TWICE

Nominations received at the 38th Golden Disc Awards

✨Album of the Year with "READY TO BE"

Twice is a nine-member girl group that debuted in October 2015 under JYP Entertainment and is one of the biggest acts in K-pop.

The girl group debuted through an audition program on cable channel Mnet titled “Sixteen.” Park Jin-young, founder of JYP Entertainment and the chief producer of the company, said that the name is meant to “impress people twice” — once with the ears and twice with the eyes, meaning that the group aims for excellence in both music and performance.

Although having international members became a common practice in K-pop in the late 2010s, having four non-Korean members — three Japanese and one Taiwanese — was considered a bold move with the global stage set in mind from day one. Before Twice, popular girl groups such as Girls’ Generation, Wonder Girls, Apink, Red Velvet and so on had only Korean members.

The band debuted with “Like Ooh-Ahh” from the six-track EP “The Story Begins,” followed by hit releases “Cheer Up” (2016), “TT” (2016), “What is Love?” (2018), “Yes or Yes” (2018) and “Feel Special” (2019) that all topped music charts in and outside of Korea immediately after release.

Is Twice popular in Japan?

Twice has been particularly popular in Japan from the early stage of its debut. In 2019, it became the first K-pop girl group to perform at the Tokyo Dome, the biggest performance venue in Japan. Because there are over 50,000 seats to fill, the stadium had been off-limits to girl groups with smaller fandoms in the local market. Last year, it set another record as the first K-pop girl group to perform for the third time at the Tokyo Dome in April.

Is Twice under Republic Records?

Twice isn’t under Republic Records, but JYP Entertainment has been working closely with the U.S. company since 2020. In February, JYP Entertainment signed an expanded partnership with Republic Records to extend JYP’s K-pop groups ITZY and Stray Kids’ activities in the United States. The two companies initially signed a strategic partnership in 2020 focused on girl group Twice’s advance in the U.S. music industry. (https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/2022/07/26/entertainment/kpop/Korea-Kpop-JYP-Entertainment/20220726114901499.html) (2022.09.09)

Is Twice disbanding?

No. Members’ contracts expired last year, but all members renewed their contracts in July 2022, according to JYP Entertainment. Rumors circulated as the girl group rose as the typical case of the “seven-year curse” in K-pop, where groups typically disband or significantly lose popularity around their seventh anniversary. It’s a result of both new groups debuting and the fact that contracts are usually signed on a seven-year basis. Hence, agencies stop paying attention to their older investments and focus their power on newer releases. Twice had its slips with a few songs during the past couple of years, but it’s overcoming rumors with new releases and content. (https://koreajoongangdaily.joins.com/2021/03/04/entertainment/kpop/ohmygirl-apink-finkl/20210304190900384.html (2022.09.09)

Why are they called Tdoong?

Tdoong in Korean is a portmanteau of Twice and the suffix doongi. Doongi, or dungi, is used in words like the youngest of the family or group (makdungi), cutie (guiyeom-dungi) or lovable (sarang-dungi). This nickname was made when Twice debuted as JYP Entertainment’s new girl group in 2015, encompassing all three meanings — the cute, lovable youngest of JYP Entertainment. (2022.09.09)