It was a song that was jotted down by Karl Morgan whilst he was sitting in the kitchen of his house in Swansea. But the songwriter could never have predicted that he had just penned a huge international hit.
Karl, lead singer of the indie band Who's Molly? wrote the hit single Youth, which was picked up for K-Pop superstar Kihyun. Amazingly, since the song was recorded, it has charted at number one in seven countries, and topped the iTunes chart in Korea, Argentina, Bahrain, Estonia, Azerbaijan, Bolvia, Panama, Paraguay and Singapore. It sold 120,000 copies in week one alone and received 8.5 million YouTube views in a week, the sort of numbers which are comparable to the likes of Adele and Ed Sheeran in the UK.
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He said: "I had written the song originally for my band. As a songwriter, you just write, write, write, and this one kind of felt good and went onto the pile for next year when we release. In the meantime, my manager heard it and played it to a couple of people because she really liked it, and then that's how they got hold of it. The label head heard it and really liked it, and it kind of seemed like a good fit for Kihyun. It went so quick, within about two weeks they had done a version of it, and within a month it was out.
"They used the same production that we've used for our version. They changed some lyrics on it because in a different language some words don't rhyme and mean the same thing. I heard his vocal and he sounded amazing singing it. He totally smashed it. The song itself sold 120,000 copies within its first week. It's a completely different market over there, it's like Adele, Ed Sheeran numbers over here, and it went to number one in seven countries which was just mind boggling."
Karl admitted it was surreal to see how well the song has done. He said: "It was just funny to watch, because being a writer from south Wales, we are quite humble about things, and it was funny to watch something having the numbers it was having. Every couple of hours someone would text me and go: 'It's on three million'. The next day: 'It's on six million'. It was like that. Just crazy. The label was really happy with the numbers it did.
"When they cut the song, I did a couple of early morning Skype sessions with the producers in Korea, and straight away they were like: 'Come out, come out, come write for other K-Pop artists', but I'm in the fully old school realm of Kelly Jones, Noel Gallagher, sitting at home writing. I wrote Youth in the kitchen where I write all my songs. It felt like it had something, but I don't think anyone expected for it to do this. It's amazing. What it does is almost validate all the hours that go into it and all the bad songs that you write when one like this pops up. It makes you want to do more. Early in the new year hopefully I'll head over there and try and do some writing out there, and I've got a trip planned to Copenhagen too to write with this guy called Cutfather who has had a bunch of number one singles."
It is not the first time one of Karl's songs have been picked up to be used elsewhere, including a song on the trailer of the Tom Cruise film American Made and television adverts for companies such as Ford and Rimmel. Who's Molly? have now been together for five years and next year will perform in a number of festivals on the back of the release of new music in March or April next year, including Youth.
Discussing his hopes for the year ahead, the 34-year-old, of Treboeth, said: "To me, it's always been about building, head down and keep going. The amount of knockbacks you get in this industry, as any band or artist will know, is unbelievable, so you've just got to kind of dust yourself off and keep going, keep building, try and reach more people, and make work I'm proud of and the band is proud of."
Karl will be part of the songwriters' circle event at Swansea Grand Theatre on Friday November 25. Tickets cost £22 and can be booked by clicking here. To listen to Kihyun's version of Youth, click here.
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