With Dusting ‘Em Off, Consequence looks back at classic albums, films, and television series and reassess their legacies years later. Today, Tablo of Epik High sits down for an interview about Map of the Human Soul 20 years after its release on October 21st, 2003.
Tablo is ready to set the record straight. Part of this story might be familiar already — the talkative and charismatic frontman of seminal South Korean hip-hop trio Epik High seems to love sharing it, and understandably so. When RM of BTS reached out about a track on his stellar solo album, Indigo, Tablo said yes before hearing any of the song. “I told him I didn’t need to,” he recalls, chatting with Consequence over Zoom from his home in Seoul. “Of course it was good.”
He received a cut of the in-progress track moments before boarding a flight and spent the entire plane ride wondering how it might sound. “I was imagining something dark or hard-hitting and emotional,” he says. “I get to Singapore and hear the song and it’s an energetic and feel-good vibe. It’s exactly the energy I needed at the time.”
He sent back a voice memo of his verse from the bathroom. The resulting song, “All Day,” is one of many highlights on the final version of the album: Tablo makes a nod to BTS’s discography — “We’ve got dynamite in our DNA” — and RM pays homage to Epik High’s “Fly” in the lyrics of his last verse.
Here’s what people don’t know. “I’m singing with him at the end,” Tablo explains emphatically. “You can’t tell that I’m singing with him! I told him, ‘Dude, I can’t hear me at all. I sang the part you told me to sing.'” He shakes his head, laughing. “Nobody knows I’m singing with him!” Don’t worry, Tablo. The people know now.
RM is only one of the many, many artists out of South Korea who would point to Tablo and Epik High (rounded out by co-lyricist Mithra Jin and co-producer DJ Tukutz) as deeply formative figures in their respective artistic journeys. RM’s own bandmate, Suga, has been similarly vocal on that point, alongside Epik High collaborators like CL, Wonstein, pH-1, Colde, and Younha. This year, 2023, sees the group releasing a new EP, Strawberry. It also marks 20 years since the trio’s debut album, Map of the Human Soul.
“It doesn’t even make sense,” Tablo says of the milestone. “One of my daughter’s friends heard that I’ve been doing this for 20 years and asked, ‘You started when you were 10?’ I’m not that young, kid.”
