“I’m simply too blatantly fair. It’s the L.A. in me — I used to be born and raised round other folks which might be very open with their reviews. I’ve were given not anything to cover.” — Matthew Kim (BM), Netflix Tudum, April 2026
THE KING CARD STEPS INTO THE LIGHT
The DAZED Korea Summer time 2026 Version doesn’t simply characteristic BM — it frames him.
In a pictorial preview that already has the web’s collective pulse spiking, the Korean-American rapper, manufacturer, and now-confirmed Hollywood actor arrives at the editorial web page like a power of nature that refuses to be labeled.
Platinum power. Razor-sharp intuition. A gaze that would forestall a song video mid-frame.
That is Matthew Kim — identified to the arena as BM, the King card of DSP Media’s co-ed powerhouse KARD. And in 2026, the king is making strikes on each and every board concurrently.
FROM “OH NANA” TO EVERYWHERE
Solid your thoughts again to past due 2016: a pre-debut unmarried drops into an unsuspecting K-pop panorama, and all at once there’s a bunch that feels like not anything the trade has served sooner than.
Constructed on reggaetón swing, dancehall pulse, and a genre-crossing self belief that made Billboard take a seat up directly, KARD introduced themselves now not with a whisper however a full-volume declaration.
The gang’s emblem of K-pop has been described as “undeniably fashionable,” with their discography that specialize in fresh area and dancehall vibes — one thing Billboard known as being “pulled without delay from Most sensible 40 charts.”
In an international the place K-pop in large part supposed completely symmetrical boy bands or lady teams glittering in synchronized formation, KARD threw a wildcard — actually. Their very title is an abbreviation of playing-card roles assigned to every member: BM because the King card, J.Seph because the Ace, Somin because the Black JokeR, and Jiwoo because the Colour JokeR. 4 contributors. Two males, two ladies. One genre-bending sound that made them the trailblazers of co-ed K-pop.
BIG MATTHEW: THE ARCHITECTURE OF AN ICON
To grasp BM is to know a selected roughly duality — the bridge-builder who exists between two worlds with out totally belonging to both, and who has became that in-between area into his biggest ingenious asset.
Born Matthew Kim, he grew up in and round Los Angeles sooner than relocating to Seoul in 2011 to compete at the SBS making a song fact display K-pop Megastar. Despite the fact that he didn’t win, he used to be due to this fact recruited by means of DSP Media and sooner or later debuted because the lead rapper in KARD — status out as one of the vital uncommon mixed-gender teams in an trade filled with boy and woman teams.
That LA upbringing threads via the whole thing he touches. The swagger in his rap supply.
The disarming honesty in his interviews. The refusal to melt his edges to suit a extra at ease trade mildew. Kim has attributed his open communique taste to his Southern California roots, describing himself as anyone who says precisely how he feels — a rarity in an leisure trade the place public figures are anticipated to rigorously curate each and every remark. However at the back of the candour sits a major musician. BM started by means of writing lyrics and composing song just for his personal portions, then regularly sought after to make the beats for complete songs, increasing his ambitions to form the total ingenious course of KARD itself. That evolution from rapper to full-spectrum manufacturer is the quiet spine of KARD’s longevity — a bunch that has persisted to adapt as a result of its contributors refused to forestall rising.
DAZED KOREA: THE EDITORIAL HOMECOMING
There’s a reason why BM and DAZED Korea make sense in combination. The mag has lengthy been a house for artists who exist out of doors simple definitions — creatives whose identification is just too layered for a unmarried highlight. When BM up to now seemed within the pages of Dazed, he delivered a dramatic solo pictorial that confirmed a major, introspective aspect — discussing his ambitions in manufacturing and his philosophy that downhill roads are all the time adopted by means of uphill ones.
The 2026 Summer time Version marks a distinct bankruptcy. This isn’t the rising manufacturer earnestly pitching his imaginative and prescient. This can be a guy who has arrived — who has became each and every aspiration he as soon as described in an interview into tangible fact. The editorial styling amplifies that shift: BM in entrance of a lens that understands find out how to translate presence into pages, his type possible choices doing what they all the time have — talking volumes sooner than a unmarried lyric performs.
Type has all the time been a storytelling language for BM. Whether or not commanding a degree in body-conscious degree put on that underlines his physicality, or leaning into the architectural fringe of luxurious boulevard styling, his aesthetic possible choices map the emotional temperature of every technology. The DAZED Korea pictorial preview distils that into one thing cinematic — a person
“There’s one thing a couple of buzz-cut blond tennis trainer. It really works for Woosh!” — Matthew Kim, Netflix Tudum / Red meat Season 2 Solid Function, April 2026
DRIFT: THE ALBUM THAT MOVED THEM FORWARD
Earlier than Hollywood got here calling, KARD delivered one among their maximum seriously celebrated releases in years. DRIFT, their 8th mini-album, used to be described by means of the crowd and their label as now not a file of drifting with out course, however of KARD’s provide hopefully shifting towards an unknown vacation spot — growing their very own trail with out being confined to current frameworks.
The album blends reggaetón, synth-pop, area, and early-2000s nostalgia with an power that earned it the tag of a “summer-ready free up made for motion.” Name monitor “Contact” leans into retro-forward manufacturing — turning up the warmth with early 2000s-inspired vibes layered with graceful, fashionable manufacturing, described as horny, catchy, and dripping with self belief, with the song video matching completely — playful, sultry, and classy.
