- Do I have to introduce myself?
Like hello MTV, my name's Amber.
(upbeat music)
(hiphop music)
Jump intro.
Hey what's up you guys? We are at the dance studio.
We are rehearsing for Countdown today
but I am directing this.
Today is the final rehearsal, tomorrow we are shooting
at four a.m. so a lot of stuff to do
a lot of blocking, we'll figure this out.
Five, four, three, two, one.
Guys, this is our shot list
and this is just everything chronologically.
- Also filled with vague technical terms.
- Yes like, there's one that says,
at the end of section hand rotation transition thingy.
I was born in West Hills, California.
My parents were born in Taiwan.
They met here and got married and had me and my sister.
My mom is the lead singer of our church
and my dad plays bass for the church band
and then my sister originally was
like a vocalist for our church.
Yeah like music theory wise my family's pretty set.
They all can read music, they're all really good,
they have like a good trained ear.
I'm just figuring it out and I still am.
I wasn't really in the whole pop space.
I was listening to mostly Linkin Park,
Blink 182, Sum 41, Take Me Back Sunday.
Guess when like Green Day hit with American Idiot
and I was like that's my whole childhood.
I listened to a lot of Asian music
at the time because I just got back from like a trip
in China and I was like oh my gosh,
this is like, why isn't this big here, in the states?
And I think that that's when I got into the more like
K pop music and having like choreography
and I call this dance.
I always wanted to dance.
I think I remember attempting to break dance at one point
but I was like, I'm too weak, I can't do this.
(upbeat music)
So when I got scouted, I thought it was just like
a sign from God 'cause I was just like thinking
like man, what if I could do music,
I'm not like the greatest but maybe I should try
and then I got scouted and I was just like
this is weird.
I prepared a song in Korean, I prepared a song in English.
What did I sing for my English, English song audition?
I think it was like either Neo or like Celine Dion,
either one of those two.
I was just so excited to experience something new
and go through this whole training process
like I knew it wasn't gonna be easy.
My dad was like the music industry is gonna be like this
and it's gonna be like this and you've gotta prepare this
and training was hard but it wasn't a mindset
where I'm gonna give up.
The first month or two months I think I was just
really on adrenaline, just like I'm gonna sing
and dance for my whole career.
I was excited to go to classes, learn Korean
but I think after time passed and adrenaline
kind of wore off, I really felt lonely
and it was kinda hard just kind of not having
someone to teach you right from wrong.
There wasn't like this person or like this guardian
figure to teach me perspective.
OH, thank you.
We are at the Steel office and my agents
from UTA are here.
I haven't actually met my agent in person before,
only on the phone.
Did you guys know that FX is kind of like modeled
after the Spice Girls?
- [Man] I didn't know that, that's great.
- If you kind of, if you.
- [Man] I kind of caught the vibe though, yeah.
- Yeah if you guys can. - [Woman] Like are are...
- I'm sporty spice.
- I guess there's a couple things we need to go over.
You know why don't we start with Amber.
- You know I think all and all like with any brand,
whether it's like food, like clothing, beauty,
like as long as they have a good campaign message,
like right now like I think as an artist,
especially in this day and age, it's really important
to you know push for self love, positivity,
women empowerment, you know, equality,
I think those are all very, very important aspects
that like not only as them as brands
but me as an artist that we should come together
as a society to always push that out.
- [Sara] That's why, Amber, like your fans respond
so strongly to you 'cause you don't just like,
you know, cash in for a social post.
- In training they set you in classes.
You're not supposed to go to other people's classes,
however, I owe my debut to my dance director
because my dance instructor saw me trying
to like look in and snuck me into their class.
He let me learn a lot of things that I wasn't supposed
to learn so I would take the guy's class,
I would take the level A class.
To be very honest when I debuted, I was so sleepy,
I don't even remember like I remember the excitement
and like, oh my gosh, I debuted but there was no like,
oh my gosh, I debuted!
We were just really working a lot of long hours.
A lot of people know about the long hours that go into
like K pop and you know, everybody's working 72 hour shifts
like probably sleeping an hour a day.
It's hard for me to remember what happened back then
and on a funny note like my hair back then
was like covering half my face so
you'd see only this so I couldn't even see in front of me.
What's up, guys.
We are on the set for my music video, Countdown
and yeah we're just shooting in this crazy warehouse.
We're gonna start from yeah, yeah, yeah.
- [Man] Okay.
- Let's do this.
And then we'll focus on the hook, the house section
and then we'll focus on the.
♪ Time to ♪
♪ No need for conversation ♪
♪ I don't want your innovation ♪
♪ Hurry come and lock me down ♪
- FX has built on individuality so I was actually
terrified on my look when I debuted.
My hair was actually long.
It was actually like to here, like I shoulda had
like some profile picture of me doing this
but it worked out to this more tomboyish,
like androgynous style.
We'll mark the house actually and do this part full out.
- [Man] On it. - [Man 2] Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- Yeah, there we go.
Sorry, communication, there we go.
I'm kind of crashing.
We have a couple scenes left so I'm just gonna push through
and you know, everybody's super just you know,
just like grinding with us so.
My avengers, assemble.
(hip hop music)
I was always very excited to write a song,
show my labor, show my friends
and being turned down and given the reason why
and going like, okay,
in the end I've kind of accepted the fact
that you're never gonna know when you're actually
ready or you're actually like this is the one.
You just gotta put it out there.
I was talking about this with a friend awhile ago
and he was asking me like, is music to you now, you?
And I think I was so curated for the past
like three years from me songwriting to cater
to a label or cater to the public's I guess,
wanting of what pop music should be,
it's kind of like embedded in my head
and I'm trying to take that away now.
You'll never know if you're 100 percent satisfied
with something and I think that's art.
The next one I'll make better, the next one
I'll make more toward what I want.
- Am I allowed to have my bit of happiness today?
- Hug, hug.
- Long time, no see.
- Long time, so see.
Right now the craze is all about
like we need representation,
which is again, something that I've very, very for
and I want to represent my community.
I think now being in the industry and seeing
that I'm actually being turned away because I'm Asian,
I'm like okay, I get it.
Now that I'm in the system and I know what goes on,
it's just like, kind of sad.
This is my godson, he's what, almost two now.
Right, Jonas?
Jonas.
Okay, Jonas, okay.
Okay.
Yeah.
- [Dad] Kiss, kiss.
- Kiss.
- [Dad] Okay.
- I can release music in Korean, in Chinese anytime
and I want to but I felt very motivated to release
some things in English because it's like
I wanna represent my community just because
I am a female, Asian, androgynous artist,
why can't I make this a thing?
Just like show like dude, I can be fucking dope
and I can be also funny.
We're not all the nice like smart friend.
I still get like oh, you're English is really good.
I'm like, oh okay, I hope it's good.
I grew up here, I hope it's good.
With me and my team and my friends,
we always look at the positive and try to figure
out and problem solve around society's boundaries
and we're just like you know what?
If society's not gonna understand,
I wanna make them understand.
I wouldn't say I necessarily rebel.
Generally I will follow every rule
but that was old Amber.