Ehwhenkeem ( Erin J Kim ) is a twenty-three years old American-Korean YouTuber, born and raised in Los Angeles, California, Korean Town, who is most known as being a part the Indie label Roots of Society and one of the twelve members of the LA, Korea Town based group, Young Creation.

Erin specialises in the genres of Blues, Hip-Hop, Seoul and RnB. He first started singing at the young age of five but started his career as an improvisation musician (Creating music on the spot) during his high school year Ehwhenkeem said “Most of my songs then were made up on the spot but were actually funny songs”. Erin's friend Brownfield recommended that Erin write his thoughts and feelings down on to paper since he thought that Erin’s words were nice and meaningful. Erin stated that “I barely got in this game” as it was something completely new to him.

 

 

Erin had two main inspirations but from the start music was the biggest inspiration to Erin alongside his parents. They were very open to any music as long as it sounded enjoyable. Though Erin was inspired by many artists, he was especially fascinated by the artist Eric Clapton. He was highly entranced by the unplugged version of Eric Clapton’s albums, it amazed him how Eric could sing such melancholic songs and tell such poignant stories. Kim Hyun Sik a Korean underground artist who was well known during the 1980’s.

At the moment Erin is currently more towards the Hip-Hop genre , ‘9th Wonder’ is one of the Hip-Hop artists who left a huge impression on him. When it comes to Soul music and “make things happen”, then ‘J.Dilla’ is the artist with the most impact for him Erin is a huge fan of Action Bronson, Joey Bada$$, Wax and Method Man. To Erin, ‘Wax is a bit more powerful and really telling powerful stories and Method Man is more laid back and is a really relaxed musician'. Erin believes that artists play a huge role in the music industry and well as wider society. Without musicians, ordinary people like him cannot have hope, dreams or passion. Eric declared that 'Everyone goes through hardships' and everyone has a unique stories to tell.

 

Music to Erin is like a mystery and he finds it fun to try and his own ambiguous answer to it. To him, music is a very tricky thing, making and creating is the hardest part, and he 'needs this and that and that to do this and that to do that. Combining all these things create such amazing songs and masterpieces but then the listeners are the questions.' Being a listener and listening to Erin's music is also important to him as he wants people to enjoy his piece of art and if they like it, it is a great feeling for him to have someone appreciate his work. 'Everyone needs and wants to do it. Everyone believes they can create something amazing; but the listeners are the real judges.' that is how Erin sees music, it is something so hard to express. But to Erin it is like a ‘friend that you can talk to any time’ or a ‘girlfriend’ that he 'needs to marry soon, but right now her and I aren't in good terms she was really mad at me recently, but like men always say, it's not her it's me'.

 

Besides working as a solo, Erin has also collaborated with various YouTube artists and underground artists. From the likes of Dumbfoundead (American-Korean artist), Dazer. Lake Kim, Sista Eyerie, Distruct, and Solares the MC , Paperblockz, Rapthree and various Latin musicians and artists from the label he belongs to Roots of Society. Erin was also featured in a few shows with Severe the MC, he express that he wanted 'to do more and see what's out there'.