The Road To Glory [EN]: Chapter 431

The Tide of Glory – Episode 43

# 43 I AM HALO

‘Racism’ is, simply put, discriminatory behavior that consciously or unconsciously shows exclusive thoughts or prejudices towards a specific race.

Racism, which took shape around the 18th and 19th centuries, faced a setback in the modern era of the 20th century.

With the civil rights movement and increased awareness of human rights, racism was legally prohibited and sanctioned in all social and economic aspects.

Of course, racism still existed. It disappeared from public places because it could be punished, but it was impossible to completely erase the deep traces it had left in people’s minds for so long.

The 21st century has become more advanced.

Beyond just being legally punished for racism, it became a social issue and was criticized by the public.

Like this.

└He is also white:)

And he’s white:)

(Dislikes 1024)

However, what bothered Halo was not just that the comment was malicious. If that were the case, he would have ignored it since he was already getting hate.

What was unpleasant was simply.

“Are you trying to sort me by race?”

That was the issue.

If the intention of the person who left this comment was to cause trouble, it was a great attempt. Even Halo was paying attention.

He took down the comment.

Most people criticized it as racist, and some argued that he might be Black or another race. Others said it didn’t matter what race he was.

Some people subtly agreed with the comment.

The fact that there were dozens of ‘likes’ meant they agreed, unless it was high-level sarcasm.

Moreover, they argued that it wasn’t about racism but about inferring ‘his’ identity, and they defended the writer by saying that if he uses a posh accent in Britpop [British popular music], who else could he be but British.

Halo rested his chin on his hand.

Even if he were reborn countless times,

Whether his form was white, Black, or anything else,

Even if he were a blue-skinned alien who could wipe out enemies with a whistle,

He was confident that he could create the music they loved.

If so.

If you love his music,

Shouldn’t you love him no matter what he is?

Halo wondered if he was more concerned because he had become Nohaeil and was no longer white.

If he had his original body, would ‘Halo’ have seen the same comment and brushed it off?

“No.”

Halo immediately retorted.

If someone told him he was successful because he was white, he would argue.

And he would have said this.

Whether I’m white or a stray dog on the street,

I would have become like this.

Instead of deleting the comment he didn’t like, Halo wrote a reply for the first time.

It was his first communication since creating the channel.

Halo didn’t attach great significance to his first or second communication.

He vaguely recalled that his former manager would have told him not to react to such minor disputes.

But didn’t he tell me not to do it back then?

Following that, Halo turned off YouTube and opened his MIDI [Musical Instrument Digital Interface, a technical standard that describes a communications protocol].

The half-finished third album is visible.

He tapped the desk and opened a new folder.

He hadn’t intended to, but he thought it wouldn’t be bad to add one more.

Twenty-one years old.

There is a single album released shortly after the third album.

Halo raised the corners of his mouth, saying it would be fun.

A word to those who talk about him.

[I am HALO]

#

Halo’s third album was quite divisive.

If the first album was divisive due to excessive emotions and a rebellious concept, the third album consisted of experimental songs using sessions he had never used before. The atmosphere of the songs themselves was gloomy or bizarre, and some people avoided it, saying it made them feel depressed.

Due to these mixed reactions, his third album experienced sluggish growth in the beginning.

At this time, many words were exchanged.

One-hit wonder – although he was successful up to the second album – he’s past his prime, he’s used up all his luck, just do what you used to do, etc. Even though he eventually won first place a week later, the talk continued for quite a while.

Moreover, some people tried to dig into the reasons for Halo’s past popularity.

The word ‘luck’ was so common that it was barely audible, and there was a lot of talk about his appearance.

If his face was slightly distorted, no one would buy the album, such words that were hard to tell whether they were praise or criticism.

And one more thing.

Someone pointed out his posh accent.

It was nonsense that he stimulated people’s admiration with the pronunciation of the elite class.

‘I am HALO’ was created by collecting such words.

He told the story they pointed out like a minstrel or like the beginning of a musical.

He didn’t put in many melodies. The main point was the lyrics.

He spoke as if he were talking with a posh accent, then introduced himself with a Cockney accent [a working-class London accent].

As if to say, doesn’t this suit me too?

Also, he satirized the rumors about him, responded to jokes with jokes, and sang about him in someone’s imagination.

In fact, this song did not do very well in Halo’s discography. His fans seemed to like it, saying it was fun, but some were angry, asking if he was being sarcastic, and some were sad, asking why he wrote the lyrics in this way with a good melody.

Above all, it was not played on TV and radio due to the level of content.

Still, Halo liked this song.

Aside from the reason that he had never been ashamed of his music, this music was meaningful to him.

He shook off the unknown gloom that was generally present in the third album because of this song.

He giggled and wrote lyrics by collecting rumors about himself, and his manager looked at his actions like a madman.

Halo was satisfied enough with his fans who enjoyed listening to this song – seeing their words in the lyrics – and the ‘friends’ whose faces turned red.

