Park Kyung faces series of lawsuits after tweet

Block B’s Park Kyung will face legal action from every singer that he accused of manipulating local music charts in a tweet on Sunday.

On Sunday afternoon, Park tweeted, “Like Vibe, like Song Ha-yea, like Lim Jae-hyun, like Jeon Sang-keun, like Jang Deok Cheol, like Hwang In-wook, I want to sajaegi.”

Sajaegi originally meant hoarding to make profit and was used to refer to the practice of bulk buying CDs to make a singer shoot up the charts. In the digital era, it refers to fabricating music charts by streaming with multiple IDs.

Despite a lack of clear evidence, K-pop fans often call foul play when lesser-known singers’ songs top the charts, beating out the industry’s biggest stars.

Park’s tweet came at a time when the highest numbers on the charts have been dominated by sad breakup songs by the singers he mentioned in his tweet.

Of the singers mentioned in Park’s tweet, veteran ballad duo Vibe was the first to react.

Park quickly uploaded another tweet saying he didn’t mean to accuse anybody of anything, but Vibe’s agency Major9 released a statement in response, saying that it will be taking legal action against Park, “who failed to give a proper apology.”

“To right the [rumor] that has been taken for granted [since Park Kyung’s tweet], we will be taking firm measures against him. Our artists’ names have been tainted with irreversible defamation,” the agency said.

Singers Lim, Song, Jeon and Hwang and trio Jang Deok Cheol have all released similar statements or had them released on their behalf.

Since the two tweets, no additional statement has been released by Park or his agency.

BY YOON SO-YEON [yoon.soyeon@joongang.co.kr]