After two and a half years of hiatus following the members' military enlistments, A.C.E (Lee Donghun, Park Junhee, WOW, Kim Byeongkwan, and Kang Yuchan) is finally back to continue walking on the path of constant growth and self-discovery. 

Their sixth mini-album 'My Girl : 'My Choice'' contains deeper music and storytelling that are for sure felt throughout the tracks "My Girl," "Effortless," "Angel," and "Facetime." "We aspire for this album to be musically soothing to listen to. We also wish for it to resonate with many, providing comfort and support through our wotk," said Junhee.

In this album, the members explore the meaning and reasons for their existence, showcasing a new level of resonance. "I believe this album portrays the journey of modern individuals rediscovering their lost selves and embodies their emotions," said Donghun.

Following the album release, all five members sat down with allkpop to delve deeper into what they want to convey with 'My Girl : 'My Choice,'' upcoming tour, and determination to show improvements, and more. Read the full exclusive interview below!

A.C.E shout-out to allkpop readers:

allkpop: Summarize to us how it felt like coming together again after two and a half years and doing all the comeback promotions like what you were doing back then, especially with all the dance challenges with other idols as well!

Byeongkwan: Before we begin answering your questions, I just want to say that we love reading allkpop. We always enjoy it!

Junhee: First of all, we really want to show gratitude to all our fans who have been supporting and waiting for us as this is our comeback after two and a half years. Secondly, we felt very fortunate to be able to come back healthy and promote again as a group. We are very grateful for that opportunity. I think it was a great time and this was a great album to be able to show different charms and new sides of A.C.E. We are very fortunate and excited to be back!

Byeongkwan: About the dance challenges, we really enjoy several challenges with other groups. We really had fun doing those! Also, we like our own “My Girl” dance challenge!

allkpop: Filming with your fans for the music video is definitely a core memory for you and them! How do you think your relationship with your fans developed over the years? Is there anything you’d like to tell your fans?

Junhee: Something that we always know and keep in mind is that ever since we debuted until the very now, we exist as A.C.E because of our fans. And we will always say, ever since we debuted, that our motto is to become a group that always improves and grows. Our fans also grow up with us. I believe that we are improving alongside them. We are in the same team together. With Choice, it’s really meaningful for us. We are thankful that we are able to spend our time together with our fans

allkpop: Who came up with the concept to invite your fans to be in the music video, and how did it become a reality? Are there any fun moments you would like to share with us?

WOW: When we were having a discussion about the album concept and preparation, we had an idea that maybe it would be really cool to have this idea of a flash mob style of a lot of people dancing together with us. And we thought, "Oh, what if we are sharing this experience with our fans?" We thought that it was a really great idea, and that is how it became a reality. When we decided to film this content, we also had this concept with our company for this album: to incorporate our fans into this and have them joined by us at the end of the music video. We were able to teach them the choreography ourselves and we were able to build a lot of happy and good memories with them. Overall, it was a great, great experience with them.

allkpop: The album is about rediscovering lost selves and embodying emotions, and I heard that the members put a lot of ideas into this release. I was wondering how you worked with the different teams so all of you could put in something (emotions, opinions, etc.) to make 'My Girl: 'My Choice'' a very special one since it’s your first in a while?

Junhee: I remember when we got the demo version of the track "My Girl," and then got to listen to it. It’s from a very talented composer Etham and we were able to work with other amazing songwriters and producers as well. Not only for this song but throughout the whole album. We thought that we got really good songs to work on, so it was a very meaningful and honorable experience to be joined by them and work with all the teams. To talk a little bit more about “My Girl,” when you just look at the title of this song, you can simply think about an imaginary girl we’re talking about. And this can be about a love story or whatnot. But it’s more of a figurative expression that the “girl” in “My Girl” can also imply my adventure, journey, goal, or achievement. It can be anything you want in your life that can be substituted as the “girl” in “My Girl.” And when we were recording, we wanted to convey the message of getting away from our everyday pressure - that boring daily life - and just to walking on your path and finding yourself. We wanted to incorporate that idea into the music video as well, that’s why we came up with that concept.

Byeongkwan: To add to what Junhee said, since this album came out after so long as we had an empty period because of our military enlistment, the most important part that we want to achieve is to touch people’s emotions deeply by this album.

allkpop: For this album, you explore the "reasons for existence." Tell us more about that on a personal level as an artist. Or perhaps share with us one line from any of the songs that hit you or resonate with you the most!

Donghun: I would choose the line that goes something like, "You become my light, just for me" as my favorite lyrics. That’s from “Angel.” I think that’s a very meaningful line because we’ve been having our challenges, thoughts, and hardships during the time we were together as a group. But thanks to the light that is our fans, we were able to stay and continue moving forward.

