Watch performances by Stray Kids, LE SSERAFIM and more from 2022 MAMA Day 1

The first day of the 2022 MAMA Awards took place yesterday (November 29), featuring performances as well as its first batch of winners.

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The first day of this year’s MAMA Awards – which took place on November 29 at Osaka’s Kyocera Dome – saw several K-pop and Asian acts such as Stray Kids, LE SSERAFIM, TXT and more take the stage with a line-up of special performances as well as never-before-seen collaboration stages between groups and dancers. The first day of the ceremony was hosted by Jeon Somi.

In between the performances, several awards were also given out to a number of K-pop and Asian acts. Last night saw BTS win the only grand prize (Daesang in Korean) of the night – the Yogibo Worldwide Icon of the Year. The K-pop titans have bagged this award for the fifth consecutive year as of yesterday.

Awards for the Favourite New Artist category – which was introduced this year – went to four bands: LE SSERAFIM, IVE, NMIXX and Kep1er. 10 of this year’s Worldwide’s Fan Choice awards were also handed out to BLACKPINK, BTS, ENHYPEN, GOT7, NCT Dream, Psy, SEVENTEEN, Stray Kids, TREASURE, TXT.

The final two awards of the night were the Yogibo Chill Artist as well as Favourite Asian Artist, which went to Stray Kids and J-pop boyband JO1 respectively.

For the performances, one included soloist Jeon Somi joining forces with Street Woman Fighter star and choreographer Leejung Lee for a dance cover medley. It featured the duo performing dance routines to aespa’s ‘Illusion’, TWICE’s ‘Talk That Talk’ and NCT 127‘s ‘2 Baddies’, among others.

JYP Entertainment newcomers NMIXX later performed both their debut song ‘O.O’ and its follow-up title track ‘Dice’ – both of which were released this year. Boyband DKZ also performed their latest release ‘Uh-Heung’, the lead single of ‘CHASE EPISODE 3: BEUM’.

Solo musicians Hyolyn – formerly a member of SISTAR – as well as BIBI later took the stage to perform their singles ‘Layin’ Low’ and ‘BIBI Vengeance’ respectively. The pair then teamed up for a medley of Hyolyn’s 2019 single ‘youknowbetter’ and ‘LAW’. The latter track was a song BIBI released with hip-hop artist Yoon Mi-rae as part of the soundtrack for dance reality series Street Man Fighter. 

Rookie girl group LE SSERAFIM also took to the stage for special performances of both their singles this year: debut track ‘Fearless’ as well as comeback track ‘ANTIFRAGILE’. Kep1er, who also debuted earlier this year, also staged a performance of two singles from their catalogue – their debut song ‘Wa Da Da’, as well as ‘The Girls’, a single they released as contestants in the idol survival show Queendom. 

Kang Daniel later collaborated with all dance crews who competed on the recent Street Man Fighter – a dance reality series he hosted – in a dance performance of ‘World Changer’, an unreleased song both sung and produced by fellow soloist WOODZ.

All 32 members of girl groups IVE, LE SSERAFIM, NMIXX, NewJeans and Kep1er appeared on the Kyocera Dome stage later for a massive collaboration. A variety of members from each band teamed up with each other to cover songs from all five groups: IVE’s ‘Eleven’, LE SSERAFIM’s ‘Fearless’, NMIXX’s ‘O.O’, NewJeans’ ‘Hype Boy’ as well as Kep1er’s ‘WA DA DA’. The 32 girls later convened on an overall cover of TWICE’s ‘Cheer Up’ to round off their performance together.

Big Hit Music five-piece TXT (Tomorrow X Together) performed three songs at the 2022 MAMA last night – ‘Opening Sequence’, ‘Lonely Boy’ and ‘Good Boy Gone Bad’ in that order – all three of which are lifted from their 2022 mini-album ‘minisode 2: Thursday’s Child’.

Day 1 of 2022 MAMA also saw the iconic on-stage reunion of veteran girl group KARA, marking their first performance as a full group in seven years. The five-piece performed a medley of classic fan favourites from their discography: 2010’s ‘Lupin’, 2011’s ‘Step’ and 2009’s ‘Mr.’ Following that, KARA then performed their new 15th anniversary song ‘When I Move’ for the first time. The performance coincided with the released of the special mini-album ‘Move Again’, featuring an additional three tracks.

Rounding off the entire night of awards and special performances from the participating K-pop and Asian musicians were Stray Kids. The eight-member boyband performed a theatric nine-minute sequence, which included songs from their March mini-album ‘Oddinary’, ‘Venom’ and ‘Maniac’. Their performance also featured several VCR clips exclusive to the MAMA Awards and Hyunjin lifted above the stage in a suspension rig.

Day 2 of this year’s emblematic MAMA Awards will take place tonight (November 30), also held at the Kyocera Dome in Osaka, Japan. Tonight’s ceremony is set to be hosted by South Korean actor Park Bo-gum. It is also set to include a solo performance by BTS’ J-hope alongside a collaboration between (G)I-DLE and Korean rock band Jaurim.

Day 2 will also feature a special joint performance from Stray Kids’ 3RACHA (comprising Bang Chan, Han and Changbin), veteran hip-hop artist Tiger JK and Squid Game music producer Jung Jae-il.  The remainder of the awards to be presented on Day 2 – which will include majority of the Daesangs from Best Female/Male Artist, Best Female/Male Groups, Best New Artist and more – will take place tonight. See the full list of nominees here.

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