Balming Tiger joined NME backstage at Reading 2025 to discuss their love of the UK and working with ATARASHII GAKKO! and IU. Watch the full interview above or read it below.
The “alternative K-pop” group performed on Reading’s Festival Republic stage yesterday (August 24), marking their debut appearance at the festival. The band are only the second Korean act to perform at Reading & Leeds, following Peggy Gou’s set in 2023.
“It’s a very iconic, cultural festival,” Omega Sapien told NME, while Sogumm added it was “very good to be here”.
The festival dates come as part of Balming Tiger’s World Expo Tour 2025, which has already seen them perform at Japan’s Fuji Rock Festival, South Korea’s Pentaport Festival, Ulaanbaatar’s Playtime Festival, and more. As part of the run, they will also headline London’s KOKO on Tuesday (August 26).
“Tour has been great,” Omega Sapien said. “We’ve been talking a lot about our first-ever UK tour, which was in 2022, and we went to Manchester, Birmingham, Leeds, Bristol… Brighton, and many, many different cities. We were a very small crew, so it was four of us and our tour manager in a van, and we’d perform in front of 20, 30 people.
“That’s one of our actual tours that we did outside of Korea. So the UK holds a lot of memory within us, a lot of good memories. So, yeah, good to be back. The team is much bigger. We’re at Reading & Leeds now, interviewing with NME – it’s amazing.”
He added: “The UK has always been showing a lot of love for us. It’s a special, special place for us, and luckily, we met a lot of good people from here who work with us, so it’s beautiful.”
“Balming Tiger couldn’t even tour in Korea at that time, but we actually ended up touring in the UK instead,” Sogumm continued. “Through that experience in the UK, I learned so much. It allowed us to grow, and I think that was a really special experience for Balming Tiger that helped us develop with a unique edge. Now that we’re back and performing at Reading & Leeds festival, I think it’s really special and I’m super excited.”
Alongside touring, Balming Tiger have shared a handful of releases so far in 2025, including ‘Narani Narani’, a collaboration with Japanese group ATARASHII GAKKO!, in June. “We always thought ATARASHII GAKKO! were a super cool band, and I guess they thought of us likewise,” Omega Sapien said of why they wanted to work with the group. “They’re unapologetically showing off their culture, just like Balming Tiger – no apologies, right? So I think that’s the connection, even before we started talking.
“In a video [interview], ATARASHII GAKKO! was saying, ‘Oh, which artist would you like to collab with?’ and they said Balming Tiger. So I think it was us frantically sending an email [like], ‘OK, I saw the video. I screenshotted it here.’ They’re great, great people, and the project was fun. I remember going to their studio in Japan, and they were showing us DVD clips of their tour, and they’re playing in massive stadiums. I was like, ‘Wow, they’re a big deal.’ It was a big opportunity for us.”
In May, Balming Tiger also appeared on K-pop icon IU’s ‘A Flower Bookmark, Pt.3’ EP, on which the singer reinterpreted classic Korean songs. The group worked on a version of Shin Jung-hyun And The Yupjuns’ 1974 track ‘A Beautiful Person’.
“It was a good time. We made a lot of versions – maybe three or four,” BJ Wnjn said. “The original artist is someone I really like, so I found it really interesting to work on. But my [version] was not selected.”
“Shin Jung-hyun is the Korean GOAT. He’s a psychedelic rock legend, and Wnjn is a big fan of him, so he worked really hard to make it good, to show respect to his idol,” Omega Sapien explained. “But there’s another producer called Unsinkable and his version got selected, not [Wnjn’s].”
Sogumm wrote new lyrics for a section of the cover, which she called “a big challenge”. “He tries to put his Korean soul into his psychedelic rock sound – that’s why I really respect him, because I want to put my Korean soul into my music too,” she said. “It was a real honour to remake this song.
“I didn’t expect to be allowed to [write a new part]. I challenged myself without knowing I’d be permitted, so I was really happy when I got the green light. It was such a fun challenge.”
Balming Tiger are currently working on more new music, on which Omega Sapien said they were “trying many new things”. “We have a lot of talent in Balming Tiger, so it’s just a matter of how much condensation we can have as a unified team with a unified vision,” he said. “If all this talent comes together into one string of light, I think it’s gonna be really big.”
Mudd The Student added: “Our first album, ‘January Never Dies’, is, for me, a pretty good album, I think. But the important thing [isn’t our] individual power, [but] Balming Tiger’s power. We have to solve the problem, and we have to talk to each other deeply. I think the unique power that only Balming Tiger has is really important.”
“Making music is my favourite thing, so I just do things the way I’ve always done them,” BJ Wnjn said of his approach, while Sogumm added that the group “keep learning how to express Balming Tiger’s own energy”.
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