It’s Her Moment: EJAE’s Growing Solo Career
Photos: Spotify
At the 2026 Grammy Awards on February 1, K-Pop brought its largest showing yet. BLACKPINK’s Rosé, KATSEYE, and the singers behind KPop Demon Hunters’s HUNTR/X—EJAE, AUDREY NUNA, and rei ami—attended the show with nominations in hand. Rosé took to the stage with Bruno Mars to perform the multi-Grammy-nominated collaboration “APT.,” and KATSEYE participated in the show’s “Best New Artist” performance medley with “Gnarly.” Though the HUNTR/X trio did not sing, KPop Demon Hunters’s soundtrack saw itself nominated for five Grammys, and “Golden” left its mark as the first K-Pop song to win in the show’s 68-year history. “Golden” achieving Best Song Written for Visual Media made waves within the K-Pop community and beyond.
For EJAE, the award also accomplished a personal dream of hers. As she wrote on Instagram, “this award is a reminder to never give up, to not be afraid to take risks, and to stay resilient.” The co-performer, co-writer, and co-composer of the hit spent many years working her way up within the K-Pop industry and now holds its first Grammy award. Evolving from a K-Pop trainee into a K-Pop producer and now Grammy winner, EJAE is building on her new solo career.
“In Another World”
Though EJAE sang K-Drama OSTs for 2019’s Woman of 9.9 Billion and 2020’s DINNER MATE, she made her official solo debut on October 24, 2025. The ballad “In Another World” centers itself around personal and interpersonal relationships, where feelings can get ugly at times. Though initially written about a tough period with her partner and now-fiance, producer Sam Kim, the message of “In Another World” works both on a personal standpoint and one that connects to KPop Demon Hunters. She told Forbes in October that “In Another World” imagines a world where she owns up to and gets rid of internal demons.
The simplistic approach of its music video reflects EJAE’s journey from a young child enjoying a love for music into who she shows the world now. The slow and soft piano notes accompany shots from childhood videos until the song’s climax, which finally closes up on EJAE as she sings emotionally. KPop Demon Hunters moved EJAE into another world from behind the scenes working with other artists to singing songs publicly for a global audience.
“Time After Time”
EJAE’s second single takes a drastically different approach than “In Another World.” On February 6, 2026, EJAE released “Time After Time,” a song about lingering feelings from a breakup. A bright pop instrumental breaks through the contrasting lyrics of anguish. “All the tears I’ve cried won’t ever be dry ‘cause my life without you feels like a lie,” EJAE sings. Though “Time After Time” launched without a music video, people listening do not need visual components to feel the story happening here.
The song also doubles as a partnership between the singer-songwriter and Volvo Cars USA that will “explore the car as a creative studio.” The collaboration sees EJAE starring in a commercial featuring “Time After Time,” written for a car-specific part in her creative process. According to a press release, EJAE uses the “car test,” a way of listening to music production outside of a studio, to check how her songs sound to regular audiences. “The car is where I really connect with my music as a listener, not just an artist,” she said. “I’ll sit there for hours, playing a track on repeat, and you hear it all—every layer, every emotion. It’s an honest test of whether the song really works.”
It’s been 10 years since EJAE landed her first K-Pop writing credit in 2016. Since writing for “Hello [Hani Solo]” off EXID’s Street album, she has grown tremendously as a producer and singer-songwriter. So much has changed for all of KPop Demon Hunters’s cast in less than a year, and the future looks bright. It’s only up, up, up from here.
Edited by Clark Royandoyan