April 7, 2022 • 38 mins
Still, today, more than a decade later the effects on the online campaign have real world consequences.
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Speaker 1 (00:02):
During most of the Tago scandal, the other two members
of the group, DJ two Cuts and myth Regin had
been away serving the mandatory military service. This meant that
Epic High was more or less on hiatus. It also
meant that Tableau was left to deal with everything on
his own. So in November, he released a solo album,
(00:22):
Fevers in Double Cone, San Maybe then that was my
first and last. I never released another solo album because
um art's not worth that much suffering. I will do
a song here and there, maybe, But I enjoyed just
(00:45):
doing music with my group because like, I don't want
music to be that kind of experience for me again.
Music critics were praising the album. It was raw, it
was unfiltered. It was a little like reading from Tablow's journal,
(01:07):
and you could tell through the music that he was
going through something terrible. My dad had always said that
he like, he was happy when I came back with
my solo album and I was starting to make music again,
but he said, like, why did you make such sad songs?
And that kind of stuck with me. So there's sort
(01:36):
of an aside here. In English, Tableau's album is called
Fever's End, but The Korean title is yell good, which
literally translates out to fever flowers. That doesn't really make
any sense in English, but it's a phrase the Korean
people use for the spots in your skin that show
up when your fever is broken and it's at its
absolute worst, and in a sort of poetic sense, it's
(02:00):
like a sign that things can only get better from there.
And that was the kind of hope that Tableau's dad
had for him, that everything he was feeling now was
a sign that the worst was behind him, that he
should move on from Tanjanio and be happy. But in
a matter of months, the man who told him that
his father suddenly passed away. What was the funeral like?
(02:27):
Child going often Jeeneen myth Regin the other rapper and
epic high I wouldn't even chere. M m Mithra said
that he had never gone to a funeral of a
close friend before. He used to see Tablow's father a lot,
(02:50):
and he wanted to comfort Tableau, but he didn't really
know how. This was also the first time in a
long time that all three members of the group we're
in one room together. What was he like when you
got there? Oh? Say Song him, didn't go touch it
on your jaw. Two Cuts, the DJ of the group,
(03:10):
topped up hill. I'm catching motan done hung you know.
Dot two Cut said that he was mad at himself.
Epic High had always been there for each other, but
his being away in the military meant that he couldn't,
and he felt like that had put a burden on Tableau.
(03:33):
And this is real. I've seen footage of the funeral.
Mithra and two cuts or buy Tableau's side. They helped
carry the casket. Tableau's wife and his mom are also there,
and everyone looks incredibly sad, But the way Tableau looked
was different. People had seen Tableau sad before he cried
(03:55):
in the documentary when he went to Stanford. It was
something beyond just sadness. He looks numb. My dad died
of this and I don't even know what this is.
H they killed him, I'm sure of that. Two Cuts
(04:17):
and Mithra agree with Tableau that this death was because
of what Tagno had done. They wanted to give Tableau
time to heal from everything. Music was the last thing
on their minds. Right after my dad passed away, uh
like two or three days after I went into the
studio and made an album with Epecai. It's hard to
(04:39):
imagine the same three friends who were just at a
funeral going into a studio days later to make music.
But for Tableau, this was the only way he knew
how to cope. Epicchai was finally back in the studio
working on music again, doing the thing that brought them
together in the first place, and it got them to
this point. Then a few months later the album dropped
(05:03):
and it was not what people expected. The album was
called it was a full one from fevers In and
that was on purpose. So those two albums coupled together
(05:27):
are like a perfect like documentation of like what must
be going through someone's head when they experienced something like
really difficult and then try everything possible to like escape
it or to avoid it. One Tableau and Epic High
(05:47):
tried to bottle his dad's optimism and reclaim the time
and the energy and the youth that they lost in
that scandal. But moving on wasn't going to be so easy,
partially because the conspiracy had become bigger than Tableau. Even
though the Tajanio Forum was now relatively small, their model
(06:07):
for organizing followers was spreading Tajanio didn't get what they wanted,
but they did set a blueprint of how a small
rumor can start online and transform into a global movement.
It also became a test case for the legacy of
our lives online, how we all have to reckon with
whatever we do lasting forever on the Internet. And maybe,
(06:31):
if we've been paying attention, tableau story could have acted
as a warning sign for all of us of FIP hop.
(06:55):
What my Name? I can writing my book saw the
first time the mask Yeah from Vice and I heart
this is authentic. I'm XR Thomas Episode eight Fever Flowers.
(07:27):
When Epic Hies album came out in October of two
thousand twelve, Tableau's fans and his record label, we're not happy.
Our core fans hated it. They say that it's the
worst album I've ever made, and coming right after Fever's end,
they can't believe it right, they can't believe it's the
same person. Juan and count two Cuts says the fans
(07:59):
didn't like their album because it was different from what
people were expecting before this. Epic High was known for
being subversive. This is the group that got banned from
radio airplay for lyrics criticizing society to directly I think
we're just reckless. They had lyrics about religion and depression
and things that everyday Korean kids were going through, but
(08:20):
was none of that. I didn't want to talk about
anything introspective because I had so many things that would,
you know, may possibly destroy me again, right if I
started thinking so all all these songs are just really
really keen pop almost. I think I just kind of
wanted to avoid it. But I also had to make
(08:41):
that album to survive. Part of that survival meant getting
back to public life slowly. At first, Tableau stayed away
from any deep interviews and he was really hesitant about
live TV. If you did see him on TV, it
was almost definitely a prerecorded performance. He still wasn't sure
if he could handle the pressure, and he really wasn't
(09:02):
interested in going back to being all over the media again.
But then by Sheer accident, things changed. Epic High had
just started doing concerts again, and in China we were
We did a show and afterwards we were having a
drink and I tried to jump kick Mithra I slipped
(09:22):
on an ice cube, landed on my shoulder, instantly broke it.
