[INTERVIEW] Popular Demand: company behind IVE's 'After LIKE' aims to broaden horizon

Aslak Klever, founder and CEO of Popular Demand / Screenshot from Instagram

Oslo-based music publishing company CEO hopes to work with BLACKPINK

By Dong Sun-hwa

"After LIKE," the third single by girl group IVE, is one of the biggest K-pop hits this year. The catchy tune has been retaining a spot on the Billboard Global 200 chart for eight consecutive weeks since its release on Sept. 19, and recently became the longest-running track on the top 10 weekly chart of Melon, a major Korean streaming platform.

It also ranked first on Korean music shows 14 times ― the highest record among all K-pop acts this year ― and its music video exceeded 120 million views on YouTube as of Wednesday. Thanks to the stellar success of this song, in which IVE members sing about expressing love through actions, the sextet has risen as a strong candidate for the rookie of the year awards.

K-pop girl group IVE / Courtesy of Starship Entertainment

Fusing assorted music genres such as EDM, pop and house, "After LIKE" was co-written by high-profile producers like Anders Nilsen from Norway and Ryan Jhun from Korea.

Among them, Nilsen sampled American singer Gloria Gaynor's disco hit, "I Will Survive" (1978) in the chorus of "After LIKE," giving it a creative twist. Nilsen, who previously worked with award-winning DJ R3HAB, belongs to Popular Demand, a management company for songwriters and producers headquartered in Oslo, Norway, which was founded by Aslak Klever in 2018.

According to Klever, "After LIKE" was originally written by Nilsen and a team based in Oslo in the autumn of 2020.

"The Gloria Gaynor part was added by Nilsen after the first demo session," Klever said in a recent email interview with The Korea Times. "He just wanted to try if it works because he felt it was very catchy. At the time we did not know if sampling would even be possible, but luckily, the original songwriters for 'I Will Survive' and their publishers saw the potential of our track, so they were very positive about sampling."

Klever added: "It took over a year for Ryan Jhun and IVE's management company Starship Entertainment to hear it and work with us to develop it to what it is today. We value having a Korean team of writers and producers who we can spar with, and who can guide us through the process. Jhun and his company Marcan Entertainment have been our great partner since day 1 in that regard."

Klever first dove into the music industry in 2010 as the head of sales at EMI Music Norway. He worked at Parlophone Label Group (PLG) and Warner Music before joining Caroline International ― a label services division of Universal Music Group (UMG) ― as the head of Nordics.

"When I was working for UMG, I witnessed that a lot of talented and successful Norwegian producers and songwriters did not have an outlet or network outside of their home country, so I wanted to change that," he said. "So I left my steady job and started Popular Demand."

Aslak Klever, left, founder and CEO of Popular Demand / Screenshot from Instagram

Popular Demand currently has seven management clients and a couple of others who it publishes for. Collectively, it is behind the No. 1 records in 22 counties globally, and nearly 8 billion Spotify streams. One of its most well-known songs is British-born Norwegian DJ Alan Walker's 2015 single, "Faded."

"Walker has been a big part of our clients' journey to step out of Scandinavia," Klever stressed. "We have done 21 songs for Alan and most of them were singles. From there, our clients have gone on to write and produce for more big-name stars like Bebe Rexha, Tate McRae, as well as DJ songs for Farruko, John Legend and Ava Max."

Popular Demand is also behind the success of a string of K-pop tracks such as TWICE's "Scandal" (2021), Red Velvet's "In My Dreams" (2022) and Pentagon's "Feelin' Like" (2022).

"Our songwriters are spending more and more time in both Seoul and Los Angeles these days," he said. "In Korea, they have written and produced for groups like TWICE and Red Velvet. K-pop is definitely going global these days and there has been an influx in international interest, not only from songwriters, but also from labels and publishers. Korea should be very proud of how big K-pop currently is on a global scale. It is very impressive, and is also becoming very competitive."

K-pop girl group TWICE / Courtesy of JYP Entertainment

Asked how his company first got to work for the K-pop industry, Klever revealed that one of his clients, Jesper Bergen, played a pivotal role.

"Borgen did a song for Girls' Generation in 2014, but my first involvement was when he co-wrote VICTON's 'Mayday' (2020)," Klever recalled. "At that time, we had very little contacts in Korea, but thanks to this track and our great partners involved, we have slowly built up a network in Seoul. In the beginning, it was challenging to reach out to Korean labels and find out who were the key decision makers especially due to the language barrier. But today, most people from Korean companies reach out to us first, not the other way around."

The CEO believes that Popular Demand's pursuit of "border-free" music has contributed to its success.

"I think what differentiates us from our competitors is that we do not see any musical borders," he said. "It does not matter if we are working on projects in Germany, Korea, the U.S. or Scandinavia. A good song is a good song and everything is accessible to anyone worldwide today. It is just two clicks away on your computer. We try to instill this mindset in our clients."

For him, the toughest part of his job is that he should pour a lot of time and effort into finding the "best home" for his clients' music. Keeping people of the creative side of things motivated throughout the entire process is another challenging mission. Nonetheless, Klever calls his job rewarding.

"Hearing and seeing how music that our songwriters and producers have created get a life of its own is so rewarding," he said. "The last time I was in Seoul I heard one of our songs in a restaurant right after I arrived, and I have had that experience in taxis, shops and offices around the world. It is pretty cool being in a shop in Paris or Berlin, or on the beach in Bali and then you hear something that you have spent a long time working on."

K-pop act BLACKPINK / Courtesy of YG Entertainment

Klever hopes he will get the chance to work with BLACKPINK, the first K-pop girl group to sell one million albums. The quartet recently embarked on its largest-ever scale world tour, which will attract some 1.5 million spectators across the globe.

"I am a big fan of BLACKPINK," he said. "I think its producer Teddy needs to call us. But I have more goals to achieve in the days ahead. To date, Popular Demand has been involved in four No. 1 records in Korea and we have had some top 10s on the Billboard 200 charts. We want to go beyond that next year. We are always pushing for progress, and I want the Billboard No. 1s on the 200 or Hot 100 chart."