Byeongkwan: Also, I want to add that since we had a hiatus for about two and a half years. Now, we’ve had our time separate from our fans and we’ve been having a lot of thoughts and we’ve had a lot of considerations about us and our fans. I think we really wanted to stress that and convey that message into the whole album ‘My Girl: My Choice.’ Also, the lyrics that really touched my heart would be, “I’ll take you to the place we’ve never been to.” It’s really implying our relationship as a group, as A.C.E, and our fans, CHOICE that we are going to take them anywhere they want. We’re going to show them the new ways and journeys ahead, so that line is really meaningful for me.

allkpop: “My Girl” can have a lot of meanings. One of them can mean finding one’s ego and life goals as you said earlier. First, I wanted to ask you: have you become more aware of your ego? What is something you want the world to see and believe about you as a person and as a member of A.C.E?

Junhee: To simply put, not all people in this world can know about A.C.E but our only goal and what we hope for is to have more people listen to our music and enjoy it. As for the ego that you asked about, we are not 100% sure about ourselves just yet too. We’re on our journey to look for it. We’re still really looking to complete it. We’re able to do that through our experience and the lessons we’ve learned as we grow. We are living this life. The message behind “My Girl” is that we are also the same human beings going through the same questions and thoughts about ourselves too. So, we really want our fans and listeners to resonate with that and to think about what is your ego, what is yourself, and what is your goal in life.

Byeongkwan: To add a little bit about your question, what we want the world to believe in us, is that instead of believing in us as the members, we hope you can have more trust in our performances, talents, and music. That is what we are hoping for.

allkpop: Second, what are your life and career goals right now? I think you already answered this previously but I read in your interview five years ago in 2019 that your biggest goal and wish is to keep showing your improvements. How is it going, now that five years have passed?

Donghun: Yeah, I would say definitely, we are on the very good track of achieving that goal from five years ago. I think we earned more and grew even more as artists from this album too. I think every piece of life that we experience like a lesson or a conversation can help us grow and improve further. Every moment, we are ready to show the best versions of ourselves and we are ready to improve for every part. Our next goal would be definitely getting into the Billboard charts. It would be a great goal that we would like to achieve. Since we made a comeback after a while, we hope to maybe win first place on music shows for the next album we’re preparing.

Yuchan: This is something that hasn't really changed since the beginning of A.C.E. Still, our long-term goal is to become artists that our fans can feel proud of. That would be the ultimate goal that we have for the long run/term.

allkpop: You said that the album contains the message that everyone can't be perfect and that it's possible for us to be in a situation where we don't 100% want to be in. Is there any instance you had a hard time during a situation that's related to either of the two I mentioned? How were you able to overcome the challenges?

Byeongkwan: During those hard times, I used to try to think too much about it, but these days, I try not to do that and get over it by eating something good and having fun times with my members. Just simply not thinking too much about it.

Donghun: As for me, personally, I’ve had the time when I felt like I was behind everyone else. I really wanted to excel and move forward to be better but I felt like I was lacking in my talents, and I thought that I was just running behind everyone else. That used to bug me a lot. That used to give me a lot of stress, but I learned that it’s better for me to just accept all the stress and all the questions. I really think that time is the key. I just have to accept it and wait for a new lesson to come by. I just needed some time to think about it and talk to people around me. I think that really played a key role in solving my questions and problems because we were able to have a positive influence by having discussions and just openly talking about it. I think that’s my takeaway from my experience: to be more open and give yourself a little bit more time to think about it.

allkpop: All three tracks, except "Facetime," have their English versions. What was it like recording the Korean and English versions of the songs?

WOW: We actually got to work on the English tracks first before the Korean versions. We thought that the English tracks were already very nice and we want to carry over that good feeling toward the Korean tracks as well. So, we tried to convey similar emotions and sentiments throughout both of the versions. Of course, it’s got the difference in lyrics and atmosphere, but we really wanted to convey the same good impression that we have received from the demos and we really wanted to carry that over in both versions of the songs.

allkpop: A.C.E is going to embark on a world tour! What is something your fans should expect from it, and are there any routines or rituals your group does before taking the stage?

Junhee: We are embarking on a tour after a while. The last tour that we did was in 2019 so it’s almost been 5 years since then. We have new songs for our new tour. And we want to really convey the new atmosphere and experience to our fans. We are very excited to meet our fans at new venues that we probably never visited before. We don’t have specific routines as a team before going on the stage, but we talk a lot and have a lot of discussions. We joke a lot as well. Something that we always tell each other before going on any stage is, “Don’t get hurt, and let’s just have fun on the stage.” We really want to bring up the tension and energy when we are on stage performing. So, sometimes, as I said, we joke a lot. We try to be as playful as possible to get rid of the tension. Also, we drink a little bit of energy drinks as well!

Yuchan: As our tour title is ‘Rewind Us,’ we really want to bring back the memories back in time with our fans. Fans who have been supporting us for a long time, and think about and rewind our old memories together on top of building new memories together. We just hope everyone to have fun and be able to build new memories on top of that. And so, after the tour, after a really long time, we look back and recollect memories together, we’ll be like, "Oh, yeah! We had a lot of fun, and it was such a happy memory to be able to see A.C.E performing during that tour."

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