K-Pop: Demon Hunters film tells the story of two very different k-pop groups. Huntr/x is a girl group that fights demons and Saja Boys is a boy group whose singers really are demons. The animated film debuted in June and quickly reached the number one spot on the Netflix global movie charts. Songs performed by the film’s fictional idol groups ascended the music charts, outpacing songs by actual k-pop groups. Yet despite the film’s focus on k-pop idols there’s only one actual k-pop idol singing on the film’s soundtrack. Kevin Woo, who voices the cute-but-demonic Mystery Saja, performed with the k-pop band U-Kiss for almost a decade.
The American singer-songwriter and actor is known to his fans simply as Kevin. He grew up in California and he was only 15 when he moved to South Korea to pursue his dream.
“Growing up there as an Asian American boy I didn’t see myself in the media,” said Kevin. “I’ve always had a huge dream of becoming a singer, a performer. I thought about going to Korea and I was deeply obsessed with Korean music. It wasn’t even titled k-pop then, it was just Korean music. Because of my love for the music, I had this yearning to go to my motherland and start my career there. For a little kid at the age of 15, it was a huge step for me to go from the U.S. to Korea, where mostly Korean music was dominated by Korean people.”
Kevin joined the band XING, before signing on with the six-member boy band U-Kiss, which debuted in 2008. He performed with U-Kiss until 2017 and also hosted the interactive music talk show After School Club.
“I did my whole run in my boy band U-Kiss, which was an amazing journey,” said Kevin. “It was one of the most thrilling journeys of my career to be a part of this k-pop international idol group. After I departed from the group I really wanted to expand my horizons. I’ve always had the dream to perform in my home country, the U.S. That’s what brought me to LA.”
ince his return to the U.S. he’s taken part in several k-pop-related projects. Before voicing Mystery Saja, he made his Broadway debut in the musical KPOP, the “first ever Korean story to be told on Broadway,” and acted in Anderson .Paak’s soon-to-be-released film K-POPS. Representing k-pop and Korean culture as part of KPOP made him proud to be Korean American. More proud moments would follow as he watched k-pop grow into a global phenomenon and saw Korean content succeed in film, on TV and in musicals. Another career and cultural milestone was performing in the Tony award-winning musical Maybe Happy Ending when it opened in Tokyo.
“That too was a huge milestone for Korean productions,” said Kevin. “Maybe Happy Ending is a Korean story. It was written by a Korean writer and it was a Korean production. And now to see that on Broadway is so incredible.”
Kevin also plays a pop star in KPOPS, the directorial debut of singer, songwriter and record producer Anderson .Paak.
“KPOPS premiered at the Toronto International Film Festival in 2024,” said Kevin. ‘It made its U.S. premiere in Tribeca. This movie will hit theaters in January and, yeah, Anderson .Paak made a film kind of about his life. It’s a fictional story, but a lot of the events that happened in the movie mirror his life story and his real life son acts alongside him.”
In KPOPS his character participates in a competition show. Anderson .Paak’s character is a drummer in the same competition.
“It’s a family friendly comedy movie that’s about bridging cultures,” said Kevin. “This one is cross-cultural about bridging black culture and Korean culture with music. The whole theme is about love and family and really finding your journey as an individual. So, even if you’re not a k-pop fan, there’s so many different themes that audiences can resonate with. It was a big hit at both TIFF and Tribeca.”
He was very surprised when Ian Eisendrath, the executive music producer of K-Pop: Demon Hunters, reached out to him for his musical input.
“I was beyond thrilled that Ian reached out,” said Kevin. “He said, do you want to be one of the members as a singing voice for this fictional boy band called Saja Boys? I didn’t know too much about the script. I hadn’t had the chance to read the screenplay, but I immediately knew this was the right fit for me. I was like ‘demon boy band and k-pop,’ I’m in. He sent over the songs ‘Soda Pop’ and ‘Your Idol.’ Ian wanted to hear my feedback on what I felt about it as a k-pop idol.”
On hearing the songs Kevin knew he wanted to perform them. The music has every element of what he loves about k-pop.
‘It was so nostalgic too because it brought back a lot of the memories that I had in U-Kiss,” he said. “All the little nuances that I have firsthand experience with, it was all incorporated into these two songs. It really perfectly portrayed why k-pop is so beloved around the world. You got a little bit of the sweetness, the innocent, pure boy band with ‘Soda Pop’ and then you have ‘Your Idol,’ where it’s like a 180-degree drastically different energy and vibe. That brought me back to the idols that I grew up listening to,”
It was a unique experience watching himself as an animated character. It was also his first time working as a voice actor, except for a short stint where he played a boy band member in the Apple TV series Central Park.
‘This was a different take on the process of recording because I got to see the characters and I had to really get into character for Mystery Saja,” he said. “But seeing the sketch of the characters, I was like, oh my God, this is so incredibly cute. Also, I just love how each member had their own unique characteristics.”
As part of the fictional Saja Boys his visibility rose dramatically.
“Once I saw my name on the Hot 100 Billboard chart this week, I had chills all over my body. I couldn’t believe it when I woke up, because first of all, before the song hit the charts on Billboard, Spotify, iTunes, across all boards of every chart, not even in the US, but globally, I saw my Spotify monthly listeners grow from 10,000 to one million overnight.”
The Spotify alert was hard to process. He double checked the screen to make sure it was the right number.
“I got an alert saying your growth is a thousand percent. I’m like, what does that even mean? I looked into my artist page and saw one million followers overnight, and I was like, what is happening? Because I believed in this soundtrack, I already knew this was going to be a hit, but I didn’t know it was going to be instant, viral.”
Saja Boys recently made music history by becoming the first male k-pop group to hit number one on U.S. Spotify.
“I’ve been hearing from my friends and my family just constantly notifying me that my songs Soda Pop and Your Idol are rising on the charts,” he said. It’s just been an incredible wild ride. I can’t really explain in words how I feel. It’s quite surreal.”
He’s happy to play a part in the success of Korean culture.
“It’s an honor and a privilege for me to represent k-pop in the western world.”
What’s next? Kevin’s short film Seoul Switch about a dork and a k-pop idol who trade places is currently being developed into a full-length film. He recently released a selection of new music and also plays the male lead role in the horror film Death Name, set to come out later this year. Given the success of K-Pop: Demon Hunters, anything is possible.
K-Pop: Demon Hunters airs on Netflix.
This story was originally published on forbes.com.