Oh my god, very bad, like just bones shattered. Tableau
was rushed to a nearby hospital and they put him
on some pretty serious pain killers, and then at that moment,
out of all times, he got a proposal. And then
we're rolling me into the surgery and my managers like,
(09:47):
you know, this show came in and I'm like, do
you have to choose now? Like I don't know what
you're saying. He's like, we have to give him an
answer like now, and I was like, okay, whatever, Yeah,
I just do it. And then I came out and
I had agreed to do this show, and that is
(10:17):
how Tableau ended up on the Return of Superman. This
was a reality TV show where celebrity dads are left
alone with their kids for a couple of days while
their wives take some time off. The whole premise is
loki kind of sexist, but the idea was that dads
would probably struggle with basic household tasks or talking to
their kids, and so it would be funny. But for
(10:39):
Tableau it didn't quite work out that way because he
has a really good relationship with his daughter Lan. The
show was a big step for Tableau because he still
wasn't really comfortable with being famous, but having his family
(11:00):
there made things easier, and actually his interaction with his
daughter ended up being one of the most memorable parts
of the show. There's this one scenes from how to
showing off her stuffed animals. She's got horses and zebra,
and she's explaining to Tableau that each one of them
represents a different member of the family. So Tableau asks, okay,
(11:24):
is the entire family there, and had says yes, and
Tableau says, well, where's the grandpa. The camera hands over
to Hat and she says, Grandpa, Grandpa's gone to heaven,
and there's this silence, and then, totally unprompted, how It
gets up and hugs her dad Carboy. This show brought
(11:52):
in a whole different audience. People who might not be
interested in Tableau's music or even his grades at Stanford,
interested in him as a dad. I didn't show my
daughter's face for like three years. I was very private after,
(12:12):
you know, sheltering them for so long and trying to
hide them. And it's weird watching this show because you
realize how much time it passed. Remember the first time
that Tableau realized something was wrong, was when Tao member
started tweeting at him when he posted a picture from
the hospital when his baby was born. That baby was
now walking around and talking on TV, and Tableau was
(12:35):
now in his thirties and he was just straight up
a different person. I often feel like we are always
watching celebrities suffer something and get crushed by it. We
don't ever really get a chance to see like chapter
(12:55):
two of that life, at least in my mind. Dedicated
in my career too to showing that, to showing how
there is possibility of a great chapter two if you
don't let chapter one be the end, right, and really,
(13:17):
this chapter two of Tableau's career looks pretty good. Epic
HAIs celebrated being around for a decade. Over the next
few years, they went on tour and they even made
it back to the States. They not only hit up
South By Southwest, but they got on stage of Coachella.
Tableau stopped going on the Return of Superman, but then
(13:39):
he joined a different program, a rap competition show called
Show Me the Money What. Tableau was a producer throughout
their career. Epic High has released ten studio albums, and
in that time they've collaborated with some major artists not
just in Korea but from all over the place. Baby Joe, Joey, Badass,
(13:59):
Eric now dumbfounded Galian. The list just goes on. In
the relatively short history of Korean hip hop, Tableau and
Epic High are now elder statesmen, and their music has
been massively influential for the younger generation of Korean musicians,
(14:20):
including what might possibly be the biggest band in the world,
BTS Base bts IS, RM and Sugar have both spoken
pretty openly over the years about being inspired by Epic High,
(14:43):
and even though their group is known for K pop,
they are influenced by lyrical hip hop that directly speaks
to broader issues, which is what Epic Hai has been
doing since day one, and Yungi and RM have said
that Epic High's song Fly is the thing that made
them want to try wrap. But if you ask Tableau
about all this, he's a little shy. I'm sure they
(15:04):
would have discovered music, they're obviously um in love with it,
and they would have become musicians regardless. It's still gonna
be wild to hear that, though. I think what's most flattering, though,
is that their lyrical content and what they're trying to
do through music, just trying their best to be like
(15:26):
a good influence. I'm certain that now kids are listening
to bts the way they were listening to epic Ai right,
and sheer amount of kids has exponentially grown, and one
of those kids are gonna do something cool too. Tableau
and epic Hi have come a long way from couch
(15:49):
surfing and struggling to pay for dinner. They have a
real legacy now, even if Tableau doesn't quite know what
that means for him personally. And also, like I've feel
like hip hop and Korea is so young that it's
just weird to already like have our mount rushmore. You know,
we'll be right. Back when Tablo got started in Korea,
(16:33):
hip hop was really niche. But now, more than a
decade later, Korean hip hop is just part of the
normal mainstream landscape. In a lot of ways, the industry
has caught up to what people like Tableau were already doing.
Back when he was getting started, people in the music
industry might have called Tableau a quote unquote bedroom producer.
This was a word that people use for artists who
(16:55):
were making tracks on cheap equipment or just their laptops.
But nowadays the term is almost irrelevant because just about
every producer is starting out from their bedroom. And we
now take it for granted that thanks to social media,
anyone could be a star. How many guys and I
(17:17):
for a little time in Canada and major artists have
adapted to that too. Musicians and artists have started to
open up their lives on social media, and we're talking
seven coverage people cooking or doing their makeup or whatever.
He I just wanted to pop in and say hello,
I am live. It is bide minded, live with money, alright,
(17:42):
So let me cut this cucumber. Okay, I'm looking at
the d MS, but I actually can't because it goes
so fast because you guys are so amazing. There used
to be like this distance between the artists and the fans,
Professor hedging Lee Again. The artists didn't feel like it
was their job to use social media up to broadcast
everything that they're doing or to like express their feelings.
(18:04):
They would use the social media as a tool for
promotional purposes. But now we're seeing the artists using these
tools to just casually talk with the fans, not necessarily
inviting a conversation, but at least kind of revealing their
private self a little bit, and I think that has
allowed the fans to kind of feel like they're getting
(18:25):
to know the artists at a more personal level. But
that amount of access and interaction also means that fans
can criticize artists directly like never before. And today we're
counting down our picks for the top ten celabs who
are constantly getting canceled. Christie he Can also recently try
to show off the results of her eyebrow transplant, and
(18:45):
her critics were appalled by her rich people problems. This
this is a serious situation. I'm just hard to al
Ovid has been dead since two thousand and three, and
the fact that Korean artists are now more global than
ever means they're being exposed to new demands from fans
in other countries to use their platform for something. We're
(19:09):
not satisfied with just art. We want to know who
these artists really are. This might be weird and other
genres of music, but within the culture of hip hop
that's always kind of been there, It's just more serious now.
