White Entertainment releases Tiffany Taeyeon Tribute Album

Earlier this month it was announced that White Entertainment will be releasing an official Tiffany Taeyeon tribute album to raise money to fund the search for the missing singer. The move comes after the government's controversial decision to scale back their search & rescue efforts after two months of fruitless investigations.

The album has been met with an explosive reception since its announcement, registering over 60,000 pre-orders from fans hoping to help find Tiffany, who is rumored to be trapped on a mysterious island somewhere in the Bermuda Triangle.

TTYL: Tiffany Taeyeon Tribute Album was officially released at Midnight last night, with all the tracks rising to the top of Korea's digital real-time charts almost instantly.

Download: TTYL

"Tiffany loved to hog the spotlight," jokes Suzy. 

The album, which was executive-produced by Suzy Sooyoung and Trina Villota, has become a hot issue in Korea due to its tracklisting, which features every artist under the White Entertainment umbrella, including KRS Media's new rookie acts Wi-Fi and White Dolls. According to Trina, each artist has contributed their own unique charms and colors to the 11-track album, making it a collection that it is able to surpass even Busker Busker and LeeSsang in terms of quality.

As a bonus, TTYL contains audio snippets of Tiffany's final interview, recorded two days before her disappearance, as well as the first song she ever recorded. The song, an unmastered demo called "Can't Do It Without You", was recorded when Tiffany was a teenager signed to Open World Entertainment, right before she fled the agency under mysterious circumstances. The acoustic midtempo is about being unable to cope without somebody, and fans are already calling it a prophetic omen that foretold Tiffany's disappearance years in advance. Due to the eerily accurate lyrics, the emotional track is already being compared to Aaliyah's swan song "Miss You", with many critics claiming that it's even better than the classic Aaliyah hit.

Fans have been especially eager to hear what Tiffany's Girls' Revolution bandmates would add to TTYL, as they were the ones who knew the famous idol best. Suzy Sooyoung performs two self-written songs on the album, a K-Indie acoustic number called "Never Forget You" which expresses her raw emotions and alternative music style, and a midempo track called "Too Young to Die (...Too Drunk to Live)" which was recorded in the genre of retro synth-pop and contains lyrics about Tiffany's fast-paced lifestyle.

"They fought like sisters," says Spires

Tiffany's Heathers unit partner Jessica Jiyeon experimented with underground rock music for her contribution "Save You", which she described as a personal letter to Tiffany that is told through song. With lyrics like, "I didn't mean to leave you stranded / I went away because I didn't want to face the truth", fans are calling it Jessica's most meaningful song to date. Additionally, with the rumors of constant in-fighting within Heathers and Girls' Revolution, many fans are also speculating that the song serves as an unofficial apology from Jessica to Tiffany that relates to their tumultuous friendship.

"Tiffany featured on my debut song,"
remembers HyunA Knowles.

But the most powerful song from the Girls' Revolution members has to be HyunA Knowles' "Starlight Tears", which is said to make anybody who listens to it start crying. The delicate piano ballad contains a fragile vocal performance from HyunA, who expresses her desire to escape the worldly pain of Tiffany's disappearance by flying to the Milky Way to release her tears amongst the stars, where she vows to remain until her unni is returned safely.

Outside of Girls' Revolution, rookie boy band Wi-Fi reveal their secret feelings for Tiffany through "Everlasting Love", which is about loving a beautiful sunbae who is already in a relationship. According to KRS Media, "Everlasting Love" is more emotional than any 2AM title track, and is expected to help Wi-Fi become one of Korea's top-tier groups.

Fellow KRS rookies White Dolls also performed a song of their own, an acoustic ballad titled "The Day You Went Away". The trio also feature as backing vocalists for KRS Media's CEO KellyRose Spires, who makes her singing debut with a cover of the Alicia Keys classic "Fallin'". KellyRose's cover is said to contain a very unique vocal performance and style that has never been heard in Korea before.

Hyomin in the studio writing "Come Back"

Superstar girl group T-ara serve as the only non-White artist to feature on TTYL. They were reportedly contacted by Suzy to contribute to the album due to their close friendship with Tiffany, as well as for their current popularity, which Suzy told Naver News she hoped would gain extra publicity for the album. T-ara have two songs on TTYL, including the dance-rap track "Come Back", which was reportedly written and produced by Hyomin and is being billed as the spiritual successor to T-ara's iconic hit "Time to Love".

The final song on TTYL is the powerful "Free The World (White Family United)". The socially-conscious anthem is led by Trina Villota, who is backed up by a harmonious choir of the entire White Entertainment and KRS Media family. The entire song was written and produced in-house at White Entertainment, with contributions from every artist on the roster. Rather than focusing on the negativity around Tiffany's disappearance, "Free The World" has a much broader and more positive approach, with lyrics about stopping war and putting an end to world hunger.

With TTYL already selling out in stores, netizens have had plenty of time to share their feedback on our forums. Comments include: "This is definitely the album of the year. It's real music and not that typical manufactured K-Pop crap," "TTYL sounds really cheap and rushed. I want to get a refund but can't return it because it was a gift," "The digital booklet is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. Tiffany so stunning ^_^", "White Entertainment definitely has the most talented idols in the industry, but I can't say the same about the CEOs..." and "HyunA's "Starlight Tears" made me cry. I hope it wins Triple Crown."