The Last-Day Question He Wrote at 21: “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End”

Part 5 of 11 in Shin Hae-chul: The Demon King K-pop Keeps Bringing Back

No. 7, “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” (Uri Apui Saengi Kkeunnagal Ttae), is a 21-year-old college student writing down, in advance, the question he’ll be asked on the last day of his life. He got only 46 years to answer it, and now idols sing the question for him.

N.EX.T – “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” and more (The Musician, KBS) — 940,000 views

Its combined views come to about 7.9 million. It was the title track of Infinite Track’s first and only studio album, released in June 1989, with words, music and arrangement by Shin (Melon). N.EX.T recorded it again for its 2006 remake album Regame?. Whenever I’m worn out, I put this chorus on. Somehow the question the 21-year-old asked never scolds me. It comforts me.

A band with three keyboards

After the College Song Festival win (Part 11), no agency wanted Infinite Track. Producers wanted Shin as a solo singer, not a band. The album happened only because the head judge, Cho Yong-pil, personally introduced them to a producer, and the band brought in Jung Seok-won, who would later lead 015B. Three of its six members played keyboards (Busan Ilbo, Oct. 21, 2015). The Busan Ilbo summed up the album as “the intricate sound of three keyboards, and lyrics too deep for their age, led by ‘When Our Lives Are Coming to an End.'” After it came out, the members scattered over school and musical differences, and Shin was left alone.

Also read: Twelve Years After He Left, Korea Gave Shin Hae-chul Its Highest Honor of the Night

Could you say you regret nothing?

The narrator remembers a classroom where stars came out beyond a cloudy window, and a boy’s blue dreams. He has been disappointed in himself for growing like the world as it changed, and he has made excuses, but the question of what we came into this world to find won’t go away. Then the chorus hands that question to the listener.

누군가 그대에게 작은 목소리로 물어보면 / 대답할 수 있나 지나간 세월에 후회 없노라고

If someone asks you in a small voice, / could you answer that you regret nothing of the years gone by?

(Words and music by Shin Hae-chul; key lines quoted)

That question became the backbone of everything he wrote afterward. “A Letter to Myself” (Part 3) and “Dream of a Freshwater Eel” (Part 6) ask the same thing again at different ages.

Yuju, Yang Yo-seob, Son Seung-yeon

In October 2015, on the first anniversary of his death, Son Seung-yeon sang it as a tearful tribute on KBS’s Immortal Songs. That clip now has 2.36 million views.

Son Seung-yeon – “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” (Immortal Songs 2, KBS, 2015) — 2.36 million views

In October 2017, GFRIEND’s Yuju picked the same song on the same show.

Yuju (GFRIEND) – “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” (Immortal Songs 2, KBS, 2017) — 400,000 views

In 2020 the long-reigning champion “Kitchen Cat” on MBC’s King of Mask Singer turned out to be Yang Yo-seob of Highlight, formerly BEAST (Money S, Nov. 23, 2020). He brought this song to one of his title defenses. Yang is also one of the idols who stood with N.EX.T at Shin’s memorial stage at the 2014 KBS Song Festival (Part 8).

Yang Yo-seob as “Kitchen Cat” – “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” (King of Mask Singer, MBC, 2020) — 970,000 views

On KBS’s Open Concert in November 2017, Ailee, the K-pop band The Rose and New Wisdom Harmony sang it together.

Ailee, The Rose and New Wisdom Harmony – “When Our Lives Are Coming to an End” (Open Concert, KBS, 2017) — 7,000 views

The final act of the 10th-anniversary tribute concert was Lee Seung-hwan, and he sang this song (according to audience-shot video). That night he said, “This era needs Hae-chul even more” (Hankyoreh, Oct. 28, 2024). The question a 21-year-old asked is now answered by his peers and the singers who came after him. And the fans who miss him are answering it too, each with our own lives.

Next, No. 6: “Dream of a Freshwater Eel.” He said it would play at his funeral, and it did.

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Sources: Melon (Infinite Track, June 1989; Regame?, Feb. 28, 2006; credits and lyrics); Busan Ilbo (Oct. 21, 2015); Money S (Nov. 23, 2020) and other King of Mask Singer reports; Hankyoreh (Oct. 28, 2024); audience video of Lee Seung-hwan’s set (not embedded). View counts as shown on YouTube, Oct. 25, 2026.