Jo PD
The first person to open the path of the internet singer in Korean popular music, posting rough raps to PC-communication bulletin boards.
At a glance 🔭💭
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Those close by ⏳🌊
- FamilyParents
Raised in comfort by a businessman father and a fashion designer mother.
- ProtégéPsy
Psy took a first step as a singer by featuring on their second album in the unknown days, and on Psy's 2001 debut album they took part as a featured guest.
- ProtégéJung-hyun Lee
Before debuting as a singer, sang together with them on the title track of their second album, "Fever."
- ProtégéVerbal Jint
He is known as a junior rapper whom he helped break into the major stage.
- FriendshipInsooni
Joining him on “Chinguyeo,” she completed his signature hit.
I. A well-off boy from Busan · 1976–1997
(Busan) In January 1976, Joong-hoon Cho was born in Busan, South Korea. His father was a businessman and his mother a fashion designer, and he had one younger sister. The family was better off than most of their neighbors. (Study abroad) Around middle school, he followed his family to the United States and spent his school years in New York. While his peers in Korea listened to songs on the radio and on the pop chart shows, he grew up in direct contact with the hip-hop and rap of New York's streets. (Music) In middle school he played in a rock band, where he first picked up a feel for instruments and the stage. That experience later became the groundwork for his move to hip-hop, where he builds the beats and lyrics alone. (Turning point) He studied marketing at Parsons School of Design in New York, but his longing for music never faded. In 1998 he transferred to Berklee College of Music in Boston and began studying music production, and his background in design and marketing later became the foundation for making his own records and founding a label.
II. The revolt of the PC network · 1998–1999
(PC network) In October 1998, he made his name by posting rough rap lyrics on the computer network Nownuri. He was the first to rise through word of mouth on a network bulletin board alone, without a radio or broadcaster audition, and would later be called the "original internet singer." (Controversy) In January 1999, through Stardom, the small label he had founded, he formally released his first album, “In Stardom.” Its sharp lyrics, a mix of profanity and social criticism, earned it Korea's first designation as media harmful to minors, yet it sold more than 500,000 copies and became the talk of the country. (Surge) In August of the same year he released his second album, “In Stardom Version 2.0,” and again reached No. 1 in sales, following his first. The album includes “Fever,” with the singer Lee Jung-hyun, and “Casanova,” on which Psy, then still an unknown junior, took the microphone for the first time.
The first official release by an unknown rapper who rose on PC-network word of mouth alone, it made a big impact even as it was designated harmful to minors.
- The rough-textured beats, which sound as if they were made alone in a home studio, deliver a raw hip-hop sound rare in Korean pop at the time.
- The rap verses are overwhelmingly longer than the chorus, and his way of pouring out everything he has to say to the very end stands out.
- His blunt tone toward society and the entertainment industry drew both sympathy and backlash from listeners in their late teens and early twenties.
- As the first case of text from a PC network bulletin board carried over onto a record, it lets us hear in sound the traces of that era's shift between media.
The title track of the second album, “In Stardom Version 2.0,” it features the singer Lee Jung-hyun and shows a popular color entirely different from the first album.
- With electronic sounds pushed to the front, the dance beat has a polish that could go straight onto the pop chart shows, unlike the raw, rap-only sound of the first album.
- Lee Jung-hyun's clear, high vocal tone alternates with Jo PD's rap, driving both the tension and the fun of the song.
- The short phrase (the hook) repeated in the chorus is said to have become an easy point to sing along to, on the radio and in the streets of the day.
A track from the same second album, it is known as the occasion when Psy, then an unknown junior, first took the microphone as a singer.
- Between Jo PD's trademark rough, fast flow (the way a rap rides the beat), the young Psy's voice cuts in briefly.
- Less polished than charged, with the energy of the two colliding live, it is a track that shows the atmosphere of the underground hip-hop scene at the time.
- It is often recalled as a debut scene that bridges generations, frequently mentioned when looking back on Psy's later career.
III. The heyday of Stardom · 2000–2004
(Label) In the 2000s, Stardom, the label he had founded, grew quickly, settling in from the project of a single PC-network singer into a small talent agency. He became a stepping stone for Psy and Lee Jung-hyun, who had joined him on the second album, as they made their names as singers, and he also helped Verbal Jint and other junior rappers grow. (Award) “My Style,” from his fourth album, “Stardom In Future Flow” (2001), drew attention with a music video about assembling a human identical to oneself in a virtual universe, and won a music video prize at the Mnet awards in 2002. (Hit) “Chinguyeo,” released in March 2004 with the singer Insooni as a featured artist, became hugely popular. For an artist who had begun with rough, socially critical rap, singing about the universal emotion of friendship brought him closer to the public, and the song was named Song of the Year at that year's Korean Music Awards.
A track from the fourth album, “Stardom In Future Flow,” its music video about assembling a human identical to oneself won a Mnet music video award in 2002.
- The futuristic sound built from synthesizers shows a point of contact with the electronic music that Korean hip-hop was experimenting with in the early 2000s.
- The confident rap delivery and clear enunciation sound meant to ensure that not a single syllable of the lyrics is missed.
- The music video's narrative of assembling a self-cloning cyborg in a virtual universe visually unfolds the song's theme of searching for one's own identity.
A song featuring the singer Insooni, it is the signature piece in which he, once known for rough, critical rap, reached the public through the universal emotion of friendship.
- Insooni's husky, appealing vocals lead the chorus, and Jo PD's rap fills the spaces between in a calm tone.
