A conversation with Silica Gel isn’t all that different from the way they make music: When one of them brings up an idea, everyone else chimes in with their own views, creating one interwoven tapestry. Following the threads, you can sense a kind of freshness there that would’ve been impossible to see coming. And maybe that’s how Silica Gel manages to maintain their inimitable style while continually evolving, expanding outwardly and growing inwardly with every move they make. I asked the four members of the band—Kim Geonjay, Kim Chunchu, Kim Hanjoo, and Choi Woonghee—how they feel these days as they continue on with a busy 2024 packed with domestic performances, international shows, and genre-bending collaborations.

The band’s been very busy ever since putting out your second album, POWER ANDRE 99, last year. You also premiered the concert film Silica Gel: POWER ANDRE 99 earlier this year in the summer. How do you decide what kind of projects you want to pursue?
Choi Woonghee: Whether we’ve got an offer or come up with an idea of our own, the main thrust behind it is whether we think it’ll be fun or not. We’re used to doing music in concert or album form, and even though we’d never made a movie before, it seemed like it could be fun.

And did it turn out to be fun in the end? (laughs)
Choi Woonghee: I watched it—I don’t know, close to 10 times, so it stopped being as fun (laughs) but up until the third time at least it was pretty fun. It felt different seeing it projected on-screen, and each theater was a little different. I’d say we struggled to adapt to all the ins and outs.

You opened for Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds and performed at Primavera Sound 2024 in Spain. What’s it like doing concerts like these in different places from where you’ve played in the past?
Kim Geonjay: Well, it’s always really fun doing different concerts. Seeing the instruments other people play and observing how their crews operate when they’re onstage is always exciting and new. Our band’s still a baby (laughs) so we learn from those who’ve been at it longer than us. Being like a baby means there’s still so much left to learn. It still feels that way.

You call yourselves a baby, but you’ve actually been around a number of years now. (laughs)
Kim Hanjoo: Okay then—an old baby. (laughs) It’s already a special opportunity to see Noel Gallagher from the audience, but watching from backstage was an unforgettable one. Our whole band, myself included, tried our best to get a sense of not only the audio and technical side of things but also how things were run—how the staff was organized, how it was catered, how duties were divided up amongst how many people. We were sort of envious after seeing all that. It’d be nice if someday our options expanded and we could talk about adopting a system like that for ourselves.

Speaking of which, Hanjoo, what was it like working with RM? Did you do anything that felt new to you?
Kim Hanjoo: Actually working in the studio wasn’t too different from with other musicians, but there were a lot of standout moments. Woah—I guess this is what you get when you take talented people doing all different kinds of music in Korea and put them all together in one place. (laughs) It was the most exciting project I’ve ever been a part of music-wise other than Silica Gel. There were 20-something songwriters there and some of them were chosen to lead things, myself included. I kept an eye on how the other songwriters were operating while I gave directions and got to hear their ideas. It was a really unique experience.

Kim Geonjay: I remember him talking about the food being really good, too … (laughs)

Kim Hanjoo: RM was always buying us food while we were working. (laughs) As lots of people know, he’s really into different cultures and deeply immerses himself into different music and art, so I tried my best to help him out with that. The whole project was really enlightening and taught me so much. I also thought about how fun it’d be if Silica Gel could hook up with all those different musicians too and do something of our own together.

Does outside work like that find its way back into Silica Gel later on?
Kim Hanjoo: It influences us. If we work on a project and it goes well, we learn what we can do to succeed, and if there’s a lot of things that don’t go so well, we try to find areas we can reflect on and improve on that. It’s less important whether it turns out good or not and more important that you do something—anything—and learn from it, rather than just sit still.

Kim Geonjay: We’re all big on receiving feedback and self-reflecting, so it’s always a process of opinions developing and evolving. And that naturally gets reflected in the future.

What does an exchange of ideas between yourselves usually look like given that you develop insights on your own individually and then bring those in for use with the band?
Kim Hanjoo: Even when we’re not together, we’re always buying and selling gear, developing the skills we need for each of our roles in the band. Then, when we need to get together for something, we trade all the information we’ve gathered. That’s our typical process. And we also have a process for filing complaints where we talk about how to deal with any problems that come up while we’re working. We take things we discover on our own and convert them into something shared, and that collection of formal complaints may be brought up again with the label or amongst ourselves to solve them.

Kim Chunchu: It’s like we’re all filing complaints but also all working the front desk at the same time. (laughs) If one of us is like, “I’m pretty sure I can deal with that,” then they do, and then sometimes we look for a solution by getting outside help. When it’s the other way around and our label raises an issue, we think about how we can deal with it in our own way. It’s very much a two-way street.

Sounds like the perfect band!
Kim Geonjay: I’m not sure about that. It might seem like a comedy, looking from the outside in … (laughs) But when one of us throws an idea out there, we all think carefully about what we can each do about it. If Hanjoo, for example, is the one tossing out ideas, then maybe someone else starts thinking about how to make it happen. It’s different every time.

