Park Jae-hyung

Background

Park Jae-hyung was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina. More popularly known as Jae, he moved to Cerritos, California where he attended and graduated from Cerritos High School. He then enrolled at California State University, to study Political Science. He owned a YouTube channel called “YellowPostItMan” where he uploaded song covers throughout his high school and university days. When the first season of the South Korean T.V. competition series aired in 2012, Park took a break from school to compete as a singer and guitarist. He ended the competition as a finalist, coming through in sixth place. However, he had already attracted several eyes and ears. At the end of the show, J.Y.P. Entertainment offered him a contract to be a trainee for an upcoming boy band at the company. Park accepted the offer and moved to South Korea to begin his training.

After a couple of years of training, Park debuted as a vocalist and guitarist with Day6, J.Y.P’s first rock band on September 7, 2015. Their debut E.P. was titled “The Day,” and the second EP, “Daydream” was released in March of the following year. Including Park, Day6 was a band with six members — Sungjin, Young K, Wonpil, Junhyeok, and Dowoon. However, Junhyeok left the band before the release of their second E.P., Daydream. Meanwhile, Park became an M.C. of the television talk show, “After School Club,” hosted by Arirang T.V., an English-Language South Korean television network based in Seoul. He started a YouTube channel in 2017 and named it “JaeSix,” but later renamed it “eaJ” and began a personal music project in 2020. He was a guest D.J. for a while on one of Arirang’s shows, and in February 2020, started his first podcast, “How Did I Get Here?,” H.D.I.G.H. for short. The podcast gained quite an audience and won a couple of awards in 2020 and 2021. On December 31, 2021, Park announced the termination of his contract with J.Y.P. Entertainment, as well as his leaving Day6 for good due to personal reasons.

Park was diagnosed with panic disorder in April 2020. He later shared updates on Twitter about his condition and his experiences with mental health. He started the campaign “From Friends,” selling clothing and other merchandise, and donated all the proceeds to the Jed Foundation to support the provision of free mental health resources to young people. The star’s bumpy life has seen a few social media controversies of its own, including misunderstandings that arose due to “cultural differences.” However, he acknowledged his faults each of those times and apologized to all parties affected.