I feel like that's one of the tough things about
hip hop, right We value maybe above all else being real,
(19:33):
being authentic, But what counts for quote unquote real is
actually fairly rigid, what kind of real that we are
interested in. There, there's a real way to dress, you know,
there's an authentic way to address it is an authentic
way to talk. And if you don't do that, then
it's just who is this nerd? Who is this outsider?
(19:54):
And so you should adjust yourself accordingly. But then the
flip of that is if you're adjusting yourself, that's not real. Yeah.
And also the concept of real just constantly changes. And
this isn't just like just in Korea. Like remember when
Kanye came out and how that was like the moment
where we had to like the world had to decide
(20:17):
are you going to be for or are you going
to be for Kanye? Because in all ways they were different.
And then Kanye happened and everyone just started, you know,
wearing like skinny jeans, And when that happened, I think
(20:39):
a lot of Korean kids kind of felt like, oh, yes,
because now Kanye is dressing like us. Really yeah, And
there's something really interesting about the way that Tableau talks
about culture shifting over time, about who gets to be
(20:59):
real and what authentic is, because I think in some ways,
hip hop might be the one culture that makes us
ask all these uncomfortable questions. Hip hop is perhaps the
one genre in which authenticity is at a premium, Professor
Que Tugley, if it if it even comes across as
(21:20):
quote unquote fake or not real or inauthentic, you're done. Yeah,
you will not be hip hop. Yeah, questionable. Authenticity always matters.
Where do you draw the line between appreciation or learning
from our hybridization and appropriation? It is very difficult to answer.
But if you only like imitate something that original hip
(21:46):
hop musicians are doing without understanding why they are doing
or without showing your own interpretation, I may consider it
as a cultural appropriation because if you if I call
it as a cultural hybridization, it means that you understand
the different culture and try to mix with the culture,
(22:10):
with the different culture with your own to create something
different from your original culture as well as the original
hip hop music. For example, there's a reason why I
waited to the last episode before even mentioning cultural appropriation.
It's not that I think the topic needs to be avoided.
It's that there's something particularly American about the way that
(22:31):
we tend to ask questions about whether or not somebody's
done enough homework to properly understand the culture. Topics like
culture and authenticity, these are difficult things to talk about,
and in theory, this is where the Internet should come in.
Thanks the message boards and social media, we have a
convenient way to have conversations where at the very least
(22:51):
you can learn how other people think. But as we
saw with Tajnyo, an online conversation can also quickly become
an online mob. I think what was interesting about the
taching your case is that people were using the internet
asked a way to like uncover truth or whatever truth
that they had in mind right and thinking that that
(23:14):
was their way of pursuing justice. And I wonder if
that's what we're seeing with so many like fringe groups
in the United States. Fringe groups are organizing in a
pretty similar model to the way that Tajanio did on Reddit, forums,
telegram channels, discords. They're demanding the truth from politicians, the media,
(23:35):
and really anyone that they believe is lying. And just
like with Tajano, as those ideas become more mainstream, it
becomes harder to call them fringe groups there, you know,
just groups with questions and alternative facts. And as they
continue to spread misinformation, they gain more followers. And look,
(23:58):
it's probably a little stream to say that we can
draw a straight line from Taijanyo to Q and on,
But both groups share not only a mission, but a methodology.
A distributed, decentralized group with anonymous leaders who can be
swapped in or out at any time, that relentlessly pursues
their version of justice and truth. Truth is such a
(24:21):
subjective thing right now. My truth might not be the
same as yours. So if that's the world that we're
living in, then how can we survive together? How can
we coexist? This question from Professor Hedging sticks with me,
because listen, it's easy to look at the conspiracy theories
like Taijano and Q and on and look at the
frankly bonkers research that they're doing and laugh and say, yo,
(24:45):
these people, they lost their minds. Just forget about them
and just move on. But the reality is is that
these people are victims of misinformation. And that's not me
telling you that you have to feel sorry for them.
I'm just saying we have to live with these people, because,
if anything, the story of Tajano is a warning that
(25:06):
these pursuits of truth and justice can start to warp
our ability to understand each other as people. Tablet was
just one of the first people to experience with the future.
Was gonna look like I was in the hospital because
of my dad. And this mom and her daughter, like
her middle school, high school daughter are walking by, and
(25:30):
this the mom just comes straight to my face as
if I'm not an actual person but maybe like a
character or an avatar. Uh, And right to my face
says this guy. This isn't this the guy that lied
about his school, like right to my face, to her daughter.
And these things were happening constantly. Jesus, you know all
(25:55):
the articles then and after that have described this as
like an online phenomenon, right as problems with the Internet,
like as if fake news is confined to this like
digital space, and it certainly is not. It is so
connected to the real world. The longer we neglect that,
(26:20):
the harder it will become to do anything about it.
It is hard to put into words what exactly we
witnessed today because we have not seen this before. Thousands
storming the Capitol after a rally with President Trump sucking
(26:42):
he man, glad to see you guys. You guys are
fucking patriots. Look at this guy's got blood. And maybe,
just maybe, if we've been paying attention at the very least,
we wouldn't have been so unprepared when missing from Nation
grew to extremism and spilled offline into real life consequences.
(27:16):
It's now been more than ten years since Tableau's life
was changed forever by Tajanio. When you talk about sort
of the effects on you, you sort of seemed to
be more or less okay with that, and even when
it was happening, it seemed like you'd sort of accepted, Okay,
my my career is over, okay, And then when it
(27:40):
spread to your family, that was when it was okay. Now,
like fighting this. You also told me about how it
affected your brother. What what kind of conversations do you
have with your brother now? I mean ten years on
and we don't talk about this really, Yeah, we don't
talk all. Lot of it just brings up too many
(28:02):
different things, you know. Yeah, after my dad passed away, honestly, um,
our family has not been the same. We don't talk
that much anymore. It's just yeah, because it just brings
up too much mhm, especially in this case, we just
(28:23):
don't discuss it. It's just it's connected to too many ah,
too many different bad things. I guess, so we are,
you know, we don't talk that much anymore because there's
nothing we can talk about to avoid talking about this.
