Thailand’s ‘Lalisa’ wins K-pop honor at MTV Awards

MTV loves Lalisa. Thailand’s home-grown superstar Lisa Manoban won the “Best K-Pop” honor at the MTV Video Music Awards for her smash hit “Lalisa”, besting boy-band heart-throbs BTS and becoming the first solo artist and the first Thai to capture the award.

“Thank you for much for making this happen,” Lisa said on stage at the event in the U.S., looking stunning in a black evening dress and holding the award aloft. She also thanked her K-Pop girl group BLACKPINK. Lisa is the third member of the group to release a solo single and album.

Last September, Lisa’s first solo single “Lalisa” premiered at No. 2 on the Billboard Global 200 and at No. 84 on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. It was featured on her album of the same name, which also included her B-side track “Money.”

The award, her single and her role in BLACKPINK make Lisa the first Thai singer to become an authentic international superstar. Recently, a 19-year-old Thai rapper named Milli also drew rave reviews after performing at the Coachella international music festival in California.

Just 25, Pranpriya “Lisa” Manoban was born in northeastern Buriram province, Thailand, and began taking dance lessons at the age of five, although she told Rolling Stone magazine that her childhood ambition was to be an air hostess.

At 13, she auditioned in Bangkok for YG Entertainment, a Korean company. Out of more than 4,000 participants, she was the only person offered a chance to move to Seoul, Republic of Korea, and begin a five-year program that trained her in dance, singing, rapping and other talents. She was the first non-Korean to be recruited by the company.

In 2016, the firm founded BLACKPINK. Lisa was the only non-Korean member of the group, which rapidly rose to international stardom in the K-Pop genre. By 2019, Lisa was the most followed K-Pop star on Instagram.

Although she lives in Seoul, Lisa says that she talks to her mother on the phone every day. “Whenever I have time, I want to return to Thailand. I want to see [my family] as often as I can,” she told Rolling Stone.

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