excerpt
Opening its fourth world tour at Gocheok Sky Dome, aespa balanced cinematic storytelling with stronger live energy before 35,000 fans in Seoul.
aespa kicked off its fourth world tour, “SYNK: COMPLaeXITY,” with two concerts on Friday and Saturday at Gocheok Sky Dome in western Seoul, marking the girl group’s first performances at Korea’s largest indoor concert venue. The two-night run drew a total of 35,000 concertgoers.
Polished visual production has always been one of the quartet’s strengths. The SM Entertainment act’s previous tour, “SYNK: aeXIS LINE,” which took place from August last year to April, had been filled with tightly coordinated spectacles as well.
At times, however, it felt like a production designed for the screen rather than for the people inside the venue — visually immaculate and precise, but somewhat lacking in the raw energy that transforms a show into an absorbing live experience.
“SYNK: COMPLaeXITY” found the balance that its previous series occasionally missed. The group’s live vocals gave the performance greater vibrancy, while a more immersive and clearly developed narrative drew the audience into the world unfolding onstage.
The two-and-a-half-hour concert was, in many ways, aespa in a nutshell, both visually and sonically.
Jumping between the real and virtual worlds of the “ae” avatars, the story followed the four members — Karina, Giselle, Winter and Ningning — as they confronted a mysterious glitch, or “error,” by rediscovering their connection with one another.
Saturday’s concert began with an intense rock instrumental filling the expansive dome as chants of “We are aespa” rang out. A music video of the group’s 2023 track “Welcome to MY World” then appeared on the screen, where the members, dressed casually like four ordinary young women, venture into a forest. Gradually, however, uncanny glitches began to seep into their surroundings, disrupting what had appeared to be reality.
The familiar video had been newly edited for the concert, with images of the members overlapping with their ae counterparts, rendered in a hyperfuturistic cyberpunk style.
From there, the sheer scale of Gocheok Sky Dome became an essential part of the spectacle as an enormous LED screen stretched across the stage displayed towering figures of ae-aespa — the members’ virtual counterparts within the group’s fictional universe — while the four real performers stood below for an explosive opening.
The contrast created an imposing image, with colossal digital beings looming above both aespa and the audience as though they had broken out of the virtual world, as the girl group launched into “Lemonade,” bringing the virtual spectacle to life, followed by “Switchblade.”
After the maximalist opening, however, the production stripped back for aespa’s 2024 hit “Whiplash,” with few visual elements except for close-ups of the members to put greater focus on their live performance and the song’s instantly recognizable choreography, before the set returned to the concept-heavy, career-defining debut single, “Black Mamba” (2021) and then “WDA.”
The concert unfolded in multiple narrative stages: the emergence of the error; the invasion by the ae avatars; the imprisonment and isolation of the real aespa members; their realization that their bond remained intact; and, ultimately, their counterattack and victory. Each chapter was fleshed out through pre-recorded video segments in which the members recounted what had happened to them in interview-style testimonies.
In the second segment, as the members began to notice violet-hued artifacts distorting their realities, dreamy purple lighting enveloped the stage as aespa moved into a slower, more vocal-heavy set of “Count on Me” (2025), “Thirsty” (2023) and “Can’t Help Myself.” The members then greeted the fans up close and personal by traveling around the venue on individual platforms shaped like lemonade cans during “Angel #48” (2025) and “Camouflage” before closing the segment with the upbeat “Kiss N Tell.”
The third segment — where the invading avatars isolated, imprisoned and placed each aespa member under surveillance, then impersonated them, taking over their reality — consisted of the four members’ solo and subunit stages.
Then, from that isolation came the members’ realization that their connection had never truly been severed, which led to a turning point toward the night’s highlight run, beginning with “Armageddon” (2024), which signaled their counterattack against the invading force. The momentum continued through “Bite” and “Drama” (2023) followed by a dance interlude that led into “Next Level” (2021), “Shakin’” and “Supernova” (2024) before the encore.
The members had notably little time to speak directly to the audience compared to the average K-pop concert and the girl group’s previous ones, apart from a brief greeting following the opening sequence, as the concert focused on maintaining the uninterrupted narrative flow. During the encore, however, the aespa members looked out into the sea of light filling the venue, and expressed gratitude for their fandom, MY.
“I truly want to say thank you to MY for filling up this venue,” Winter said. “We never imagined we would be able to fill this venue [Gocheok Sky Dome]. We will continue to do our best and show our growth, so please look forward to it.”
“This has been an unforgettable memory for us, so I hope it is for you as well,” Karina said. “Thank you for always choosing aespa.”