(28:44):
You know, it's our biggest shared memory, which sucks, but
it's impossible for us to not talk about this, so
we just talk about stupid things, you know, irrelevant and
possib things. I guess. I don't think I've ever talked
(29:07):
about this with my brother and my sister. I've talked
about it with my sister, she was sort of detached,
but I don't think I've ever talked to my mom
about it or after this. Do you think there's a
point where you'll be able to do that? Uh? I
don't think I really want to, um, to tell you
(29:29):
the frank truth, like I intended to never revisit this. Uh.
And I told the people that I work with. I
told my team, you know, like, this is just something
I don't want to discuss. I don't want to think about.
I'm doing. I'm doing much better now with these memories
tucked away right, and Uh, I had a conversation with
(29:52):
like my you know, my manager, and like I I
I started seeing like this world, you know, I seeing
things happen that just constantly reminded me of what I
went through and noticing how it's not getting any better.
(30:13):
And now that my daughter is uh you know, she's
she's gonna she's gonna have to live in that world. Uh.
And I was telling my manager, you know, like I
really don't want to, but I think I need to
start talking about like what I experienced. I need to
(30:34):
uh start you know, revisiting it because you know, I
know that this isn't going to change anything. I know
that it's not gonna like just one day snap all
these problems away. At the very least, Tableau can keep
moving forward. Epic High just dropped their latest album. There
(30:58):
was a lot of anticipation for this one, but even
Tableau surprised not only the critical reception but the fans.
People are saying that this is their favorite Epic High
album ever. But I don't think this is surprising at all.
For almost twenty years, Epic High has been proving themselves.
In their first albums, they were trying to teach an
(31:20):
entire country what hip hop even was. Then they wanted
to prove that they could do pop music too. Then
they had to prove that, despite the scandals and the haters,
that they still had it. But they don't have to
prove anything anymore, and today Tableau is known for being
Tableau the Dad, just as much as he's known for
(31:41):
his music. Would you rather be stuck in a bast
room for twenty four hours or be stuck in our
car for twenty four hours? Is the car moving? When
you search Tableau and Epic High on YouTube, you'll see
his music, but you'll also see even more clips of
(32:03):
him hanging out with the other members, telling stories about
his family and just joking around. And he's cool with that.
The Tajano thing is more in the background now. He
tries not to think about it too much, but it's
hard because people still bring it up. Anytime there's a
rumor or an online accusation, people compared to Tableau and
(32:25):
start talking about Tajano all over again. For the longest time,
Tableau was trying to take the advice of everyone around
him to put all that in the past behind him.
But he knows that's not happening. It made me wonder something,
are you worried talking about this again? It's like kicking
the hornet's nest again. Um. I mean, like, but but
(32:54):
you know, I gotta kick the hornet's nest for people
to realize there's hornets here. M Uh. Whether or not
this will kick the hornet's nest again, I don't know.
It's actually something I didn't really that didn't really occur
to me until now until yeah, you mentioned it and
(33:14):
kind of scares me too. Yeah, of course, because now
my daughter can google stuff and she she has a
she has a phone, like she has friends with phones,
and um, yeah, of course, of course. Uh, it's something
that worries me. Like this experience I had resulted in
(33:41):
nothing good. I didn't like overcome this. I didn't like
have a big victory just because these people went to jail.
I didn't. I wasn't vindicated like um, people want to say,
like there was nothing really good about this, no matter
(34:01):
how you spend it. I lost too much that I
can't get back. Uh, So there's nothing good about it.
But I don't want to leave it at that. It
sounds to me like you're saying you hope that people
should be able to learn from this, but you don't
sound optimistic that they will. Yeah, but I gotta try
(34:29):
being real. I think Tableau is doing what a lot
of us do when we go through something terrible. You
know that phrase everything happens for a reason. And you
know how when somebody tells you that when you're going
through it that it just feels kind of empty. Well,
Tableau is living through that, and he's hoping it's true.
(34:50):
Maybe it happened because I uh, I have the ability
to to use it in some way, like in some
positive way, and if it becomes uh, you know, like
a conversation between people about misinformation about um you know what,
(35:11):
how easy we trust things, we believe things. It's just
just the various different things that are like that are
a part of this story. I feel like some of
it could lead to something good. The fever is not over,
not by a long shot. Looking around at the world online,
(35:34):
it might get worse, but maybe someday, well at least
get to see the flowers. M h Authentic is a
(36:26):
production of Vice Audio and I Heart Podcast Network special
thanks to Junior Khn from Vice Korea, Spion Home Threes Reez,
Nina Sudra and Kim Pierce. Also thanks to Stacy Harrington,
Samantha Rodriguez, and Jason Guberman. We'd also like to thank
Adi Nam, Brian Gold and Jim Are. Translators for the
(36:48):
series were Sarah Ree and Jen Quan. Authentic is produced
and reported by Stephanie Kryuki, Minji Coop, Kate Osborne and
myself with Janet, Stephanie Brown and Sam Egan. Sound design
and original music composition by Kyle Murdock with additional support
from Natasha Jacobs. Our supervising producer is Janet Lee, editing
(37:12):
from Lazy Roberts, fact checking by Minji Ku and Nicole Pasuka.
This episode features music from Epic High from their album
Fever's End, distributed by y G Entertainment. This episode also
features music from BTS of Big Hit Entertainment. Thanks also
to KBS for their show The Return of Superman. Our
(37:33):
executive producer and VP Advice audio is Kate Osborne from
I Heart Podcast Network. Executive producers Nikki e Tor and
Lindsay Hoffman. I'm Dexter Thomas. Make sure to subscribe wherever
you get your podcast so you don't miss an episode
and if you dig it, give us a rating and
a review.
