1980–2003: Early life and career beginnings Tablo moved to
Jakarta,
Indonesia in 1980 shortly after his birth. Due to his father's work, he spent around 3 years living in Jakarta before his family relocated again several times to
Switzerland and
Hong Kong for his father's career until Tablo was six, when they returned to South Korea briefly. His family moved again to
Canada when he was eight, and he gained
Canadian citizenship at age 12. Tablo attended
St. George's School in
Vancouver,
British Columbia. He then transferred to
Seoul International School. Tablo simultaneously attained a
Bachelor's Degree in
English literature and a
Master's Degree in
creative writing in four years. Tablo started playing
piano at the age of six but later switched to
violin, which he played for 10 years. His music teacher, who had been a pupil of
Isaac Stern, used to lecture him saying: "Music is communism, but you're playing democracy". Tablo wrote the lyrics to legendary singer
Kim Gun-mo's song "Rainy Christmas" when he was sixteen years old, as Kim took an interest in Tablo after reading a poem of his. During his early life, Tablo suffered from bouts of
depression. Whenever he faced hardship, hip hop music served as an outlet. However, Tablo's father disapproved of his career choice, so as a teenager, he frequently ran away from home. Ostensibly, Tablo asked a friend to live out his dream, but when that friend died of cancer, it became an impetus for him to re-enter the music industry. Tablo later admitted his family forced him to enroll in Stanford, and even after the release of his second album, was still persuading him to return to the United States to attend Law School.
2003–10: Success with Epik High and Pieces of You Tablo met future bandmates
Mithra Jin and
DJ Tukutz while active in the underground hip-hop scene. The three came together to form
Epik High, with Tablo as their leader. Under the tutelage of Movement crew members, especially the trio CB Mass, they attempted to record their first studio album alongside hip-hop duo and close friends TBNY (composed of Yankie and TopBob); however, CB Mass member Curbin allegedly embezzled Epik High and TBNY's funds for the album, effectively causing the disbandment of CB Mass (and the creation of
Dynamic Duo without Curbin). Tablo and Epik High were finally signed by Woollim Entertainment, which at the time focused on underground hip hop and modern rock, and the group officially debuted in 2003. The group's first album,
Map of the Human Soul, was released on October 21 of that year; however, due to hip hop's lack of popularity in South Korea at the time, the album was a commercial failure. It wasn't until the release of their second album,
High Society, that the group started to gain popularity. Epik High's third album,
Swan Songs, was originally intended to be their last album; however, upon release, the album reached the top of numerous charts, and swept the year-end hip-hop awards. One of the lead singles from the album, "Fly", was featured on the soundtrack of the video game
FIFA 07. Due to the numerous offers to remake "Fly", as well as "Paris", the second single from the album, a CD sampler was released in Japan. In 2007, the group released their fourth studio album,
Remapping the Human Soul, and managed to push Epik High to the number one spot for best upcoming artist after selling almost 90,000 copies in the first month of release. The album ended up becoming South Korea's third best-selling album of 2007. However, many songs from the album were banned from several TV channels, and the album buying age was restricted to 19+ due to some songs dealing with issues the Ministry of Culture and Tourism in South Korea deemed inappropriate for younger listeners. The group later went on to release their next album,
Pieces, Part One, which was also a commercial success. In late 2008, Tablo published a book entitled
Pieces of You. Although the stories were originally written in English, the book was first published in Korean. The Korean translation sold 50,000 copies in its first week of release and topped the bestseller's list in Korea. The original English version was released in February 2009 and also met with moderate success. The book garnered a positive reception from critics, with Tablo's writing praised for a first-time author. After the group's contract with Woolim Entertainment expired in 2008, Tablo, alongside his group members, founded their own independent label, Map the Soul, and went on to release an album
of the same name. Through their independent label, the group went on to release two more albums;
[e] in 2009, and
Epilogue in 2010. In November 2013, Tablo revealed in his interview with
HiphopLE that "Map the Soul" was shut down due to one of its executive member embezzling the label's funds.