I’m guessing it’s a similar story when you’re making music. I would imagine all your different musical backgrounds would come together to play off each other.
Kim Chunchu: The type of music that we each like comes with its own unique characteristics, of course. One might prefer something simple, while another prefers something with electronic instruments. I think your preference for certain genres comes from liking those distinct characteristics. We each focus on those characteristics or those styles, and they all either blend together easily or, even if they don’t, they end up standing out nicely in the final version.

Is the way that all comes together so nicely a result of consciously working toward a Silica Gel sound or merely a natural consequence of that exchange?
Kim Chunchu: We all look at our music and have slightly different interpretations, things we wish we could change, and favorite parts. It’s like Silica Gel is a round table, and what we do is bring everything off each of our computers there, and what comes out of that is basically what our music is. We’re not really like, “This is the way it’s gotta be.” It’s more like, we just try it out, and then we say, “Sounds good,” and we go with that. It’s a really natural process.

Choi Woonghee: We all have other bands we play with besides Silica Gel, and it’s so much different working with Silica Gel that it’s almost scary. Even if we do the same song, the arrangement’s different. I’m just speculating here, but maybe we have an abstract idea of Silica Gel’s feel in mind when we work together. (laughs) Nobody knows for sure, to be honest.

On that note, what sort of feel or direction did you have in mind while creating POWER ANDRE 99?
Choi Woonghee: Everyone probably had their own image of POWER ANDRE 99 in their heads. Me, I had this vague idea that I should be playing like Machine Boy [the fictional character that drives the theme of the album]—sort of cold, mechanical, and repetitive, but ultimately ends on a warm note. I constructed this world alone in my head while we worked on it. The band, the engineers, the employees at the label all came together and contributed ideas toward the bass on our second album. I remember how there were three or four bass tracks for some of the songs. (laughs) I’m happy with the way it turned out, but it wouldn’t be easy to do it again. (laughs)

Kim Geonjay: My focus while we were making it was on making it sound warm. These days, and for the past two years or so, I've been concentrating on creating a very humanistic sound. I’m sure everyone has their own take, but I feel like drums should sound like one single instrument, not several separate parts. I look to prioritize balance so that no one thing stands out too much.

Kim Chunchu: This second album of ours is a part of what could be called the Machine Boy Saga, a fictional universe that’s been ongoing since the year before last. We put out additional context connected to each single and that helped them sustain momentum. We were curious what people would think when they heard our music and opened up an EdrawMind, then absorbed and worked their interpretations into our performances. On top of us, everyone from our fans to the staff and artists working on the album were exposed to the story and the concept behind it, and their influence was blended back into it.

Choi Woonghee: We ended up making use of “patches” while we were working. We made patches, the things the fans said on EdrawMind became patches, the music video directors added patches … It was wild. (laughs)

“NO PAIN” is probably a good example of the kind of momentum you got from continuously patching a song based on the feedback you received. You tried out a number of ways to let people enjoy the song when it was released. Why did you feel compelled to make that decision?
Kim Hanjoo: Even the people we worked with were excited for “NO PAIN” before it was released. It got a great response when we performed it in concert early. People started talking about how they felt about it a lot, too. We thought it’d be good if there was something that was still ongoing after it was released, not just graduating and being done with it. There’s something in the song that everyone can relate to, so we thought it’d be interesting if we released the source files for the music, then people could mess around with it and feel connected with us by coming up with a variety of interpretations. I think it’s more than just something that’s simply pretty and fun—we see it as something that is tangibly beneficial to us. It fits really well with the music, and it also gave it an opportunity to go viral, so there was no reason not to do it.

What kind of influence do those reactions have on your band?
Kim Chunchu: It’s fun to hear so many different impressions either on social media when we release a song or in letters after a performance. It’s very enjoyable for the people putting these things out there to get both completely unexpected feedback and exactly the kind of thing we expected, too. Whether instinctively or intentionally, when you make music, you inevitably imbue it with your impressions, emotions, or abstract ideas, even if you don’t explain that explicitly. That’s just how it is when you express yourself through the medium of music. The things we want to say go on to be interpreted through the music by the listener, and their feedback serves as a kind of guide for us—one that shows us, Oh, so it does come across to the listener when I say it that way, or, Wow, I didn’t see that kind of reaction coming. It’s similar to writing a demo and asking your friends, “What do you think?” but shared more publicly. In that sense, I think it has an influence on the music we make later, too.

Kim Hanjoo: I’m with Chunchu on this one. Just to add on, sometimes I feel a sense of connection with the fans, too. Not sometimes—quite often, actually. (laughs) It was my decision to pursue music, but still, sometimes you need some encouragement and some courage, which you can’t always produce for yourself. I gain strength and courage from our fans’ feedback. Maybe that’s especially the case for me because I’m the kind of person who gets lonely easily (laughs) but anyway, I really do mean it.