During most of the Tago scandal, the other two members
of the group, DJ two Cuts and myth Regin had
been away serving the mandatory military service. This meant that
Epic High was more or less on hiatus. It also
meant that Tableau was left to deal with everything on
his own. So in November, he released a solo album,
(00:22):
Fevers in Double Cone, San Maybe then that was my
first and last. I never released another solo album because
um art's not worth that much suffering. I will do
a song here and there, maybe, But I enjoyed just
(00:45):
doing music with my group because like, I don't want
music to be that kind of experience for me again.
Music critics were praising the album. It was raw, it
was unfiltered. It was a little like reading from Tablow's journal,
(01:07):
and you could tell through the music that he was
going through something terrible. My dad had always said that
he like, he was happy when I came back with
my solo album and I was starting to make music again,
but he said, like, why did you make such sad songs?
And that kind of stuck with me. So there's sort
(01:36):
of an aside here. In English, Tableau's album is called
Fever's End, but The Korean title is yell good, which
literally translates out to fever flowers. That doesn't really make
any sense in English, but it's a phrase the Korean
people use for the spots in your skin that show
up when your fever is broken and it's at its
absolute worst, and in a sort of poetic sense, it's
(02:00):
like a sign that things can only get better from there.
And that was the kind of hope that Tableau's dad
had for him, that everything he was feeling now was
a sign that the worst was behind him, that he
should move on from Tanjanio and be happy. But in
a matter of months, the man who told him that
his father suddenly passed away. What was the funeral like?
(02:27):
Child going often Jeeneen myth Regin the other rapper and
epic high I wouldn't even chere. M m Mithra said
that he had never gone to a funeral of a
close friend before. He used to see Tablow's father a lot,
(02:50):
and he wanted to comfort Tableau, but he didn't really
know how. This was also the first time in a
long time that all three members of the group we're
in one room together. What was he like when you
got there? Oh? Say Song him, didn't go touch it
on your jaw. Two Cuts, the DJ of the group,
(03:10):
topped up hill. I'm catching motan done hung you know.
Dot two Cut said that he was mad at himself.
Epic High had always been there for each other, but
his being away in the military meant that he couldn't,
and he felt like that had put a burden on Tableau.
(03:33):
And this is real. I've seen footage of the funeral.
Mithra and two cuts or buy Tableau's side. They helped
carry the casket. Tableau's wife and his mom are also there,
and everyone looks incredibly sad, But the way Tableau looked
was different. People had seen Tableau sad before he cried
(03:55):
in the documentary when he went to Stanford. It was
something beyond just sadness. He looks numb. My dad died
of this and I don't even know what this is.
H they killed him, I'm sure of that. Two Cuts
(04:17):
and Mithra agree with Tableau that this death was because
of what Tagno had done. They wanted to give Tableau
time to heal from everything. Music was the last thing
on their minds. Right after my dad passed away, uh
like two or three days after I went into the
studio and made an album with Epecai. It's hard to
(04:39):
imagine the same three friends who were just at a
funeral going into a studio days later to make music.
But for Tableau, this was the only way he knew
how to cope. Epicchai was finally back in the studio
working on music again, doing the thing that brought them
together in the first place, and it got them to
this point. Then a few months later the album dropped
(05:03):
and it was not what people expected. The album was
called it was a full one from fevers In and
that was on purpose. So those two albums coupled together
(05:27):
are like a perfect like documentation of like what must
be going through someone's head when they experienced something like
really difficult and then try everything possible to like escape
it or to avoid it. One Tableau and Epic High
(05:47):
tried to bottle his dad's optimism and reclaim the time
and the energy and the youth that they lost in
that scandal. But moving on wasn't going to be so easy,
partially because the conspiracy had become bigger than Tableau. Even
though the Tajanio Forum was now relatively small, their model
(06:07):
for organizing followers was spreading Tajanio didn't get what they wanted,
but they did set a blueprint of how a small
rumor can start online and transform into a global movement.
It also became a test case for the legacy of
our lives online, how we all have to reckon with
whatever we do lasting forever on the Internet. And maybe,
(06:31):
if we've been paying attention, tableau story could have acted
as a warning sign for all of us of FIP hop.
(06:55):
What my Name? I can writing my book saw the
first time the mask Yeah from Vice and I heart
this is authentic. I'm XR Thomas Episode eight Fever Flowers.
(07:27):
When Epic Hies album came out in October of two
thousand twelve, Tableau's fans and his record label, we're not happy.
Our core fans hated it. They say that it's the
worst album I've ever made, and coming right after Fever's end,
they can't believe it right, they can't believe it's the
same person. Juan and count two Cuts says the fans
(07:59):
didn't like their album because it was different from what
people were expecting before this. Epic High was known for
being subversive. This is the group that got banned from
radio airplay for lyrics criticizing society to directly I think
we're just reckless. They had lyrics about religion and depression
and things that everyday Korean kids were going through, but
(08:20):
was none of that. I didn't want to talk about
anything introspective because I had so many things that would,
you know, may possibly destroy me again, right if I
started thinking so all all these songs are just really
really keen pop almost. I think I just kind of
wanted to avoid it. But I also had to make
(08:41):
that album to survive. Part of that survival meant getting
back to public life slowly. At first, Tableau stayed away
from any deep interviews and he was really hesitant about
live TV. If you did see him on TV, it
was almost definitely a prerecorded performance. He still wasn't sure
if he could handle the pressure, and he really wasn't
(09:02):
interested in going back to being all over the media again.
But then by Sheer accident, things changed. Epic High had
just started doing concerts again, and in China we were
We did a show and afterwards we were having a
drink and I tried to jump kick Mithra I slipped
(09:22):
on an ice cube, landed on my shoulder, instantly broke it.
