ARTISTS TO LISTEN TO FOR ASIAN HERITAGE MONTH (AND ALL YEAR ROUND) PT. 4
BY BRENESSA ROACH | MAY 11, 2024
Happy Asian Heritage Heritage Month! In last week’s blog, we shared six talented Asian-American and Asian-Canadian artists. We are back again this week with another six talented Asian-American and Asian-Canadian artists.
As mentioned last week, as a Canadian-based organization owned and operated by an individual of Asian descent, Behind The Beat takes pride in shining a spotlight on and providing support for Asian artists. We now have a part 1, part 2 and part 3 of this blog series, so make sure to check those out as well.
JHIN is a South Korean-American Indie-Pop artist born and raised in Chicago, Illinois. He currently has around 1.1 million listeners on Spotify alone. He debuted on May 27th, 2022 with the single “Crush on My Tutor” followed by “You Would” on November 11th, 2022. “You Would” is his second most popular song with over 1.3 million streams on Spotify.
On August 25th, 2023, JHIN released the single “Blue Butterflies” which was the first song we ever heard of his. It’s also the song that made him gain a lot of attention as it has garnered over 24.6 million streams on Spotify alone. His latest release “Airplanes” is from November 2023.
Currently, JHIN is coming out with his first single of 2024 on May 24th titled “Anymore”. Make sure you pre-save the song. Additionally, JHIN is the opening act for 8 cities on slchld’s “Apology” North American tour.
Listen to “Blue Butterflies” by JHIN on Spotify:
Check out JHIN on Instagram: @jhinthekid
HOHYUN is a South Korean-American R&B/Pop artist from Los Angeles with around 281K listeners on Spotify. He debuted on November 9th, 2018 with the single “Just Wanna Stay”.
He released “I Don’t Mind” on January 31st, 2019, followed by “A.I.E.O.U” in April. Both these releases were pre-release tracks for his debut EP Stage Fright which came out on October 18th, 2019. He started 2020 off with the release of “Never Came Through” in April. This song garnered over 1.4 million streams. HOHYUN then released 4 more singles in 2020; “Losing You” in July, “Pick Me” in August, “Takes My Breath” in September and “Karaoke Night” in October.
On July 20th, 2021, HOHYUN released his second EP Dreams. O March 31st, 2022, HOHYUN released the single “SUNSET BOULEVARD” which is the first song I ever listened to from his discography back when it came out. This song is also his most popular song with over 10 million streams on Spotify. Releasing a few more songs throughout 2022, HOHYUN started to gain more listeners and fans. He ended 2022 off with the release of “Those Three Words” in December. This song garnered over 1 million streams as well.
ON January 31st, 2023, HOHYUN released the single “I Don’t Wanna Fall in Love” which is one of our favourite songs. Another one of our favourite songs is “i can’t escape the rain” which came out on April 28th, 2023.
So far in 2024, HOHYUN started the year off with the single “Not Complicated” which came out on February 5th. This was in collaboration with Sonny Zero. On March 15th, 2024, HOHYUN released his first album DRAMA.. He is actually having his first headline show following the album on June 18th in LA so, get tickets here if you can.
His latest release “Clouds” is from April 5th and it’s in collaboration with LambC.
Listen to “i can’t escape the rain” by HOHYUN on Spotify:
Check out HOHYUN on Instagram: @itshohyun
Aiko Tomi is a Japanese-Taiwanese and Canadian alt-pop singer and songwriter from Toronto with 590 listeners on Spotify. She released her first single “Lotto” on May 4th, 2020 which is her most popular song of almost 11K streams on Spotify. Followed by her debut, she released “Can’t Touch Me” in January 2021.
Both of these singles were included on her debut EP For the Love which came out on March 26th, 2021. After her debut, she released two more singles in 2021; “Salty” in April and “Otherside” in June.
Aiko started 2022 off with the release of “Animal’s Awake” on May 13th, followed by “Handful” on September 22nd. In October, she released “Fit” and ended the year off with a triple single EP Mute Me in November. Mute Me includes the single “Mute Me”, “Handful” and “Gladly”.
ON March 24th, 2023, she released the single “Dragonfire” which was a pre-release track for her debut album Animal’s Awake which came out on June 30th, 2023.
So far for 2024, Aiko Tomi released “Some Lights Need To Be Dimmed” on March 29th. This is her latest release and the first song we listened to of hers. Currently, Aiko has been in Taiwain performing at a few local shows. Additionally, she is set to perform at NXNE (North by North East) in Toronto on June 13th.
Listen to “Some Lights Need To Be Dimmed”. by Aiko Tomi on Spotify:
Check out Aiko Tomi on Instagram: @aikotomic
Kheeno is a Filipino-American R&B artist from Orlando, Florida with 18.6K monthly listeners on Spotify. He debuted on April 23rd, 2022 with the single “Felon’s Fault” which is his most popular song wth 187.1K streams on Spotify. Followed by his debut, he released “Far Far Away” on April 27th, “Inside” on June 8th and “Out There” on September 27th.
Kheeno started 2023 off with the release of “Tether” on January 24th. In October, he collaborated with Y.D. for the single “a cöver perhaps?”. His last release of the year was on November 23rd for a triple single EP Interludes Only. The EP includes the songs; “relapse / abstinence”, “delusion / the fall” and “leave”.
So far for 2024, Kheeno recently released the single “Keep Me Company” on April 4th. This is the song that got us to discover Kheeno, thanks to him submitting to our form.
Listen to “Keep Me Company” by Kheeno on Spotify:
Check out Kheeno on Instagram: @iamkheeno
James Han, also known by his artist name Uzuhan is a Korean-American rapper and songwriter based in Los Angeles. He currently has 39.3K monthly listeners on Spotify. He debuted on March 3rd, 2013 with his debut EP Art of Starch. Followed by his debut, he released his first album *Rejoice* on February 22nd, 2024.
He has been active since his debut, but his release “God Be My Witness” from February 2019 is when he started gaining traction. This song has over 1.3 million streams on Spotify – making it his most popular song.
Since his career started, he has released over 6 Albums and 6 EPs. We discovered him this year with the release of his EP End on January 12th, 2024. In February, he released the EP *Flirty Friends* followed by another EP Who I Was in March. The single “Who I Was” is one of our favourite songs of Uzuhan’s.
His latest release is from April 26th and it was for his 6th album End Of An Error.
Listen to “Who I Was” by Uzuhan on Spotify:
Check out Uzuhan on Instagram: @uzuhanmusic
Neela is an Indian-Canadian R&B/Pop singer from Vancouver, Canada with 1.3K monthly listeners. She debuted on July 27th, 2018 with her debut EP *Lovers in Danger.* After he debut, she didn’t release anything until March 3rd, 2021 when she released her single “Can’t Let You Take”. Followed by that single, she released “Let It Down” in July and “Easy on You” in September.
On May 25th, 2022, she released the single “Tease” which is her most popular single with almost 49K streams. She then released “Exposed” on September 9th – which was her last release of the year.
In 2023, she released one single “You’ll Never Know” in March. All of her releases from 2022 and 2023 were pre-release tracks for her debut album Exposed which is her latest release from April 11th.
Listen to “Tease” by Neela on Spotify:
Check out neela on Instagram: @neelamusic
Check out our “ARTISTS TO LISTEN TO FOR ASIAN HERITAGE MONTH” Spotify Playlist:
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