KARD Just Released Their First Full-Length Album. It's Also Meant to Be Their Last.
KARD released "Where To Now? (Part.2): NOWHERE" on Tuesday, the co-ed quartet's first full-length studio album in a nine-year career - and, under the group's current plans, its final one before members go their separate ways.
The 10-track album is led by "Back To Life," a moombahton-based dancehall track that updates KARD's early tropical sound with bright synthesizers, heavy bass and woodwind textures over lyrics offering reassurance to someone finding their way back into the world. All four members - BM, J.seph, Somin and Jiwoo - contributed to the song's lyrics, with BM also credited on composition, arrangement and programming alongside co-writers Taneisha Jackson and Liam Dowell. The tracklist rounds out with B-sides "Armor," "At Least" and "Signal," plus four solo tracks - BM's "Move," J.seph's "EASY," Somin's "Backseat" and Jiwoo's "Home Sweet Home" - before closing on "Always" and an instrumental version of the title track.
DSP Media confirmed on July 6 that KARD would conclude group activities once the album's promotions and a following world tour wrap, ending one of K-pop's longest-running mixed-gender acts. But in a July 21 roundtable interview in Seoul, the members pushed back on framing it as a breakup. "We didn't make this album thinking it would be our last," J.seph said. "As our contracts were nearing their end, we worked on the songs and gradually realized this might end up being our final album." BM described the moment as a chance for individual growth rather than an ending: "If we gain those experiences, I think we'll be able to come back together later and create even better work with even greater synergy." Somin pointed to precedent elsewhere in the industry: "We've seen senior groups take a break and come back together later. I think it could be the same for us."
KARD debuted in December 2016 under DSP Media, building an international fan base - known as Hidden KARD - as one of the few coed groups to sustain a long-term career in an industry still largely built around single-gender lineups. With the members' renewed contracts set to expire this year, all four chose not to sign again, a decision the agency has framed as a mutual conclusion rather than an internal split.
The "NOW HERE" world tour opens Aug. 8 at Gabin Art Hall in Seoul before heading to Europe for 10 dates in September, including stops in Berlin, Paris, Madrid, Barcelona and London, plus a Sept. 27 date in Singapore at Marina Bay Sands' Sands Theatre. The setlist is expected to draw from the new album alongside the group's earlier catalog, giving Hidden KARD one final run of shows before the group's activities pause - for however long that turns out to be.