Oh my god, very bad, like just bones shattered. Tableau
was rushed to a nearby hospital and they put him
on some pretty serious pain killers, and then at that moment,
out of all times, he got a proposal. And then
we're rolling me into the surgery and my managers like,
(09:47):
you know, this show came in and I'm like, do
you have to choose now? Like I don't know what
you're saying. He's like, we have to give him an
answer like now, and I was like, okay, whatever, Yeah,
I just do it. And then I came out and
I had agreed to do this show, and that is
(10:17):
how Tableau ended up on the Return of Superman. This
was a reality TV show where celebrity dads are left
alone with their kids for a couple of days while
their wives take some time off. The whole premise is
loki kind of sexist, but the idea was that dads
would probably struggle with basic household tasks or talking to
their kids, and so it would be funny. But for
(10:39):
Tableau it didn't quite work out that way because he
has a really good relationship with his daughter Lan. The
show was a big step for Tableau because he still
wasn't really comfortable with being famous, but having his family
(11:00):
there made things easier, and actually his interaction with his
daughter ended up being one of the most memorable parts
of the show. There's this one scenes from how to
showing off her stuffed animals. She's got horses and zebra,
and she's explaining to Tableau that each one of them
represents a different member of the family. So Tableau asks, okay,
(11:24):
is the entire family there, and had says yes, and
Tableau says, well, where's the grandpa. The camera hands over
to Hat and she says, Grandpa, Grandpa's gone to heaven,
and there's this silence, and then, totally unprompted, how It
gets up and hugs her dad Carboy. This show brought
(11:52):
in a whole different audience. People who might not be
interested in Tableau's music or even his grades at Stanford,
interested in him as a dad. I didn't show my
daughter's face for like three years. I was very private after,
(12:12):
you know, sheltering them for so long and trying to
hide them. And it's weird watching this show because you
realize how much time it passed. Remember the first time
that Tableau realized something was wrong, was when Tao member
started tweeting at him when he posted a picture from
the hospital when his baby was born. That baby was
now walking around and talking on TV, and Tableau was
(12:35):
now in his thirties and he was just straight up
a different person. I often feel like we are always
watching celebrities suffer something and get crushed by it. We
don't ever really get a chance to see like chapter
(12:55):
two of that life, at least in my mind. Dedicated
in my career too to showing that, to showing how
there is possibility of a great chapter two if you
don't let chapter one be the end, right, and really,
(13:17):
this chapter two of Tableau's career looks pretty good. Epic
HAIs celebrated being around for a decade. Over the next
few years, they went on tour and they even made
it back to the States. They not only hit up
South By Southwest, but they got on stage of Coachella.
Tableau stopped going on the Return of Superman, but then
(13:39):
he joined a different program, a rap competition show called
Show Me the Money What. Tableau was a producer throughout
their career. Epic High has released ten studio albums, and
in that time they've collaborated with some major artists not
just in Korea but from all over the place. Baby Joe, Joey, Badass,
(13:59):
Eric now dumbfounded Galian. The list just goes on. In
the relatively short history of Korean hip hop, Tableau and
Epic High are now elder statesmen, and their music has
been massively influential for the younger generation of Korean musicians,
(14:20):
including what might possibly be the biggest band in the world,
BTS Base bts IS, RM and Sugar have both spoken
pretty openly over the years about being inspired by Epic High,
(14:43):
and even though their group is known for K pop,
they are influenced by lyrical hip hop that directly speaks
to broader issues, which is what Epic Hai has been
doing since day one, and Yungi and RM have said
that Epic High's song Fly is the thing that made
them want to try wrap. But if you ask Tableau
about all this, he's a little shy. I'm sure they
(15:04):
would have discovered music, they're obviously um in love with it,
and they would have become musicians regardless. It's still gonna
be wild to hear that, though. I think what's most flattering, though,
is that their lyrical content and what they're trying to
do through music, just trying their best to be like
(15:26):
a good influence. I'm certain that now kids are listening
to bts the way they were listening to epic Ai right,
and sheer amount of kids has exponentially grown, and one
of those kids are gonna do something cool too. Tableau
and epic Hi have come a long way from couch
(15:49):
surfing and struggling to pay for dinner. They have a
real legacy now, even if Tableau doesn't quite know what
that means for him personally. And also, like I've feel
like hip hop and Korea is so young that it's
just weird to already like have our mount rushmore. You know,
we'll be right. Back when Tablo got started in Korea,
(16:33):
hip hop was really niche. But now, more than a
decade later, Korean hip hop is just part of the
normal mainstream landscape. In a lot of ways, the industry
has caught up to what people like Tableau were already doing.
Back when he was getting started, people in the music
industry might have called Tableau a quote unquote bedroom producer.
This was a word that people use for artists who
(16:55):
were making tracks on cheap equipment or just their laptops.
But nowadays the term is almost irrelevant because just about
every producer is starting out from their bedroom. And we
now take it for granted that thanks to social media,
anyone could be a star. How many guys and I
(17:17):
for a little time in Canada and major artists have
adapted to that too. Musicians and artists have started to
open up their lives on social media, and we're talking
seven coverage people cooking or doing their makeup or whatever.
He I just wanted to pop in and say hello,
I am live. It is bide minded, live with money, alright,
(17:42):
So let me cut this cucumber. Okay, I'm looking at
the d MS, but I actually can't because it goes
so fast because you guys are so amazing. There used
to be like this distance between the artists and the fans,
Professor hedging Lee Again. The artists didn't feel like it
was their job to use social media up to broadcast
everything that they're doing or to like express their feelings.
(18:04):
They would use the social media as a tool for
promotional purposes. But now we're seeing the artists using these
tools to just casually talk with the fans, not necessarily
inviting a conversation, but at least kind of revealing their
private self a little bit, and I think that has
allowed the fans to kind of feel like they're getting
(18:25):
to know the artists at a more personal level. But
that amount of access and interaction also means that fans
can criticize artists directly like never before. And today we're
counting down our picks for the top ten celabs who
are constantly getting canceled. Christie he Can also recently try
to show off the results of her eyebrow transplant, and
(18:45):
her critics were appalled by her rich people problems. This
this is a serious situation. I'm just hard to al
Ovid has been dead since two thousand and three, and
the fact that Korean artists are now more global than
ever means they're being exposed to new demands from fans
in other countries to use their platform for something. We're
(19:09):
not satisfied with just art. We want to know who
these artists really are. This might be weird and other
genres of music, but within the culture of hip hop
that's always kind of been there, It's just more serious now.