The DRIFT technology additionally took the crowd again to the place their fandom breathes loudest: the are living degree. The DRIFT 2025 US Excursion noticed KARD open in Los Angeles, handing over a collection that moved via their complete discography — from debut tracks to new favourites — proving why Hidden KARD, their faithful fanbase, assists in keeping appearing up excursion after excursion.
KARD at their absolute best isn’t just a listening enjoy. It’s a full-body tournament.
THE HIDDEN KARD UNIVERSE: FANDOM AS CO-CREATOR
Ask any Hidden KARD member and so they’ll let you know: this fandom didn’t develop, it organised. With social media fluency and an international unfold that stretches from Latin The united states to Southeast Asia to New Zealand, Hidden KARD operates as one thing nearer to an inventive neighborhood than a passive target audience.
The gang has all the time rewarded that power. BM specifically has cultivated one of the original rapper-fan relationships in K-pop — rooted now not in manufactured mystique however in authentic accessibility. His podcast Get Actual, co-hosted with fellow Korean-American entertainers, turned into an area the place the sophisticated realities of being an Asian-American within the leisure trade might be mentioned with the type of frankness uncommon in idol tradition.
His philanthropic instincts, changing web meme tradition into actual charitable donations for the Breast Most cancers Analysis Basis, became a second of viral humour into one thing lasting and significant. In November 2023, UTA (United Ability Company) introduced it used to be now representing KARD all over out of doors Asia — a sign that the crowd’s international ambitions had infrastructure to check.
WOOSH: HOLLYWOOD OPENS THE DOOR
After which got here Red meat.
Set to premiere on April 16, 2026, the second one season of Netflix’s Emmy-winning anthology drama Red meat solid BM within the function of Woo Shi, a tennis trainer who runs a tennis store at an unique nation membership — a personality entangled with robust figures whose polished external conceals calculated ambition.
In BM’s personal phrases, performing introduced a fully new roughly power — being on degree felt other from going through veteran actors like Youn Yuh-Jung in actual time. But he additionally discovered that the emotional honesty he’d evolved via years of song transferred without delay: conveying feeling isn’t certain by means of rhythm whilst you strip it to its core.
Even with 15 years in leisure and hundreds of thousands of social media fans, Kim stays reluctant to name himself a celeb — pronouncing he has so much to be informed sooner than he can in reality be seen that manner. That humility, coming from anyone who simply made his Hollywood debut reverse Carey Mulligan, Oscar Isaac, and the mythical Youn Yuh-Jung, isn’t efficiency. It’s the similar intuition that has pushed each and every ingenious bounce he’s taken: the conclusion that the paintings isn’t finished, that the most productive continues to be forward.
That power — hungry, provide, fair — is strictly what makes BM one of the compelling figures in K-pop’s 2026 panorama.
THE BIGGER PICTURE: KARD AND THE CO-ED FUTURE
KARD didn’t simply make area for themselves in K-pop. They made the argument, via just about a decade of constant ingenious output, that co-ed teams may continue to exist and thrive with out conforming to a boy-group or girl-group template. In doing so, they’ve remained a reference level for a brand new era of idol tradition that values identification and authenticity over formulation.
Somin and Jiwoo anchor the crowd’s vocal intensity with a heat that offsets the sharpness of BM and J.Seph’s rap strains. Reside, the 4 generate a chemistry this is inseparable from the song — the type of degree dynamic that can’t be manufactured, most effective evolved over years of shared paintings.
The tale of KARD is in the end a tale about staying power with integrity. A few organization that survived the scepticism of the trade’s earliest doubters, the power of necessary army carrier reshaping their lineup, the complexities of world traveling, and the consistent evolution of K-pop style — and got here via every problem with their sound sharper and their bond tighter.
THE ERA WE’RE IN NOW
DAZED Korea recognises what the remainder of the arena is readily catching as much as: BM is now not merely a K-pop idol who makes excellent song. He’s a multi-disciplinary ingenious whose presence throughout type, movie, song, and podcast tradition represents the fullest conceivable expression of what a contemporary Korean-American artist will also be.
And KARD, as a bunch, aren’t in a past due bankruptcy. They’re within the bankruptcy the place the whole thing they’ve constructed begins to pay compound hobby.
The King card is in play. And from right here, the sport most effective will get extra attention-grabbing.
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CREDITS & RIGHTS
Revealed by means of: Kpoppie Mag
Mother or father Corporate: Speed Leisure Inc Japan / New Zealand
Editorial Function Written by means of: Kpoppie Mag Editorial Crew
Photograph Credit: DAZED Korea / DSP Media (Pictorial Preview Pictures)
Artist Control: DSP Media (Korea) / UTA — United Ability Company (International, ex-Asia)
Ability Referenced: BM (Matthew Kim), KARD (J.Seph, BM, Somin, Jiwoo)
Netflix Red meat Season 2: Created by means of Lee Sung Jin / Netflix Authentic Manufacturing
Mag Referenced: DAZED Korea — 2026 Summer time Version
© 2026 Speed Leisure Inc Japan / New Zealand. All Rights Reserved.
All editorial content material, remark, and unique writing contained inside of this selection is the highbrow assets of Kpoppie Mag and Speed Leisure Inc Japan / New Zealand. All artist pictures and similar credit stay the valuables in their respective rights holders. This newsletter is produced for editorial and journalistic functions.
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