Just like they sing in “Super” off their 10th mini album, FML, SEVENTEEN “looked at the ground and kept going to the top” this year. After shattering records with FML, the group continued on to ever greater heights with another explosively popular cut, their 11th mini album, SEVENTEENTH HEAVEN, with both releases bagging them a slew of awards at different year-end awards shows. It’s clear by now that SEVENTEEN is no ordinary group. They’re not resting on their laurels and they’ve yet to reach their peak, instead pioneering the space to reach unprecedented highs after building the band from the ground up on their own terms. Made up of performance, vocal, and hip hop units, SEVENTEEN started producing their own albums even before they debuted, and over eight years on, they’re still not done growing. And that brings us to WOOZI, the member of the group who not only sets us up for “Super” from high up on the stage, but is also one of the group’s producers, taking everything each of the other members excel at musically and fitting them together in perfect harmony. Now, let’s take a look at SEVENTEEN, CARAT, and everything WOOZI has done to send them soaring and where he’ll fly next. 

2023 producer of the year 

Aside from singing and dancing with SEVENTEEN, WOOZI also functions as the group’s producer, putting out three of their albums this year, along with the album SECOND WIND as part of the SEVENTEEN unit BSS, which he did as a member of production duo UNIVERSE FACTORY. The duo of WOOZI and singer-producer BUMZU, SEVENTEEN’s music mentor, have been making music for the group over t​he past 10 years. In 2019, three years after his debut, WOOZI became a member of the Korean Music Copyright Association, and has since registered an amazing 157 songs—and over 500 total if counting those that haven’t been released. His Instagram account, which makes for a convenient look at his discography, catalogs not just SEVENTEEN tracks but also songs like “DOWNPOUR” by I.O.I and the title track for the web series A-TEEN, which won the Mnet Asian Music Award (MAMA) for Best OST in 2018. As his status as a producer has risen, he’s also worked with famous artists outside Korea, like Marshmello, Anne-Marie, Peder Elias, and Shingo Katori. WOOZI also has a surprisingly “diverse” range of styles he plays with when making music, as BTS member SUGA has said, drawing from a variety of genres for SEVENTEEN’s songs. That includes rock (“CLAP,” “Rock with you”), hip hop (“Hot,” “Left & Right”), swing (“HOME;RUN”), soul (“God of Music”), and bossa nova (“Light a Flame”), all of which he puts his own pop spin on. And that’s to say nothing of touching ballads like “Smile Flower,” “All My Love,” and “Circles.” With “Super,” SEVENTEEN earned the second-highest K-pop entry on Rolling Stone magazine’s “100 Best Songs of 2023” and the highest for any male K-pop artists, at number 47. They were also the first boy group this year to get a number one on the TOP100 chart from Melon, Korea’s biggest music streaming service, with “God of Music.” On top of that, ALWAYS YOURS, their Japanese greatest hits album, went straight to the top of Japanese streaming service LINE MUSIC’s real-time chart immediately after release, while BSS’s song “Fighting (Feat. Lee Young Ji)” was awarded the grand prize at the 2023 Asia Artist Awards (AAA). SEVENTEEN collectively won Album of the Year at this year’s MAMA, too, for FML. During the group’s acceptance speech, WOOZI said, “I will work hard until the end to gift you really good, even better music.”

Vocal guide tracks 

On top of writing songs, WOOZI also records guide tracks for vocals and directs the other members when they record theirs. In a livestream for the release of the special album DIRECTOR’S CUT, JUN attributed the quality of the vocals on the final version to WOOZI’s direction, while HOSHI commented that, “when WOOZI makes a guide track, it’s got the WOOZI buff,” leading fans to adopt the phrase as well. WOOZI uploaded his guide tracks on his Instagram and played them on Weverse Live. You can hear the WOOZI buff in action in the beautiful longing in the guide tracks for songs like “Home,” “Run to you,” “Smile Flower,” and “Pinwheel,” where his knack for conveying a particular mood through emotional melodies and highly skilled vocals makes it easy for the other members of SEVENTEEN to grasp the feeling he’s going for.