I feel like that's one of the tough things about
hip hop, right We value maybe above all else being real,
(19:33):
being authentic, But what counts for quote unquote real is
actually fairly rigid, what kind of real that we are
interested in. There, there's a real way to dress, you know,
there's an authentic way to address it is an authentic
way to talk. And if you don't do that, then
it's just who is this nerd? Who is this outsider?
(19:54):
And so you should adjust yourself accordingly. But then the
flip of that is if you're adjusting yourself, that's not real. Yeah.
And also the concept of real just constantly changes. And
this isn't just like just in Korea. Like remember when
Kanye came out and how that was like the moment
where we had to like the world had to decide
(20:17):
are you going to be for or are you going
to be for Kanye? Because in all ways they were different.
And then Kanye happened and everyone just started, you know,
wearing like skinny jeans, And when that happened, I think
(20:39):
a lot of Korean kids kind of felt like, oh, yes,
because now Kanye is dressing like us. Really yeah, And
there's something really interesting about the way that Tableau talks
about culture shifting over time, about who gets to be
(20:59):
real and what authentic is, because I think in some ways,
hip hop might be the one culture that makes us
ask all these uncomfortable questions. Hip hop is perhaps the
one genre in which authenticity is at a premium, Professor
Que Tugley, if it if it even comes across as
(21:20):
quote unquote fake or not real or inauthentic, you're done. Yeah,
you will not be hip hop. Yeah, questionable. Authenticity always matters.
Where do you draw the line between appreciation or learning
from our hybridization and appropriation? It is very difficult to answer.
But if you only like imitate something that original hip
(21:46):
hop musicians are doing without understanding why they are doing
or without showing your own interpretation, I may consider it
as a cultural appropriation because if you if I call
it as a cultural hybridization, it means that you understand
the different culture and try to mix with the culture,
(22:10):
with the different culture with your own to create something
different from your original culture as well as the original
hip hop music. For example, there's a reason why I
waited to the last episode before even mentioning cultural appropriation.
It's not that I think the topic needs to be avoided.
It's that there's something particularly American about the way that
(22:31):
we tend to ask questions about whether or not somebody's
done enough homework to properly understand the culture. Topics like
culture and authenticity, these are difficult things to talk about,
and in theory, this is where the Internet should come in.
Thanks the message boards and social media, we have a
convenient way to have conversations where at the very least
(22:51):
you can learn how other people think. But as we
saw with Tajnyo, an online conversation can also quickly become
an online mob. I think what was interesting about the
taching your case is that people were using the internet
asked a way to like uncover truth or whatever truth
that they had in mind right and thinking that that
(23:14):
was their way of pursuing justice. And I wonder if
that's what we're seeing with so many like fringe groups
in the United States. Fringe groups are organizing in a
pretty similar model to the way that Tajanio did on Reddit, forums,
telegram channels, discords. They're demanding the truth from politicians, the media,
(23:35):
and really anyone that they believe is lying. And just
like with Tajano, as those ideas become more mainstream, it
becomes harder to call them fringe groups there, you know,
just groups with questions and alternative facts. And as they
continue to spread misinformation, they gain more followers. And look,
(23:58):
it's probably a little stream to say that we can
draw a straight line from Taijanyo to Q and on,
But both groups share not only a mission, but a methodology.
A distributed, decentralized group with anonymous leaders who can be
swapped in or out at any time, that relentlessly pursues
their version of justice and truth. Truth is such a
(24:21):
subjective thing right now. My truth might not be the
same as yours. So if that's the world that we're
living in, then how can we survive together? How can
we coexist? This question from Professor Hedging sticks with me,
because listen, it's easy to look at the conspiracy theories
like Taijano and Q and on and look at the
frankly bonkers research that they're doing and laugh and say, yo,
(24:45):
these people, they lost their minds. Just forget about them
and just move on. But the reality is is that
these people are victims of misinformation. And that's not me
telling you that you have to feel sorry for them.
I'm just saying we have to live with these people, because,
if anything, the story of Tajano is a warning that
(25:06):
these pursuits of truth and justice can start to warp
our ability to understand each other as people. Tablet was
just one of the first people to experience with the future.
Was gonna look like I was in the hospital because
of my dad. And this mom and her daughter, like
her middle school, high school daughter are walking by, and
(25:30):
this the mom just comes straight to my face as
if I'm not an actual person but maybe like a
character or an avatar. Uh, And right to my face
says this guy. This isn't this the guy that lied
about his school, like right to my face, to her daughter.
And these things were happening constantly. Jesus, you know all
(25:55):
the articles then and after that have described this as
like an online phenomenon, right as problems with the Internet,
like as if fake news is confined to this like
digital space, and it certainly is not. It is so
connected to the real world. The longer we neglect that,
(26:20):
the harder it will become to do anything about it.
It is hard to put into words what exactly we
witnessed today because we have not seen this before. Thousands
storming the Capitol after a rally with President Trump sucking
(26:42):
he man, glad to see you guys. You guys are
fucking patriots. Look at this guy's got blood. And maybe,
just maybe, if we've been paying attention at the very least,
we wouldn't have been so unprepared when missing from Nation
grew to extremism and spilled offline into real life consequences.
(27:16):
It's now been more than ten years since Tableau's life
was changed forever by Tajanio. When you talk about sort
of the effects on you, you sort of seemed to
be more or less okay with that, and even when
it was happening, it seemed like you'd sort of accepted, Okay,
my my career is over, okay, And then when it
(27:40):
spread to your family, that was when it was okay. Now,
like fighting this. You also told me about how it
affected your brother. What what kind of conversations do you
have with your brother now? I mean ten years on
and we don't talk about this really, Yeah, we don't
talk all. Lot of it just brings up too many
(28:02):
different things, you know. Yeah, after my dad passed away, honestly, um,
our family has not been the same. We don't talk
that much anymore. It's just yeah, because it just brings
up too much mhm, especially in this case, we just
(28:23):
don't discuss it. It's just it's connected to too many ah,
too many different bad things. I guess, so we are,
you know, we don't talk that much anymore because there's
nothing we can talk about to avoid talking about this.