He laughed for a month.

Someone said it was a strange shape,

Not beautiful at all

Or not like you

But Halo liked this song.

I think it was the song I wrote most excitedly without thinking.

However, the atmosphere is quite different between then and now.

Back then, it was ‘You became famous because you are like this or not like this,’ but now it was ‘You must be like this,’ which contained affection and interest.

Halo wanted to tell them that no matter what I look like, you will like me.

I hope everyone has fun.

Halo sang about himself.

Whoever I am

Whatever I look like

You will call me glory.

That sentence remained deeply in my head.

#

The suspicious article on the [Who is HALO] blog about music manipulation was published by yellow journalism [sensationalist or biased reporting], but as a result, it was deleted due to Veil’s strong legal response.

The small internet media company did not think of winning against Veil, which had the large record label August behind it.

Caroline thought it ended more blandly than expected.

In fact, it is said that the media company’s phone was already in chaos before Veil stepped in directly.

‘His’ fans, although not yet worldwide, were as persistent as a pseudo-religion that had sprung up in a corner of a country.

The blogger who wrote the original article had also been hit hard and had run away long ago. Following the deletion of the article, the blog was also made private.

They only lost money and, conversely, only provided noise marketing for ‘him.’ There was no need to send ‘him’ a message not to worry.

It was at that time.

“···!”

Caroline, who was monitoring his YouTube channel with the order to pay more attention to ‘him’ and with personal fan sentiment, was startled. The YouTube channel was once again submerged in chaos.

It wasn’t just a commotion…

She soon found out the cause.

‘He’ posted a message on his YouTube channel for the first time.

Not in the community, but in the comments of the last song on his second album.

This was because he had pinned a comment that was typically likely to be controversial.

And he gave the ‘response’ that his fans – I don’t know if the cute title of fan is correct – had been hoping for.

[Don’t you like me if I’m not white?]

First of all, Caroline was relieved that ‘he’ did not agree with the controversial article. This was because there were occasionally artists in Veil who caused controversy in such issues.

Rather, it was a good rebuttal.

It was an attitude that led the atmosphere itself gently and accurately refuted the discriminatory tone.

It seemed that a similar nuance would not come out on his channel in the future.

Of course, the people who still believed he was white had not disappeared. His words were somewhat ambiguous and could be interpreted in multiple ways. It could be interpreted as he was not really white, or it could be interpreted as, ‘Don’t you like me without the modifier ‘white’?’

In the end, they still had no clues to infer his identity.

Caroline read the comments under ‘his’ response.

A group that likes that the real person has appeared

A group that asks him questions with specific names

Some people who swear at the annoying comments.

Above all, even fans who felt angry that his first response was to a racist.

She ends the monitoring, saying it’s always the same Halo universe.

Then, what she has to do is analyze the trend.

“Billboard top… It’ll be difficult, right?”

Halo’s song is good, but if it automatically goes to number one just because it’s good, all companies wouldn’t be struggling to make it to Billboard number one.

Billboard is not determined solely by ‘the song is good.’

A good song is one of the conditions that can make it to Billboard number one. Billboard is more complicated than you think, requires luck, and has a lot to worry about. In that respect, his current album started at a disadvantage.

First of all, unlike other competing works, his album was formally disadvantageous. Other albums have music videos, album covers, and other basic things that exist in his album. Those things don’t determine the ranking of the song, but there is a big difference between having them and not having them.

In addition, his album is only available as a digital sound source. Streaming, YouTube, and digital streaming are included in Billboard, but physical album sales cannot be ignored.

Of course, there are musicians who have reached number one on Billboard with only digital albums without physical albums. I knew that a group that led the heyday of K-pop [Korean popular music] also achieved number one on Billboard Hot with a digital album, and there were others as well.

However, they are world-renowned musicians and the scale of their fandom is globally unique.

Lastly, ‘he’ is a ‘rookie(?)’ who has just begun to be known. There have been examples of rookies reaching number one on Billboard, but most of them have made their names and faces known in the media. Radio airplay accounts for a significant portion of Billboard, so I was worried whether radio DJs would listen to the music of a singer whose face is not known even once.

It only takes one listen.

It seemed quite difficult for ‘him,’ an faceless singer, a rookie, with no physical album, and with a classic sound quality, to reach number one.

Then, the cloud rang.

Veil connects to the cloud that best preserves the sound source for each artist, and the newly uploaded file among them came from ‘him,’ which Caroline had been watching all along.

“Oh my.”

Caroline’s hands trembled.

Then, she contacted August Veil and carefully took out her headphones.

The anxiety about Billboard subsides.

The artist doesn’t care about the upcoming high ground, so I wondered what she was doing.

Strangely, there was a vague expectation that it would work out.

A sound rings in my head.

[Who is HALO?]

When someone asks,

Halo replied.

I’m Halo.