Six months after leaving one of K-pop's biggest boy bands, EVAN says the album he has built as a soloist is organized around a personal anxiety: that an artist whose music stops reaching people has "ceased to exist."

The soloist, known until March as Heeseung of ENHYPEN, released his first mini album "DEATH OF ME" on Monday. Hours ahead of the official release, he hosted a press showcase at the Grand Peace Palace at Kyung Hee University in Dongdaemun District, eastern Seoul.

The idea behind the album, he explained, came from a line in the anime "One Piece" about how a person truly dies only when they have been forgotten — a sentiment drawn from the series' celebrated passage about the late pirate king Gol D. Roger, and one that has long resonated with fans of the franchise.

"When my music no longer reaches people, my reason for existing as an artist disappears," he said. "This album carries the meaning that I won't let that happen."

Belift Lab, the HYBE label that announced his departure from ENHYPEN on March 10 and that he remained with as a soloist, describes "DEATH OF ME" as an album about holding onto a tangle of emotions and moving forward anyway. ENHYPEN, the seven-member group that debuted under the label in 2020, has continued as a six-member act since the announcement. His exit came amid a broader moment of change for HYBE's roster, where solo careers have increasingly run alongside group activities for label artists.

Asked directly about the exit, EVAN said the decision followed a "long stretch of uncertainty" about what kind of music he wanted to make.

"I shared what I had been working on with the company, we talked, and after thinking about it for a very long time, I ended up taking the solo path," he said.

He also addressed the reaction from some of his fans, going a step further by issuing an apology to the reporters in the room, many of whom had fielded protest messages from fans in the weeks after March.

"I understand deeply how hurt and worried fans have been," he said. "I want to repay that with music and with a sincere path forward."

The eight-track album, released the same day, is the first release he has produced across the board, going beyond merely singing the songs — a hands-on role that marks a clear departure from the group framework in which he first built his career.

"It's like a mirror," he said. "There's fear about what's ahead, but there's also this bare, unfiltered story about wanting to achieve a lot. I think it projects my thoughts exactly as they are."

Part of what that produced was a disclosure he had never made publicly before. In a Weverse Magazine interview published Thursday, EVAN said he was treated for malignant lymphoma, a type of blood cancer, when he was a fourth-grade student.

The singer said the illness belonged in the album rather than beside it.

"The theme running through all eight songs is hope, and I felt my childhood illness ran along the same line, so I brought it out," EVAN said. "It was a moment that had a huge effect on how I think and what I value, and confessing it came naturally."

"If I was going to show what's inside me exactly as it is, it was a story I had to tell," he added. "And I'd like to use this occasion to offer a small comfort and a story of hope to people who are living with childhood cancer."

The title track, which he co-wrote and co-composed, wraps that resolve in heavy pop R&B built around the declaration that nothing is going to stop him.

"There were a lot of moments while preparing this album when I thought I had reached my musical limit," he said. "This song is about not giving up when I run into that wall."

Alongside the title track and "Ride or Die," the album features "Not Enough," "Noise," "Twilight," "Immature," "Overflow" and "Going Home."

His live schedule is filling out across the region. In August, he became the first recipient of the Global-K Artist award at the 2026 TMElive International Music Awards at Kai Tak Stadium in Hong Kong. He is also set to open NBA Fan Day 2026 at the Venetian Arena in Macao on Oct. 10, before performing at K-LIVE FESTIVAL BAND : AGE in Bangkok on Oct. 17.

"My goal is to stand on bigger and more numerous stages," he said, "so that people take an interest in me, in my story and in my album."

His motto as an artist, he added, is to give people hope through music and to help listeners who are worn down find the strength to get through it.

Source: The Korea Times