(28:44):
You know, it's our biggest shared memory, which sucks, but
it's impossible for us to not talk about this, so
we just talk about stupid things, you know, irrelevant and
possib things. I guess. I don't think I've ever talked
(29:07):
about this with my brother and my sister. I've talked
about it with my sister, she was sort of detached,
but I don't think I've ever talked to my mom
about it or after this. Do you think there's a
point where you'll be able to do that? Uh? I
don't think I really want to, um, to tell you
(29:29):
the frank truth, like I intended to never revisit this. Uh.
And I told the people that I work with. I
told my team, you know, like, this is just something
I don't want to discuss. I don't want to think about.
I'm doing. I'm doing much better now with these memories
tucked away right, and Uh, I had a conversation with
(29:52):
like my you know, my manager, and like I I
I started seeing like this world, you know, I seeing
things happen that just constantly reminded me of what I
went through and noticing how it's not getting any better.
(30:13):
And now that my daughter is uh you know, she's
she's gonna she's gonna have to live in that world. Uh.
And I was telling my manager, you know, like I
really don't want to, but I think I need to
start talking about like what I experienced. I need to
(30:34):
uh start you know, revisiting it because you know, I
know that this isn't going to change anything. I know
that it's not gonna like just one day snap all
these problems away. At the very least, Tableau can keep
moving forward. Epic High just dropped their latest album. There
(30:58):
was a lot of anticipation for this one, but even
Tableau surprised not only the critical reception but the fans.
People are saying that this is their favorite Epic High
album ever. But I don't think this is surprising at all.
For almost twenty years, Epic High has been proving themselves.
In their first albums, they were trying to teach an
(31:20):
entire country what hip hop even was. Then they wanted
to prove that they could do pop music too. Then
they had to prove that, despite the scandals and the haters,
that they still had it. But they don't have to
prove anything anymore, and today Tableau is known for being
Tableau the Dad, just as much as he's known for
(31:41):
his music. Would you rather be stuck in a bast
room for twenty four hours or be stuck in our
car for twenty four hours? Is the car moving? When
you search Tableau and Epic High on YouTube, you'll see
his music, but you'll also see even more clips of
(32:03):
him hanging out with the other members, telling stories about
his family and just joking around. And he's cool with that.
The Tajano thing is more in the background now. He
tries not to think about it too much, but it's
hard because people still bring it up. Anytime there's a
rumor or an online accusation, people compared to Tableau and
(32:25):
start talking about Tajano all over again. For the longest time,
Tableau was trying to take the advice of everyone around
him to put all that in the past behind him.
But he knows that's not happening. It made me wonder something,
are you worried talking about this again? It's like kicking
the hornet's nest again. Um. I mean, like, but but
(32:54):
you know, I gotta kick the hornet's nest for people
to realize there's hornets here. M Uh. Whether or not
this will kick the hornet's nest again, I don't know.
It's actually something I didn't really that didn't really occur
to me until now until yeah, you mentioned it and
(33:14):
kind of scares me too. Yeah, of course, because now
my daughter can google stuff and she she has a
she has a phone, like she has friends with phones,
and um, yeah, of course, of course. Uh, it's something
that worries me. Like this experience I had resulted in
(33:41):
nothing good. I didn't like overcome this. I didn't like
have a big victory just because these people went to jail.
I didn't. I wasn't vindicated like um, people want to say,
like there was nothing really good about this, no matter
(34:01):
how you spend it. I lost too much that I
can't get back. Uh, So there's nothing good about it.
But I don't want to leave it at that. It
sounds to me like you're saying you hope that people
should be able to learn from this, but you don't
sound optimistic that they will. Yeah, but I gotta try
(34:29):
being real. I think Tableau is doing what a lot
of us do when we go through something terrible. You
know that phrase everything happens for a reason. And you
know how when somebody tells you that when you're going
through it that it just feels kind of empty. Well,
Tableau is living through that, and he's hoping it's true.
(34:50):
Maybe it happened because I uh, I have the ability
to to use it in some way, like in some
positive way, and if it becomes uh, you know, like
a conversation between people about misinformation about um you know what,
(35:11):
how easy we trust things, we believe things. It's just
just the various different things that are like that are
a part of this story. I feel like some of
it could lead to something good. The fever is not over,
not by a long shot. Looking around at the world online,
(35:34):
it might get worse, but maybe someday, well at least
get to see the flowers. M h Authentic is a
(36:26):
production of Vice Audio and I Heart Podcast Network special
thanks to Junior Khn from Vice Korea, Spion Home Threes Reez,
Nina Sudra and Kim Pierce. Also thanks to Stacy Harrington,
Samantha Rodriguez, and Jason Guberman. We'd also like to thank
Adi Nam, Brian Gold and Jim Are. Translators for the
(36:48):
series were Sarah Ree and Jen Quan. Authentic is produced
and reported by Stephanie Kryuki, Minji Coop, Kate Osborne and
myself with Janet, Stephanie Brown and Sam Egan. Sound design
and original music composition by Kyle Murdock with additional support
from Natasha Jacobs. Our supervising producer is Janet Lee, editing
(37:12):
from Lazy Roberts, fact checking by Minji Ku and Nicole Pasuka.
This episode features music from Epic High from their album
Fever's End, distributed by y G Entertainment. This episode also
features music from BTS of Big Hit Entertainment. Thanks also
to KBS for their show The Return of Superman. Our
(37:33):
executive producer and VP Advice audio is Kate Osborne from
I Heart Podcast Network. Executive producers Nikki e Tor and
Lindsay Hoffman. I'm Dexter Thomas. Make sure to subscribe wherever
you get your podcast so you don't miss an episode
and if you dig it, give us a rating and
a review.
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