- With an arrangement that puts more weight on melody and lyrics than on fierce beats, it is said to have been widely sung on the radio and in karaoke rooms at the time.
- The form, in which hip-hop and pop ballad blend naturally, is counted as an example showing that rap can also be used to sing of popular feeling.
- Named Song of the Year at the 2004 Korean Music Awards, it also earned critical recognition.
IV. Marriage and silence · 2005–2011
(Family) He married in 2005 and later had two sons. As his heyday passed, the center of gravity in his private life shifted to his family. (Military service) Keeping his American citizenship, he completed his military duty in Korea as industrial technical personnel. Under this system, one fulfills the obligation by working as technical staff at a designated company instead of serving in the military, and during this period he cut back sharply on his musical activity. (Silence) After 2005 he noticeably reduced his activity and entered a state of semi-retirement. In 2010 he announced his return by releasing a new song on Twitter ahead of time, and in October 2011 he put out his seventh album, made up of two parts, “State of the Art” and “Art of Business.” His identity at the time, leaning fully toward neither musician nor businessman, was captured in the album's very title.
His seventh album, released after a semi-retirement, put his two identities, musician and businessman, right in the title.
- The two-part structure of the album itself shows, in form, his struggle as he moved back and forth between art (State of the Art) and business (Art of Business).
- Digital production more refined than that of the early 2000s reflects the changing conditions of Korean hip-hop and pop production in the early 2010s.
- Releasing a new song first on Twitter shows an industry shift, as promotion moved from broadcasts and physical albums to social media.
V. Businessman, and the courtroom · 2009–2020
(Business) In 2009 he founded Brand New Stardom with Rhymer and took part in producing the idol group Block B; under Stardom Entertainment he went on to raise the idol group ToppDogg. Having done only albums and rapping before, from around this time he took on a larger role as a label executive. (Charges) In July 2015 he signed a contract transferring Stardom Entertainment's assets and the rights to its artists to another company. In the process, he was indicted on charges of concealing that he had received an advance of 270 million won for ToppDogg's Japanese concerts, and of taking an additional 1.2 billion won by claiming it was his own investment. (Verdict) In November 2018 the Seoul Central District Court sentenced him for fraud to two years in prison, suspended for three years, and the appeals court upheld the same sentence. In 2020 the Supreme Court dismissed his appeal, and the ruling became final.
VI. Choco, a stage written anew · 2019–2026
(Turning point) In May 2019, while the legal battle was still dragging on, he founded Choco Entertainment. It was a business headed in a different direction from the existing idol industry: gathering and training real trainees of different nationalities, races and generations. (Challenge) In 2023 he unveiled 'Choco,' a multinational group of artists of different nationalities, races and generations, and pushed ahead with producing a global K-pop audition reality show. The young man who once posted raps alone on a PC tongsin bulletin board had, decades later, moved on to planning idols who cross borders alongside artificial intelligence. (Now) Even now, he keeps experimenting at the point where music, technology and business overlap. His journey, from rough PC tongsin rap through a producer's career in the idol industry to planning global idols, runs parallel to the way Korean popular music has changed by switching media.
The lesser-known story
He is called 'the original internet singer' not simply because he debuted early, but because he was the first to use PC tongsin, the medium of the day, as a channel for releasing music. The path that led to a record deal purely on the response on a network bulletin board, bypassing broadcaster auditions and the night-club stage, became a reference point for countless indie and underground musicians afterward, yet this fact has been relatively overlooked, overshadowed by his later image as a businessman. The name Stardom that he founded, and its label structure, are cited as one of the early models for the way Korean hip-hop labels later gathered and developed artists around a 'crew.'
Glossary 📚🔎
PC tongsin
PC tongsin is a compound of 'personal computer' (PC) and tongsin ('communication'). It refers to the network services of 1990s Korea that connected computers by telephone line so that people could exchange text and files. In Korean popular music, newcomers emerged who posted lyrics and songs on bulletin boards of networks such as Hitel and Nownuri and became known by word of mouth, and Jo PD is the representative example. It is similar to posting a song you made on YouTube or social media today, except that back then it spread quietly, only as text and recording files.
Featuring
The word comes from the English 'feature' (featuring), meaning 'to give special billing.' In Korean popular music, it refers to inviting another singer or rapper onto your song to take a part. The structure is like calling in a friend from another class to sing just one line with you at a choir competition.
Sanyeop gineung yowon
The term means serving as skilled personnel (gineung yowon, 'skill personnel') in industry (saneop, 'factory or enterprise'). It is a system in which, instead of enlisting in the army, a person who meets the qualifications works for a set period at a designated company to substitute for military service. The principle is similar to a student who is unwell during gym class making up service hours in another way at the school nurse's office, but it is an entirely different public institution.
Suspended sentence
It means that a sentence is pronounced, yet its execution (jiphaeng, actually locking the person up) is suspended (yuye, 'put off') for a set period. It is a system in which the court hands down a prison sentence, but the person does not actually go to prison if they commit no further crime during the specified period. It resembles a conditional measure in which demerit points are wiped clean if you go a certain period without an incident.
Virtual idol
The word combines 'virtual' and 'idol.' In Korean popular music, it refers to characters made with computer graphics or artificial intelligence, not real people, singing and performing like singers. It is the same principle as making a character you designed in a game dance and sing, brought into the real music industry.
Crew
The English word 'crew' originally comes from the sense of sailors riding in the same boat. In Korean popular music, especially hip-hop, it refers to a team of rappers or singers with similar musical colors who gather to make songs and tour performances together. It is like friends from a school club preparing and going to performances together.