as possible. But when those feelings keep piling up inside, the collapse that eventually comes later can become much more dangerous. If you’re hurting, maybe it’s better to completely break down now instead of forcing yourself to endure it.

Whether or not you eventually overcome those emotions or memories comes afterward. Before anything else, I think there first needs to be a moment of collapsing. Trying to look away from your feelings or pretending you’re okay in order to “move on” eventually becomes a kind of lie to yourself. First, you should allow yourself to exist exactly as you are. What comes after that — how you stand back up again — can be different for everyone.

A lot of pop music tends to revolve around messages like “be stronger” or “you can overcome this.” Your approach feels quite different from that.

DAMONS YEAR: I think lyrics like that are often directed toward “the masses” rather than toward an individual person. And honestly, I feel like words aimed at the masses usually contain at least a little bit of a lie.
Of course, I’m not trying to reject those kinds of messages completely. But to me, they sometimes feel similar to drinking alcohol and immediately falling asleep — words that temporarily help you forget something, rather than truly face it.

The Influence of Shunji Iwai: Creating Dreams Because Reality Cannot Be Resolved

In a previous interview, you mentioned Shunji Iwai as an influence, which really stood out to me. What is it about his films that resonates with you so deeply?

DAMONS YEAR: What fascinates me about Shunji Iwai’s films is that they make you emotionally experience things you’ve never actually gone through yourself, almost as if they were your own memories.

For example, with PiCNiC, I’ve never been locked away inside a psychiatric hospital like the characters in the film. But I do understand the feeling of wanting to escape somewhere, or the sensation that the entire world — except for yourself and maybe a very small number of people — feels like hell.

Those emotions overlapped with the situations inside the film, which made it affect me even more deeply. The dialogue especially left a strong impression on me. It felt almost like hearing words I had personally needed to hear.

When you say “words you needed to hear,” do you mean something close to comfort or reassurance?

DAMONS YEAR: Yes, I think it was a form of comfort. In PiCNiC, the protagonist Tsumuji lives while carrying guilt over a sin committed during childhood. Watching that made me think deeply about the idea of “sin” itself.

Human beings create societies, and societies define good and evil through laws. That’s where guilt comes from too. In the film, Coco says something to Tsumuji that basically feels like, “If the world ends tomorrow, then your sins disappear too.” It’s such a simple line, but it felt like an enormous form of comfort to me.

I also went through a period where I suffered for a long time from guilt over hurting someone else. So when I heard that line, it felt almost as if it were speaking to me from somewhere outside this world itself. It felt like a kind of “divine comfort.”

When I write lyrics myself, I’m drawn less to complicated or intellectual expressions and more toward words that are simple, but still leave you thinking afterward.

Shunji Iwai’s films often feel as though emotions and problems that cannot be resolved in reality are somehow sublimated or transformed within the world of the work itself. Do you feel your music shares something similar?

DAMONS YEAR: I think so. Lately, because I already know certain things can’t truly be resolved in reality, I’ve started feeling more drawn toward creating something closer to a “dream” shaped the way I wish things could be.

Shunji Iwai has many admirers in Korea as well. Why do you think his work resonates so strongly there?

DAMONS YEAR: I think people and societies are fundamentally similar everywhere, and there are simply a lot of people who feel lost.

On the surface, many people may seem completely fine, but deep down they’re running away from their emotions, their past, or even from themselves. For people like that, I think Shunji Iwai’s films can resonate very deeply.

Singing Beyond Language Ahead of His Japan Tour

Early on, you often cited minimalist and quiet sounding artists like The xx and Beach House as influences. But your more recent work feels broader in scope, with heavier use of guitars and more experimental arrangements. What do you think led to that evolution in your sound?

DAMONS YEAR: I don’t think the music I listen to has changed that dramatically over the years. What’s probably changed more is the way I perceive music itself.

Lately, I’ve found myself looking at films or photographs and imagining what kind of music would fit those images. I think that naturally expanded the range of my expression. It’s not necessarily that I became more “experimental,” but rather that I became better at turning the scenes I imagine in my head into actual sound.

The way I watch films has changed too. In the past, I focused mostly on the story itself, but now I pay much more attention to the emotions underneath it and what exists behind those emotions.

Your music really does feel cinematic and literary in that sense. Sometimes it almost feels like the kind of music that could exist alongside paintings in a museum gallery. Your recent solo concert in Korea was even held inside a hall at a history museum. When you create music, does it ever feel less like “making songs” and more like writing a novel or constructing visual imagery?

DAMONS YEAR: When I write songs, I often work while looking at scenes from films I love, photographs, or paintings on a screen. I imagine what kind of chords or melodies would fit those images, and then I sing from there.

For example, I might picture a scene from Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind and imagine myself as one of the characters, asking, “What kind of music should be playing during this moment?” I think working that way naturally leads my music toward a more cinematic atmosphere.

As for lyrics, writing them feels close to talking to myself. I like writing them almost like dialogue from a novel.

