My Experience at Enhypens First US concert

On October 2, 2022, Enhypens first ever concert in the United States took place. Although they have performed in the U.S before (for KCON) they never had a full concert with a series of different songs to perform. This was also their first performance in the U.S as a full group since one of the members wasn’t able to perform in KCON due to health issues. As this was a big event for the group (and me), I wanted to make sure everything went perfectly.

Picking an outfit
It took me quite a while to pick my outfit for this concert. I wanted to dress up as one of the members but I had a hard time trying to think of what concept to choose, to figure out costs and budgeting, and whether people would even recognize who I was trying to dress up as. I had gone through at least five or six different outfit ideas over the span of a month.’

Then, I remembered that Enhypen did a show called ‘En- o’clock’ (on Youtube or Vlive) in which they do different activities in each episode. In episodes 38 and 39 of ‘En- o’clock,’ they worked as baristas, taking people’s orders, making coffee and waffles and then serving them. The members also did a performance on a music show called Inkigayo and dressed up as different careers. It was then that I decided that I’d dress up as member Sunoo since he wore a barista outfit for the performance.

First things first, I quickly looked up “barista apron” on Amazon and easily came across the same exact apron that Sunoo wore on ‘En- o’clock.’ I also purchased a customized badge with his name on it so people could easily identify which member I was dressing as and to add a sense of authenticity to the outfit. Those were the main things I needed to pull off the outfit and neither of the items cost much at all.

Aside from that, the rest of his outfit was pretty simple to duplicate. He had on a white button down shirt paired with black dress pants and black shoes. The shirt was a simple purchase and I already had the pants, so all that was missing was the shoes.

My friend that was coming to the concert with me had decided that we’d go shopping together to get anything else we needed. I needed to purchase some black formal shoes while she needed white sneakers to complete her outfit. We both made our way to TJ Max, Burlington and Ross and found exactly what we were looking for. Now that we were concert ready, all that was left was to wait until the day finally came.

Arriving early
Although the concert started at 7:30, we arrived at the venue at about 3:45 so we’d have enough time to explore, take pictures, meet new people, and pass out freebies (free mini goodie bags). The moment we walked into the venue’s parking lot we immediately recognized the different concepts of people’s outfits. Some were dressed as fruits (from Enhypens ‘Chamber 5’ dance practice video) and some were dressed as the members from Enhypens iconic ‘Blessed-Cursed’ music video.

First, we saw a dance team dance amazingly to ‘Future perfect (Pass the mic)’ by Enhypen. Not long after we met the creator of the ‘Polaroid love’ Tik Tok dance trend and took a few pictures with him. After we finished exploring the area we not only passed out freebies, but we also got so many in return that within an hour we had to take a trip back to the car to empty our pockets and put away anything we didn’t need. Later, we stood in line for about 30 minutes until it was time to get our tickets scanned.

Setlist
The setlist consisted of songs from all their albums including their song ‘One in Billion,’ which was created for their webtoon ‘DARK MOON.’

The setlist in performance order, is as follows:

Given-Taken, Flicker, Not for Sale, 20 Cube (Let Me In), TFW (That Feeling When), Upper Side Dreamin’, Mixed up, Drunk-Dazed, One in a Billion, Fever, Attention Please, Polaroid Love, Just a Little Bit, Tamed-Dashed, Blessed Cursed, Go Big or Go Home, Pass the Mic, Paradoxxx Invasion, Shout Out, Shout Out (performed a second time)

Here’s a short background of a few of their songs that they performed:

Given-Taken: This was the opening song of the concert and Enhypens’ debut song. It expresses the struggle of young artists that were chosen to debut by fate controlled by the fans votes on their survival show ‘ILAND’

Flicker: This song was first performed by a few of the members on ‘ILAND’ along with another contestant named ‘K’ who is now part of a group called ‘&TEAM.’ At the concert, this song was performed by all seven members of Enhypen.

Not for Sale: Enhypen member Sunoo via NME says, “I relate to the song as it contains a realistic message about the mindset of today’s teenagers. It’s common to think that you need to give in order to receive something in return. This song, however, captures a boy’s change in beliefs at the appearance of someone to whom he wants to give his everything. As Enypen, we always want to return the endless love from our fans through various aspects, including our music and performances.”.

Fever: This song marked the climax of the concert with their extended performance.

Polaroid Love: This song especially melts Engine’s hearts whenever they hear it, as this song was made as a gift to them

Go Big or Go Home: This song helps to express today’s youth of having a mindset of “all or nothing” and believing that eventually they’ll gain something big from having that mindset.

Shout Out: This song was the closing song for the concert. Enhypen member Jake also wrote some of the lyrics to this very meaningful song for Engines.

During/after the concert
Around the ending of the concert during their Polaroid Love performance, all of the members walked to where the audience was to greet them and sing to them. One of the members named Heeseung walked up to my friend and sang her the chorus of the song, making her the first person to get directly sung to, by him, in the United States. That night after the concert, she posted her POV of him singing to her and went viral not long after with 245k+ views, 23.5k+ likes, and 10k+ retweets on Twitter. Her video was also reposted on many social media platforms including TikTok and Youtube.

The members ended their concert later that night with their song Shout in which almost all Engines, otherwise known as Enhypen fans, held up a banner with the phrase “You’re blowing up our hearts” to express their love and appreciation for the group. They then did an encore performance of Shout again and said their goodbyes.