2022 is the only year where the main award was given to the Digitals Award, not Album Award which is traditionally the award which counts in GDA.
That is because BTS , who was certain to win the Album Grand Prize, did not show up.
2022
Updated December 30 KST: - 2nd Batch
The next lineup has been revealed for the 36th Golden Disc Awards!
It was announced on December 30 that STAYC, Stray Kids, Big Mama, SEVENTEEN, IU, Oh My Girl, TXT, and Heize are also attending the upcoming event.
The 36th Golden Disc Awards will be held on January 8 at 3 p.m. KST.
Source (1)
Original Article: - 1st Batch
The 36th Golden Disc Awards has revealed its first set of performers!
On December 28, the Golden Disc Awards announced that aespa, ENHYPEN, THE BOYZ, BTS, Brave Girls, Lee Mujin, Lim Young Woong, and Jeon Somi will be part of the lineup for the event.
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Usually the main draw is announced in the first batch. The second batch usually features singers who are 'also attending'.
2023
Updated January 5 KST: 2nd Batch
More artists have been announced for the 37th Golden Disc Awards (GDA)!
On January 5, GDA announced that Jay Park, MeloMance’s Kim Min Seok, Lim Young Woong, and MAMAMOO’s Moonbyul will be performing at the awards ceremony.
Updated December 14 KST: 1st Batch
The next lineup of artists has been revealed for the 37th Golden Disc Awards (GDA)!
On December 14, it was announced that (G)I-DLE, BE’O, BIG Naughty, IVE, BTS’s J-Hope, PSY, and Younha will be also be joining the lineup of performing artists.
Usually the 2nd lineup shows additional singers far from Grand Prizes. 2022 will probably be the only one time someone from the 2nd Batch won the Grand Prize, let alone the Main Grand Prize. For reference, on the same year, Melon Music Awards announced Lee Jieun first in the lineup, since at that time BTS was having a concert in Los Angeles and was certain to be absent there.
I personally feel if BTS showed up in the Golden Disk 2022, IU would not have attended and aespa would have won the Grand Prize for digitals. To placate aespa, GDA gave it Artist of the Year award, not considered to be a Grand Prize under GDA's rules but more like a Junior Grand Prize.
Hong Jungdo, the owner of JTBC and the son of the Hong Sukhyun, who owns the Korea Central Daily newspaper and a very, very powerful figure in K-O-R-E-A, was there to give the Official Grand Prize to BTS, the Main Award winner
and they played BTS' clip for almost 10 minutes on that award
But BTS did not show up, even though they were in K-O-R-E-A!
Hong Jungdo had to announce the Main Award himself since he bothered to show up there he had to something, and he had to announce that IU was the main award winner for 2022 and left immediately.
(2023)
Normally Mr. Hong gives the Main Grand Prize winner the trophy like this, a great honor, but he didn't do that to IU and left.
2022 where he announces IU as the winner.
In the subsequent scene where IU comes out to get the trophy, Mr Hong is not to be seen and she picks it up herself. She seemed to be a bit upset about this too, leading to a subsequent gaffe. She subsequently only mentioned Lee Dohyun, whom she acted with at Hotel Del Luna and who gave her the album regular award, but nothing about the Grand Prize presenters.
But that does not change that the Main GP winner of 2022 GDA was IU, since he did announce her name. Whether the whole Armies of the world like it or not, IU was the main winner.
It seems Mr. Hong was quite upset by this absence, since while JTBC has been quite influential in shaping Korean opinion, it was less than enthusiastic to defend BTS' military exemption. Usually it takes a stand on issue but for this it kept silent.
I think that led to BTS being dragged to the military and ending its Empire. JTBC was very influential for ousting president Park Geunhye back in 2016, and since there were sympathetic politicians who were arguing BTS should get an exemption, if JTBC had moved the few ultrareationary politicians who wanted to send BTS to the military no matter what would have kept silent since JTBC might have some info which were not good for their careers.
JHope went to Bangkok to please Mr. Hong, although he could have skipped this now there was no reason to pander to the K-O-R-E-A-N-S anymore, because Hong is very powerful and if BTS keeps Hong angry he might really go upset.
Again, what BTS and Bang did in Dec 2021 and Jan 2022 probably ended their dominance. They should 1) do a worldwide tour to reaffirm their dominance and silence all the detractors , or 2) crush IU beyond recovery so there would have been no alternative in K-O-R-E-A to strike it from the back, but did neither.