When he puts his director’s hat on and guides the other members through the recording process, he is, in their words, “gentle,” “sweet,” “comforting,” and “angelic.” On the show Chattering with Nah, when asked about WOOZI and whether he’s come down hard on anyone during recording or practice, SEUNGKWAN describes him as being “a bit carefree,” and WONWOO calls him “very kind” when it comes to directing. WOOZI touches on his own experience being directed by other songwriters prior to his debut, saying that no one can record their vocals properly if the directors just “yell at” you because “it only discourages you.” Back when he was 18, WOOZI said he “felt like, if I was going to direct vocals, I had to keep spirits up,” and that’s just as true now nine years later. JUN previously recalled a time he felt unconfident because he had a sore throat and how touched he was when WOOZI told him not to “feel too pressured because” he “can definitely do” the part. Similarly, JEONGHAN has touched upon how “WOOZI kept cheering me up” when recording became difficult. In behind-the-scenes footage from SEVENTEEN PROJECT and other videos that document the group’s recording process, curious viewers are treated to WOOZI’s detail-oriented side—a director who isn’t afraid to pay compliments or provide advice on how best to capture the emotions in the songs. It’s clear how much respect he has for his fellow artists in SEVENTEEN, right down to the tone of his voice. WOOZI is more than just a songwriter—he’s the guiding vocals and the director, and the way he treats his fellow bandmates with the utmost kindness and friendship helps him to help them make the melodies he’s written shine their very brightest.

Solo? Unit? Group? WOOZI for hire

In addition to SEVENTEEN songs, WOOZI has also worked on songs for other artists, like I.O.I, Ailee, and BAEKHO. The list is even more extensive when you consider he’s written songs for all of SEVENTEEN’s units—each with their own particular character and image—and solo work for members of the group as well. There’s also BSS, who were “born out of live Internet shows we did when we were trainees” and conceived as SEVENTEEN’s “fun” unit, starting with their debut song, “Just Do It,” and putting out the huge hit “Fighting” earlier this year—both written by WOOZI. “Fighting (Feat. Lee Young Ji),” in particular, was an unparalleled hit in the world of idol unit songs. In addition to music for SEVENTEEN’s unique formation through their vocal, hip hop, and performance units, WOOZI’s also written individual songs for the youngest members and those born each year in 1995, 1996, and 1997 on the special album ; [Semicolon], “MY I” for Chinese members JUN and THE 8, “BRING IT” for HOSHI and himself, “ROCKET” for JOSHUA and VERNON, “Falling For U” for JOSHUA and JEONGHAN, and music for S.COUPS, HOSHI, and himself, who collectively make up SVT LEADERS. DINO has thanked WOOZI for taking the initiative to help him flesh out DINO’s ideas for his mixtape, Wait, while THE 8 worked on his solo song “Hai Cheng” with WOOZI over the course of just two hours by talking through the feelings and ideas he wanted to convey. WOOZI is, without a doubt, the man to come to when it’s time to translate the SEVENTEEN members’ thoughts into fully realized songs thanks to knowing his bandmates so well. For example, he worked with MINGYU to make the song “Like the Beginning” for the hip hop unit member’s solo performance during the IDEAL CUT concert, as he was insistent that he “really wanted to sing,” and it’s since become a favorite of CARAT for his amazing vocals. It's also why HOSHI, who’s now worked on WOOZI with songs like “Tiger,” “Hurricane,” and “Spider,” said that, “as a songwriter, WOOZI knows me well and takes the things I want and makes them real” (The Thirteen Tapes (TTT) vol. 1/13).

WOOZI’s incredible ability to capture the image an artist is going for shines just as brightly through the solo work he’s done for himself. He wrote “SIMPLE,” a song about “young thoughts and mindsets,” in his early 20s while staring up at the stars. He creates beautiful ballads like “What Kind of Future,” long beloved by CARAT, and hard-hitting dance songs like “With me.” Then there’s “Ruby” from TTT and its “soothing orchestration” in the intro—the kind of sound people readily associate with the artist’s solo work—that suddenly gives way to rock guitar, showing, in his own words, what “people have come to know and expect from him and the complete opposite.” It’s a masterful producer who intuitively understands and plays to an artist’s image and direction, and then just as easily defies expectations.