You must love the feeling you get from being onstage, then.
Kim Hanjoo: I usually think of myself as being most comfortable in the studio, and that that’s where I really shine, but I always go back and forth between thinking, I’m more of a studio guy, and, Nah—I’m all about the stage. I guess it’s key for me to draw energy from other people, like when I’m performing and the audience is right in front of me and I can feel that immediate energy, or when I go into a trance with the rest of the group. It’s hard to say, since there’s different people and a different vibe at every venue, and we play different songs each time, but there’s definitely days when I say to myself how deciding to do this with these guys was a really good choice.

As the band has been playing bigger and bigger shows at a wider variety of venues in recent years, have your aspirations for what you want to show your audiences evolved as well?
Kim Hanjoo: I have some concrete things in mind, absolutely. It just feels like the time has come to showcase an insane level of quality. (laughs) We have a setup we want to show off in the future. I’m pretty determined to show people a level of quality they’ve never seen before. 
Kim Chunchu: You know, there’s things that have nothing to do with personal taste and are just so amazing that you just stand there with your mouth hanging open—things that are so amazing that all you can do is stand there and say, “Whoa.” Concerts are one of the most powerful weapons at a musician’s disposal, after all. I’d really love to give our fans that kind of experience. We’re tired of always feeling jealous of groups in other countries and their crews (laughs) and now we want to show that it’s possible to put on just as good a show with the infrastructure here. We’ve been in the process of changing our setup since the beginning of the year so we can elevate the quality of our live shows.

Performing sounds like hard work—having to fully immerse yourself in it while juggling so many thoughts at the same time.
Kim Hanjoo: It’s our job to make that possible. (laughs)

Kim Geonjay: So it can be a bit exhausting, being onstage. (laughs) You have to be constantly thinking while you’re up there. I mean, you want to do a good job, you know? I used to think all I had to do was have fun and that would make the whole concert fun, but you’re taking a bit of a risk playing it that way. These days I’m focused on properly conveying everything we’ve worked on. I find ways to make the drums dynamic and keep the show rolling along while also being sure to avoid it sounding mechanical.

I’m sure it’s not easy upgrading your setup and figuring out your individual goals when you’re so busy.
Kim Hanjoo: You hit the nail on the head there. (laughs) But there’s always going to be some things you just can’t compromise on, so aiming for quality will always take priority, no matter how challenging that might be.

Then is there an ideal vision you have for yourselves that you can’t give up on, and do you feel the time to pursue that is now?
Kim Chunchu: For as long as we’ve been Silica Gel, we’ve always wanted to put on great shows, but a number of practical issues stood in the way, like not being able to have all the instruments we wanted on the stage. We’ve always hoped that bands and musicians in general who make performing live one of their focuses will hold their performances to a higher standard. As Silica Gel started to gain traction, that desire grew significantly stronger and we got to thinking about setting better standards for ourselves. And that of course ties back into making the experience in the whole music scene and for concertgoers better. Hopefully it would ultimately lead to elevating concert culture and quality.

Actually, your band often comes up when people talk about a revival of certain scenes. Have you given this any further thought?
Choi Woonghee: We’re grateful people see it that way, but we’re not at the point yet where we can save anyone. (laughs) We’re still too busy trying to save ourselves … (laughs)

Kim Hanjoo: How am I supposed to respond to views like that? (laughs) But seriously, I’ve always felt that Korea has tons of talented people making great music and putting on great shows. I think a lot of people are ready to go—ourselves included—and that now there just needs to be more improvements made backstage. I think that’s what needs to happen for there to be the right atmosphere for the band craze that people have been waiting for.

Kim Geonjay: I mean, I don’t think anyone makes music with the intention of staying out of the spotlight. I feel like releasing music is inherently about finding someone to engage with, and I hope better infrastructure can be built around that. Like Hanjoo said, there’s a lot of good music in Korea, and if we can play a role in making it more accessible, we’ll do whatever it takes.

What kind of impact do you expect all these thoughts will have on Silica Gel going forward?
Kim Chunchu: I think it feels less like our calling and more like an opportunity. Obviously it’s not something we can just make a goal, or something we just talk about and then some scene magically appears, but ultimately we do want to create an environment where good music can be enjoyed. People say the band craze is already here, and I think there’s good opportunities to be had in that coming to fruition. It motivates us to think about what we can do to contribute and keeps us going at the same time. I hope we can make use of this period to increase not only the number of Silica Gel fans but also music fans in general—fans who will know the joys of live performances.

Choi Woonghee: I don’t think anything with us has changed. There’s a lot we want to do, and we’re working on them one by one, step by step by step by step. (laughs) Even now, we’re obsessively thinking, “What should we check off next?” We’ll try to keep moving in good new directions.