2010–11: Musical hiatus and Stanford controversy In 2010, it was announced that Epik High would go on hiatus after DJ Tukutz enlisted in his mandatory military service, whilst Tablo and Mithra would be working on solo careers until DJ Tukutz's return. However, in mid-2010, a group of Internet users raised doubts about the academic background of Tablo, who majored in English and Creative Writing at
Stanford University. It became front-page news in South Korea in June 2010 when one of the fansite's managers, who went by the username "whatbecomes", claimed that Tablo's academic record was "not making any sense" and showed what he believed to be inconsistencies in Tablo's transcripts. Even though Tablo posted his official transcript and other legal documents online, many netizens refused to believe him, and called for other documents such as his immigration statement and diploma to be released. Tablo visited Stanford University in late August to disprove these allegations by having the university
registrar re-print his documents on camera, and many of Tablo's acquaintances and former professors from Stanford attested to the validity of his academic background on camera. On October 9, however, police confirmed that Tablo had indeed graduated from Stanford, having requested information beyond what Tablo had already provided, directly from Stanford University. In addition, twenty-two netizens received summons indicating they had been sued by Tablo for
criminal defamation. The fansite was shut down soon after by its host site,
Naver, following the results of the investigation, which also revealed that
whatbecomes had fraudulently used a friend's ID number to create the website, violating Naver's terms of service. However, many members of the fansite joined another community called "We Demand the Truth from Tablo 2" (), which has a membership of over 33,000 netizens despite proof provided by both the university and the police that Tablo did indeed graduate from Stanford University.
2011–present: Return, solo career and Epik High comeback On September 27, 2011,
YG Entertainment announced that Tablo would be signing a 4-year contract with them and that his first solo album would be released on November 1. Although Tablo signed as a solo singer under
YG Entertainment, he indicated that it did not mean that
Epik High disbanded, nor that they would necessarily sign with YG as a group. On October 14, 2011, Tablo released the song "Airbag" from his new upcoming album. On October 21, 2011, YG announced that the new album, titled ''Fever's End'' (), had been split into two parts. The first part was released along with the recent announcement, and the second part was released on the planned release date. On September 27, 2012, YG officially announced through yg-life.com that
Epik High would have their comeback in October 2012, after a three-year hiatus as a group. Their first single, "춥다" ("It's Cold"), featured SBS's
K-pop Star finalist
Lee Hi and was released on October 9, while their comeback album, titled
99, was released on the 19th. On December 30, 2012, during the
SBS Gayo Daejun, Tablo joined fellow Epik High bandmate Mithra Jin, Dynamic Duo and Simon D for
Cypher 2012, a remix of popular hip hop tracks of the year, to much acclaim. In October 2013, Tablo joined KBS variety show
The Return of Superman with his daughter Haru. On April 21, 2014, Tablo returned as radio DJ. His show's name is ''Tablo's Dreaming Radio''. He was the DJ for this same program until 2016. In March 2014, Tablo carried out a collaboration with China's top female singer
Bibi Zhou. On October 18, 2014, Epik High released their music video for "
Born Hater", after the video was delayed by YG due to the
Pangyo Techno Valley Festival Tragedy. The track is from their eighth album,
Shoebox, and features a myriad of hip hop artists including
Beenzino,
Verbal Jint,
Mino of
Winner, along with
B.I and
Bobby of
iKon. On August 31, 2015, Tablo released a teaser clip for a collaboration track with American rapper and co-founder of
Pro Era,
Joey Badass. Their collaborated song, "Hood," was released September 5, 2015. On January 26, 2017, he collaborated with Gallant and Eric Nam on the single release of "Cave Me In", and music video which was shot in Hong Kong. "Cave Me In" premiered worldwide on Zane Lowe's Beats 1 Radio Show and was trending globally on YouTube and Facebook for over 72 hours upon releasing. In 2021, he was featured in B.I's song "STAY". In September 2022, he collaborated with Jackson Wang for a new track "Imagine" on the hip-pop competition series, Rap Of China. ==Personal life==