A producer who can dance

Though now famed for his role as SEVENTEEN’s producer and vocal team leader, WOOZI actually trained to be a dancer first. He was so talented, in fact, that the label considered putting him in the group’s dance-focused performance team instead. CARAT was all aflutter about WOOZI’s flawless, jaw-dropping dance moves from start to finish in the group’s debut Japanese song, “Call Call Call!” Long-time SEVENTEEN choreographer Choi Youngjun noted in K-pop Generation (TVING) that WOOZI has a lot of long position changes because he “can move really fast, even in two beats.” His expert dance moves are on full display during his butterfly-like solo part in “Don’t Wanna Cry,” his incredible control during his floating-in-air dance solo in “Fear,” and the dance break he did at THE FACT MUSIC AWARDS 2021. And earlier this year, he executed the closer to the group’s now-famous massive “mega crew” performance of “Super.” No doubt, WOOZI’s incredible dancing is part of what makes SEVENTEEN one of the biggest, best names in K-pop dance songs. The idol producer says that he knows a song is complete “when I can envision our members” putting on an amazing performance to it—in other words, even when he’s producing, he’s a performer at heart, picturing SEVENTEEN up on stage even in the songwriting phase. That’s exactly why performance leader HOSHI told Weverse Magazine that the whole reason WOOZI can make “unbelievable dance songs” is because he’s “a great dancer,” too.

That WOOZI feeling

“I feel I’m at my most honest when writing ballads,” WOOZI says in the book Idol’s Studio. “If you were to ask me to be completely honest about myself, that’s usually how it comes out.” And, indeed, there’s a certain emotional consistency when it comes to the ballads he’s written. Among those he’s written that CARAT say have got that “WOOZI feeling” in spades are “Yawn,” “Hug,” “Pinwheel,” “Habit,” “Smile Flower,” “Don’t listen in secret,” “SIMPLE,” “DOWNPOUR,” “When I Grow up,” “20,” “Thanksful For You,” “i don’t miss you,” and “What Kind of Future.” A few weeks ago on Weverse Live, SEVENTEEN member JEONGHAN paid a full tribute to WOOZI and his songwriting with CARAT, reciting lines he’s written and showing his utmost admiration for some 20 minutes. As a group, the SEVENTEEN members also called “Yawn” possibly “the peak of WOOZI’s ballad music” before deciding it’s actually “not the peak” and that “there will be better songs” coming from the producer still. In “Smile Flower,” WOOZI writes heartfelt lyrics about how loving something also causes you to be afraid of losing it; in “What Kind of Future,” he similarly sings about how much he loves someone but also the limits of that relationship. This is the very essence of that WOOZI feeling: a sensitive look at the fragility of loving someone so much that you fear losing them, and at the same time, not wanting to burden them with that feeling.

WOOZI has called that fragility one part of his character that makes it into the way he writes music. Even in a world where opening up about your truest, most vulnerable feelings leaves you open to be exploited, he writes openly about his fragility and how it only increases when faced with real hurdles or love. It’s just that kind of honesty through which he’s able to make people feel comforted and loved—and move them to tears.

SEVENTEEN and CARAT’s “Diamond Days”

WOOZI finds “narrative progression revolving around personal growth important when writing songs” and cites “SEVENTEEN and CARAT” as the biggest influences on his music, using many of his songs to reflect on the past, present, and future of the group and their fans. “Diamond Days,” off SEVENTEENTH HEAVEN, their 11th mini album, has especially poignant lyrics (“that cannot be copied, Seventeen Carat”) that interpolates another song they sang, “Shining Diamond,” before they even debuted—one where they make a “brilliant promise” to their fans that they will “never get weak even after all the years,” and one they keep to this day. Just like the boys sang in “We gonna make it shine” before their debut (“Please just wait a little / We’ll show how cool we can be”), they lived up to their promise and worked hard to become the hugely successful idol group they are today, as they sing in the 2017 version of the same song (“We’ll light you up looking cool forever”). They also borrow something team leader S.COUPS said in 2018 when the group debuted in Japan and work it into “Sara Sara,” a track off ALWAYS YOURS, the Japanese best-of album released earlier this year: “Will you keep following our dream?” SEVENTEEN and WOOZI always highlight their own sincerity, and many of their songs show how they still cherish their old days together, even after all this time and success, and will always do so. During the pandemic, when it became impossible for SEVENTEEN to perform for CARAT in person, they released “Us, Again” to make their fans feel better with touching lyrics like, “Let’s meet again,” and, “We will meet again.” They also put out the Japanese single “Not Alone,” where they promised to wait until it was possible to meet again. And when, after two long years, the group was finally able to resume in-person concerts and promote their fourth studio album, Face the Sun, they included in it a song specifically for their fans, “If you leave me.” It’s songs like this that show SEVENTEEN’s passion and love never waver—and that includes “God of Music,” off their 11th mini album, SEVENTEENTH HEAVEN, in which WOOZI “wanted to show my gratitude to the God of Music, if there is one,” who makes CARAT happy. And so, whenever WOOZI produces a song, he takes SEVENTEEN’s deepest gratitude—“Thank you for being with us and believing in us”—and embeds it in the music.