BOL4's Agency Issues Statement After Meeting With Politician; Confirms No Involvement In Chart Manipulation

BOL4’s agency has announced that they met with The People’s Party candidate Kim Geun Tae and confirmed with him that the agency and its artist were not involved in music chart manipulation.

Kim Geun Tae held a press conference on April 8 in which he accused the marketing company Creativer of illegally acquiring and misusing regular citizens’ online accounts in order to manipulate music charts. The names of 10 artists including BOL4 were mentioned in the conference and their agencies have denied the claims of a connection to chart manipulation, and many have said they will be taking legal action.

On April 16, BOL4’s agency Shofar Music put out a statement in which they wrote that the company had never heard of Creativer and they demanded more information and clear proof from Kim Geun Tae about his accusations. They asked for a formal apology if he is unable to provide proof of their company’s artists being involved in chart manipulation.

The agency then released a statement on April 21 explaining that after meeting with Kim Geun Tae, they confirmed that the chart manipulation he had been referring to was for an OST that BOL4 had only sung. They therefore had no relation to the marketing of the song, and the copyright and rights to profit all belong to the drama OST production company and not the artist.

Read their statement below:

Hello, this is Shofar Music.

Yesterday (April 20), we met with The People’s Party candidate Kim Geun Tae.

Candidate Kim had put forth a certain OST sung by BOL4 as proof of music chart manipulation. Our artist had taken part in this OST after receiving a casting offer, and so both our company and our artist have absolutely no neighboring rights [rights of musicians to receive payment for the broadcast/performance of their recordings], ownership to the masters, or rights to the promotion or marketing of the song. Therefore we mutually confirmed clearly that our company has no relation to music chart manipulation.

Candidate Kim then expressed his regret over how his press conference, which was intended to expose the manipulation committed by the under-marketing company, had been conveyed in the media mistakenly as though the artist’s side was responsible for the manipulation.

We once again state earnestly that not only have our company and artists never attempted music chart manipulation of any kind or requested it, we also have never met with or contacted a company that carries out music chart manipulation, and we are not at all connected to them.

We no longer plan to carry out the legal measures of civil and criminal suits against Candidate Kim. Following this official statement as well, we will be taking strong legal action against thoughtless malicious comments and slanderous posts through continued monitoring and the collection of tips, for the sake of our artist’s protection.

Thank you.

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