EJAE Profile, Bio, & Facts

EJAE (김은재) is a is a Korean-American singer-songwriter and record producer. She was the singing voice of Rumi of HUNTR/X in the show Kpop Demon Hunters.

EJAE Profile

EJAE Facts:

Early Life

– EJAE was born in Seoul, South Korea.
– She studied Music Production and Psychology at New York University.
– During her trainee days, she often traveled between Korea and the US to focus on both training and studying.

Personal Life

– Her Chinese zodiac sign is Goat.
– She lives in Brooklyn, New York.
– She said she has a loud personality but always had to mold herself during her years as a trainee because of Korea’s high standards. (Forbes)
– She can speak Korean and English.
– After being considered too old to debut, she moved to the US to continue her studies and songwriting career.
– She feels blessed for the amount of struggles she went through because she could channel those emotions into Rumi as she deeply relates with the character. (HT City)
– She is nicknamed the “Benny Blanco” of kpop.
– She first met Rei Ami during the recording session for “Golden”.
– In the song “Golden,” she hit her highest vocalnote, A5.
– She said she ugly cried all day when her song hit #1 on Billboard.
– She has known Audrey Nuna since she was 15 years old.
– She came up with “Trixies” as the fandom name for HUNTR/X.
– If she could go back in time she would want to make music with Billy Holiday.
– She wrote the song “Pyscho” when she and her fiancé were fighting during long distance. (Variety)
– She described “Rumi” in one word as ‘perseverance”.
– Her grandfather, Shin Young-kyun, is a famous actor and lawyer in Korea.
– She didn’t want to be an artist anymore when she was 25 because of the pressure and thought at the time that if she ever were to become one, she would like to be an animated character singing from behind the scenes just using her voice. (Forbes)
– Even though she was first brought in only to record demos, the team decided to keep her as Rumi’s final singing voice. The film’s director said her demo vocals helped get the project approved.
– She said if there is any Kpop artist who would understand Rumi the best, it’d be BoA.
– She said she would likely survive a demon attack because she is very strong and even her brother tells her that.
– Her songwriting mentor Andrew Choi voices Jinu in the same film.
– She got the opportunity to work on HUNTR/X through a friend. (Genius Korea)
– Her childhood dream was to become an idol.
– She wrote the mega popular song “Golden” from HUNTER/X on her way to the dentist and got a gold filling. (HT City)

Career

– EJAE trained under SM Entertainment for 10 years, starting in 2003.
– She was once set to debut with a trio group. (Forbes)
– She has written songs for many K-pop artists, including Red Velvet, TWICE, aespa, LE SSERAFIM, and NMIXX.
– Her first big hit was “Psycho” by Red Velvet, which later earned a gold certification in the US.
– She also worked on the songs “Drama” by aespa and “Birthday” by Red Velvet.
– She was called the ‘heart and soul’ of “Huntr/x” by the director and said she had been working on the project since 2019. (Grammy Awards)
– She has also written a song for the game League of Legends.
– She is the music producer for the project group TDYA.

Likes & Dislikes

– She is a big fan of Bada from S.E.S. (Grammy Awards)
– She likes to watch Kdramas. (Forbes)
– Her favorite Kpop group is g.o.d as they got her into Kpop. She also likes H.O.T.
– Among the newer generations of Kpop, she likes aespa, NewJeans, BTS, BLACKPINK, and TWICE.
– Her favorite food is Kimchi stew. (Billboard News)
– She loves to eat bread a lot, including chocolate croissants.

EJAE Photos