Do you often go to movie theaters or museums to find inspiration?

DAMONS YEAR: I watch films all the time. Recently, I’ve been going to the theater almost every weekend. I don’t regularly visit museums in the same way, but every once in a while I suddenly feel the urge to go.

Sometimes I come across words in movie dialogue or the titles of artworks that I normally wouldn’t encounter in everyday life, and those moments often become inspiration for new ideas.

Do you feel that music, film, literature, and visual art are all deeply connected to each other?

DAMONS YEAR: I think the methods of expression are different, but fundamentally they’re all acts of creating a single “world.”

For me, every song should have its own protagonist, and an entire world should exist within it. That’s why I’m not very drawn to songs that lack a real sense of world building, or songs that only imitate a mood superficially.

You also have performances coming up overseas in places like Japan and Taiwan. In Korea especially, many listeners seem deeply drawn to the lyrical aspect of your music. How would you like your songs to reach audiences who don’t understand the language?

DAMONS YEAR: Even when I listen to foreign music myself, I usually fall in love with the atmosphere first and only look up the lyrics afterward. So to me, the most important thing isn’t necessarily the language itself, but the feeling or energy that reaches you first.

I think musicians naturally express the strongest energy when singing in their native language. So rather than trying too hard to directly communicate meaning, I think it’s enough if listeners become curious precisely because they don’t fully understand it.

That’s why, when I write lyrics, I care not only about meaning but also pronunciation and the texture of the sounds themselves. I also think of the voice almost like an instrument that supports the emotions and lyrics, so I always try to sing in a way that best fits each song.

In the end, even if listeners don’t understand the words, I hope something still reaches them emotionally first — and from there, they’ll naturally want to discover more on their own.

DAMONS YEAR “CORPUS 0”

CORPUS 0

Artist: DAMONS YEAR
Format: CD
Retail Price: ¥3,600 (tax included) / ¥3,273 before tax
Catalog Number: SCD-0022
Released by: SSE PROJECT
Distributed by: BIG ROMANTIC RECORDS (Moonromantic Inc.)

Track List
Disk 1
1. +
2.504 GATEWAY TIMEOUT
3. GERTHA LOEW
4. TO THE UNDYING LOVER
5. THE CLOCKWORK WHIRL
6. UNDERWATER JUNE
7. CORPUS 0
8. THE BEACON OF HOPE
9. EREBIA
10. TO THE DEPARTED LOVER
11. DELIRIUM
12. TELEPATHY
13.-

Disc 2
1.-
2. TELEPATHY
3. DELIRIUM
4. TO THE DEPARTED LOVER
5. EREBIA
6. THE BEACON OF HOPE
7. CORPUS 0
8. UNDERWATER JUNE
9. THE CLOCKWORK WHIRL
10. TO THE UNDYING LOVER
11. Gertha Loew
12.504 GATEWAY TIMEOUT
13.+

About DAMONS YEAR
DAMONS YEAR returns with his second album, “CORPUS 0,” a deeply conceptual work from one of Korea’s most beloved singer songwriters.

Through delicate lyricism, the album explores the feelings of loss, emotional darkness, and faint traces of hope that quietly exist within everyone. Built on indie rock foundations, DAMONS YEAR’s sophisticated songwriting and fragile yet emotionally piercing vocals create music that lingers long after listening.

Following the success of his signature song “Yours,” DAMONS YEAR has cultivated passionate listeners not only in Korea, but also across Europe and North America.

“CORPUS 0” is structured around the confrontation between the opening track “+” (yang/light) and the closing track “-” (yin/darkness), both converging toward the central seventh track, “CORPUS 0.” The album unfolds as a conceptual portrait of wandering love through DAMONS YEAR’s uniquely introspective worldview.

DAMONS YEAR Mini Live at Tower Records Shibuya
Date: Friday, May 15, 2026
Start Time: 7:00 PM
Performance: DAMONS YEAR (solo set)
Venue: 6F TOWER VINYL SHIBUYA

Admission

Free admission. No purchase required to attend.

Purchase Bonus

Customers who purchase eligible items will receive a voucher redeemable for a signed postcard.

Event Information

Tower Records Shibuya Event Page

Inquiries

Tower Records Shibuya
TEL: 03-3496-3661

DAMONS YEAR 2026 LIVE IN TOKYO

DAMONS YEAR Tokyo Solo Concert 2026

Date: Saturday, May 16, 2026
Time: OPEN 6:30 PM / START 7:00 PM
Venue: Aoyama Tsukimi Ru Kimi Omou

Performer: DAMONS YEAR (band set)

Tickets:
Advance: ¥5,500
Door: ¥6,000
(Drinks sold separately)

Ticket Sales Begin: Thursday, March 5, 2026 at 6:00 PM

Ticket Links

• e+ Ticket Page
• Livepocket Ticket Page

Organizer: Aoyama Tsukimi Ru Kimi Omou
Production Support: MOONPICK

More Information

Concert Details