Oneus path into our hearts: pre-debut until today!

K-Pop Blog > Artists > Oneus

In July 2018, RBW Entertainment announced that two groups would debut in the second half of the year. One of them is the six-member boy band “Oneus”, which has gathered fans around them even before their debut.

We'll introduce you to the other group - rock band Onewe - next time!

The members

Pre-debut activities

Three of the future members - Seoho, Keonhee and Hwanwoong - appeared on the survival show “Produce 101” in the first half of 2017. There, 101 male trainees fought for a place in the “Wanna One” project group. The highest ranking was achieved by Keonhee, who was eliminated in 33rd place.

In the second half of 2017, Ravn, Seoho and Leedo applied for YG Entertainment's survival show “Mix Nine”. Unfortunately, Leedo was already eliminated during the audition, but Ravn and Seoho were among the 170 trainees who passed the round and even made it to 23rd place (Ravn) and 13th place (Seoho)!

In November 2017, RBW (Rainbow Bridge World), the agency where the trainees are contracted, launched a reality show called: RBW Trainee Life - We Will Debut!

Even & Odd

The show follows six trainees on their way to their debut as Oneus: Seoho, Keonhee, Hwanwoong, Ravn and Leedo, who are already known from Produce 101 and Mix Nine, and another trainee with the stage name Xion. After four episodes, Oneus got company on the show. Onewe, the rock band that was supposed to debut almost simultaneously with Oneus under the same agency, was also part of the show starting in December!

However, the agency is not the only connection between the two teams. Xion - whose real name is Son Dongju - from Oneus is the twin brother of Dongmyeong, the singer and keyboard player from Onewe! Dongmyeong is a minute older. This is a coincidence because the two did not join the agency together. Onewe debuted back in 2015 as an independent group called “M.A.S 0049”. In April 2017, the band signed a contract with RBW and shortened their name to “MAS”. Only later did they change their name completely and from then on they were active as “Onewe”. Xion independently took part in an audition and was accepted by RBW as a trainee.

The two teams competed against each other or worked together in various missions throughout the show. They also held several concerts together; At that time, the members of Oneus were still active under the name “RBW Boys”. Oneues and Onewe even released a joint song called “Last Song” before their debut.

On January 9, 2019, Oneus debuted their first album “Light Us”.

The name “Oneus” is a combination of the English words “One” and “Us”. It is intended to express that the group gathers the strength of us (=us) and we all become one (=one).

The title song of “ Light Us ” - Valkyrie - entered the top 10 of the iTunes charts in several countries and reached number 15 on the Billboard World Digital Song Sales charts! This was the first step of many, as Oneus released four more albums in 2019 alone and debuted in Japan, among other places!

“Light Us” was followed in May by the second album “ Raise Us ” with the title song “Twilight”. In August, the boy group celebrated their Japanese debut with their first Japanese mini album “Twilight”, which, as the name suggests, contains a Japanese version of Twilight. It also contains a new version of “Valkyrie” and two new original Japanese songs. In the same month, Oneus gave a concert in Japan and won the “Next Artist Award” at the Korean Soribada Best K-Music Awards!

The third Korean album “Fly With Us” was released in September, and Oneus then visited six American cities as part of her first U.S. album. Tour, and in December the boy band released their second Japanese album “808”. The latter topped the Japanese Oricon charts with over 3,662 copies sold on the first day of release!

So 2019 ended with a great success. But Oneus didn't rest on his laurels and was at least as busy in 2020 as the year before.

2020: Concerts, comebacks and “Road to Kingdom”

To celebrate the first anniversary, Oneus held a fan meeting on January 10th. In February, Japanese fans had another chance to see the boy band live as they held four concerts in Japan.

On March 24, the first single album “ In It's Time ” was released with the title song “A Song Written Easily”, which reached number 11 on the Billboard World Digital Song Sales charts. Four days previously, it had been announced that Oneus would take part in the survival show “Road to Kingdom”. In Kingdom, seven boy groups - Pentagon , ONF, Golden Child, The Boyz, Verivery, TO1 and Oneus - competed against each other to determine the “true number 1”. The show aired from April to June and is known as the male version of the show “Queendom”, in which female acts competed against each other. For the finale, each participant released a new song. Oneus presented a single called “Come Back Home” and finished in fourth place.

Even after the show there was no break in sight, because on August 19th Oneus presented a new Korean album entitled “ Lived ”.

But the year wasn't over yet! On December 1st, the boy band surprised their fans with their first digital single “Bbusyeo”. In the music video and the image teasers, the boys are more colorful than ever before with bright colors and a big smile!

Three new albums were released in 2021:

“ Devil ” in January, “ Binary Code ” in May and “ Blood Moon ” in November. “Binary Code” contains a rock version of Oneu’s debut song “Valkyrie”. Fans will probably remember “Blood Moon” in particular, because the title song “Luna” finally gave the boy group their first song on a music show!

Afterwards, Oneus officially worked again with their agency colleagues “Onewe” for a long time. The two bands released their second joint single “Stay” on December 21st.

But that wasn't the first collaboration since the debut. In fact, Onewe's CyA worked on two of Oneus' songs: "Crazy & Crazy" from "Light Us" (2019) and "Dizzy" from "Lived" (2020) were partly written by him. CyA also regularly uploads songs to Soundcloud and has collaborated with Leedo from Oneus on more than one occasion. We look forward to further joint projects from Oneus & Onewe in the future!

2022 Oneus started a U.S. tour!

This time the boy band visited no fewer than 14 American cities from early February to mid-March! The boys stopped in New York and Chicago, among other places, as well as smaller cities like Lawrence. The last concert took place on March 12th in Beverly Hills. The last album “Blood Moon” was actually almost half a year ago, so we are particularly happy that Oneus has announced a comeback for May!

Discography

Bonus

Did you know that Ravn almost debuted in Victon?

The talented rapper was a trainee in YG, JYP and Plan A Entertainment before landing at RBW. When he was with Plan A (now IST Entertainment), he trained with the future members of Victon. He was supposed to debut with them, but then left the agency for personal reasons. Victon debuted in November 2016 with seven members and Ravn took the stage almost three years later with Oneus!