HYBE has debuted another new girl group.
Their name is TUIDE.
The seven-member group officially debuted on August 24, 2026, with their first EP, 《TUNE & PLAY》.
When I first saw the name TUIDE, my first thought was pretty simple.
Oh, HYBE has another new girl group.
Several girl groups under HYBE have already attracted a lot of attention, so naturally, I became curious about this new one too.
Could TUIDE grow into another successful HYBE girl group?
Of course, they’ve only just debuted, so there’s no way to know the answer yet.
So I started with the music.
No matter how big the company behind a group is, if I don’t like the music, I probably won’t be interested enough to check out their next release.
I listened to their first EP, 《TUNE & PLAY》
TUIDE’s debut EP 《TUNE & PLAY》 contains five tracks.
At first, I assumed that since this was a rookie girl group’s debut album, most of the impact would be concentrated in one big title track.
But after listening to the whole EP, it felt a little different.
Rather than using one song to make a strong statement like, “This is exactly who we are,” the album experiments with several different kinds of music.
There are elements of R&B and hip-hop, as well as soul, electronic, house, and G-funk.
What surprised me was that even though the genres keep shifting, the album doesn’t feel completely disconnected.
Each song has a different mood, but there seems to be a common emphasis on rhythm. Instead of constantly piling on powerful sounds, the songs leave some room for the members’ voices to move over the beats.
And the song that caught my attention first was, of course, the title track, SUN KISS.
SUN KISS and a word I had never heard before: “Soultronic”
After listening to SUN KISS, I looked up more information about the song and came across a word I had never seen before.
Soultronic.
It’s a combination of Soul and Electronic.
It’s used to describe TUIDE’s musical style in the song, combining the emotional melodies of soul music with electronic sounds.
At first, the word Electronic made me expect something much more intense.
But when I actually listened to SUN KISS, it wasn’t quite what I imagined.
The beat is definitely there, but the song doesn’t hit you with heavy sounds from beginning to end. Instead, the vocals feel quite relaxed as they move over the rhythm.
When I think of a rookie girl group’s debut title track, I usually imagine something built around a powerful performance or an addictive chorus that practically shouts,
“Remember our name!”
SUN KISS felt like it chose a slightly different approach.
And strangely enough, the part I remembered fastest was also the simplest.
“Ba-da ba-ba-ba, ba-ba-da-ba.”
You can hear it once and just follow along.
There’s no Korean lyric to memorize and no English pronunciation to worry about.
After listening a few times, I realized I was already going ba-da ba-ba-ba~ myself.
It seems like such a small thing, but somehow it sticks.
K-pop songs often mix Korean and English, which can make them difficult to sing along to immediately if you don’t know the language. This part was fun because anyone can join in without knowing either.
I also learned that GroovyRoom participated in producing SUN KISS.
Rather than filling the song with constantly powerful sounds, the way it uses rhythm and a repeating hook to naturally stay in your head felt like a good fit for the song.
There was a reason behind the title SUN KISS too
Since I liked the song, I looked into the lyrics a little more.
SUN KISS is about trusting your own senses and voice and expressing yourself freely instead of changing yourself to fit other people’s expectations or standards.
One expression in particular caught my attention.
“sun-kissed voice.”
Sun-kissed can describe something warmly touched or colored by sunlight.
But here, it’s paired with voice.
When I connected that phrase to the song’s message about not hiding the voice and instincts you already have, I thought it was a pretty interesting expression.
At first, I assumed the title SUN KISS was simply meant to give the song a bright, summery image.
After understanding the lyrics, though, it sounded a little different to me.
It felt like the warm image of sunlight was being used to express the idea that it’s okay to follow what you feel instead of other people’s standards.
The other songs made me even more curious about TUIDE
If I had only listened to SUN KISS, I might have remembered TUIDE simply as a rookie girl group promoting a Soultronic sound.
But after listening to the other tracks, things became a little less simple.
The album’s first track, ABD, brings in R&B and hip-hop, while other songs introduce elements of house and G-funk.
There’s a surprisingly wide range of music within just five tracks.
But strangely, when the album ended, I wasn’t left thinking that it felt messy.
Instead, I had another question.
What kind of music will this group try next?
When I listen to the first album from a new K-pop group, I usually want to be able to sum them up in one sentence.
“Oh, so this is the kind of music this group makes.”
TUIDE was harder to define that way.
At first, I wondered if that was a weakness.
But I don’t necessarily think it is.
Because they didn’t define themselves too narrowly with their debut album, I became more curious about what they might do on the next one.
At first, I had only listened to their music because I heard HYBE had debuted another girl group.
By the time I finished the album, I wanted to know more about TUIDE themselves.
So that’s when I started looking them up.
So, who exactly are TUIDE?
TUIDE is a seven-member girl group consisting of Seohee, Seoyeon, Elena, Jia, Saki, Sea, and Lee Hanee.
The members come from a variety of national and cultural backgrounds, and the group is made up of relatively young members.
Seoyeon, in particular, received attention even before debut after it became known that she is TWICE Jihyo’s younger sister.
And this was when I learned something I hadn’t known at first.
TUIDE didn’t debut under one of HYBE’s existing labels.
They are the first group launched by ABD, HYBE Music Group’s new girl group label.
In other words, TUIDE is the label’s very first girl group.
I also became curious about the meaning of their name.
TUIDE is said to come from the phrase “Tune the tide,” meaning to tune or shape the flow of the world.
And suddenly, the title of their album, 《TUNE & PLAY》, looked a little different to me too.
The idea of different members bringing their own personalities and music together and tuning them into something unified had already been connected to the group through their very first album.
It also helped me understand a little better why I had heard so many different genres on the album.
Then I saw a familiar name while reading about TUIDE
I was getting more curious about TUIDE, so I kept reading articles about them.
I read about the members and started looking into their newly created label, ABD.
Then one familiar name caught my eye.
Producer Han Sung-soo.
I learned that Han Sung-soo is overseeing TUIDE’s production.
At first, I thought that sounded pretty reassuring.
He has produced several K-pop groups, including SEVENTEEN, and considering TWS as well, it’s hard to ignore how much experience he has in idol production.
But strangely, when I saw Han Sung-soo’s name, it wasn’t his boy groups that came to mind first.
After School.
Hello Venus.
PRISTIN.
And that was when a thought occurred to me that hadn’t crossed my mind when I first listened to TUIDE.
Wait. What happened to the girl groups Han Sung-soo worked on before?
When I started thinking about them one by one, I had mixed feelings.
There were definitely successful groups among them.
But strangely, when I thought about how all three ended, each one left me with some disappointment.
So the question I had at the beginning started to change a little.
Can TUIDE become successful too?
And if they do,
can that success last this time?
After School succeeded, but I still wish their story had lasted longer
The first group that came to mind was After School.
It wouldn’t be fair to call After School an unsuccessful girl group.
They had several hit songs, strong recognition, and a distinctive identity among K-pop girl groups at the time.
They also tried things that were unusual for other girl groups.
One of the most distinctive was their admission and graduation system.
New members could “enroll,” while existing members could “graduate,” allowing the group to continue with a changing lineup.
At first, it was genuinely interesting.
But as time went on, I think that system also made it difficult to maintain a consistent identity for both the individual members and the group itself.
A member you liked could graduate, while new members continued to join, meaning the After School that fans originally knew could keep changing.
On top of that, the subunit Orange Caramel became hugely successful, and at one point its image became almost as memorable as that of the main group.
After School was definitely successful.
That’s actually why I find their ending more disappointing.
Could they have lasted longer if things had been handled differently?
I still wonder about that.
Hello Venus was more complicated
The second group I thought of was Hello Venus.
Hello Venus began as a joint girl group project between Pledis and Fantagio.
Early on, they started gaining recognition with their bright image and the members’ individual charm.
But things changed significantly when the partnership between the two companies ended.
The lineup changed, new members joined, and the group’s music and concept later moved in a noticeably different direction.
Of course, it wouldn’t be fair to blame Han Sung-soo alone for what happened with Hello Venus.
The group had the unusual situation of being managed as a joint project between two companies, so changes in that business relationship clearly mattered too.
Still, when I think about the Hello Venus that debuted and the group they later became, it’s difficult for me to feel like one team naturally developed in the same direction from beginning to end.
That group also left me with a sense of “what if?”
And then there was PRISTIN
Personally, PRISTIN is the one I remember with the most disappointment.
PRISTIN started with some very favorable conditions.
Several members were already familiar to the public through Produce 101, and some had gained significant recognition through I.O.I.
So there was already considerable interest in the group when they debuted.
I also thought that with a lineup like that, they would probably be around for quite a long time.
But things turned out differently.
Their activities didn’t continue for very long, and the group eventually disbanded after a relatively short period.
Considering the recognition and attention they already had at the beginning, it was even more surprising.
Of course, those of us looking in from the outside can’t know every internal reason why PRISTIN’s activities ended so quickly.
So I don’t think it would be fair to reduce everything that happened to the responsibility of one producer.
Still, after thinking about After School, Hello Venus, and PRISTIN one after another, I realized that I had developed one genuine concern about TUIDE.
Will things be different with TUIDE?
After reading all of this, it might sound like I’m saying:
“Han Sung-soo can’t make a successful girl group.”
That’s not what I mean.
After School was genuinely successful.
Hello Venus had the complicated circumstances of being a joint project between two companies, and there were probably many reasons behind PRISTIN’s short career that people outside the companies will never fully know.
And the situation today is very different from back then.
Pledis is now part of HYBE, and the K-pop market has grown enormously.
Most importantly, TUIDE isn’t another Pledis girl group.
They are the first girl group being launched from the beginning under the newly created ABD label.
So things could turn out completely differently this time.
And purely based on the music, my first impression was pretty good.
SUN KISS had a part that was easy to remember after just one listen, and the first EP showed several musical possibilities instead of locking the group into one genre immediately.
That’s why I’m less interested in where TUIDE ranks during their first week and more curious about what kind of group they’ll be a few years from now.
Making a good debut song and building a good group for years are two different things.
Will TUIDE still have a musical identity of their own two years from now?
Will all seven members have enough time to establish their own identities?
Can the different sounds they experimented with on their debut EP eventually become something that feels unmistakably TUIDE?
And most of all,
will we get to watch this girl group’s story for a long time?
Nobody knows yet.
TUIDE have only released their first album.
So rather than deciding right now whether they’ll succeed or fail, I want to see what happens next.
At first, I played SUN KISS simply because I thought,
“Oh, HYBE has another girl group?”
Then I listened to the album, looked up what TUIDE meant, learned about the members and their label, and eventually found myself thinking again about Han Sung-soo’s previous girl groups.
So now I’m left with a slightly different version of my original question.
Can TUIDE become another successful HYBE girl group?
I don’t know yet.
But I’ll probably listen when their next album comes out.
After all, SUN KISS’s “ba-da ba-ba-ba~” is still stuck in my head. 😅