2018 – SB19 Debut
SB19 comprised of Pablo, Josh, Stell, Ken (Felip), and Justin, debuted under ShowBT Philippines on October 26, 2018 with their single, Tilaluha. A ballad song that, “…relays an emotional message about unrequited love”.
Before debut, most of the members were part of dance teams and k-pop cover groups. Some being on the same teams and others on rival teams where they often competed against each other before coming together as trainees under ShowBT.
Their debut was small and challenging and many people questioned their validity as artists in a time when P-pop was fairly unknown. They even questioned themselves and considered disbanding but decided to continue.
Going Viral in 2019
In 2019, SB19 released their second single, “Go Up” which went viral when an anonymous user shared the dance practice video for the song, due to being impressed by their in-sync dance skills. The video currently has over 6 million views.
SB19 Fandom – A’TIN
SB19’s loyal fandom is called A’TIN (pronounced eighteen) and derived from the Filipino word for atin which means Ours. The members stated that the meaning is “…if there is no A’TIN there will be no SB19”.
The members were affectionately named by A’TIN as Mahalima. Mahalima is made up of the two words, mahal, meaning love, and lima, meaning five. It means that A’TIN loves and supports all five of the SB19 members. A’TIN’s support is the driving force behind SB19’s success.
Starting their own Management company – 1Z Entertainment
In October of 2023, almost five years after their debut, SB19 launched their own management company, 1Z Entertainment.
As stated on their official X account, “1Z is a play of the word – zone. ‘THE ZONE’ is our dojo where we work on ourselves and our talents and ‘IN THE ZONE’ is our state of being where we put our 100% in everything we do”. SB19 leader Pablo serves as the CEO.
Going viral – GENTO and MAPA
On May 19th, 2023 SB19 released their song “GENTO“. The word Gento is derived from two filipino words, ganito, which means, “like this”, and ginto, which means, “gold”. Representing SB19’s distinctive style, sound, work ethic and determination.
The song resonated with not only lovers of P-pop music, but listeners all over the world and has spawned a worldwide dance cover phenomenon.
On the rise are vocal covers of the song as well as recreations of its’ famous filipino lyrics into other languages! A Chinese language cover was made as SB19 and Gento have reached explosive popularity worldwide!
Their song about the love returned to parents for their efforts towards their children, ‘MAPA‘ (short for Mother and Father, and the Filipino word for map) became the first filipino MV to reach 100 million views.
It has also become a standard song dedicated to parents at graduations and other ceremonies when children, young and old show appreciation to their parents. It has been translated from Tagalog into multiple languages as well.
6 Years with SB19!
SB19 celebrated their 5th anniversary on October 28, 2023 with a “Half A Decade Celebration Fan meet”, held in person and live streamed, alongside an anniversary exhibit.
On May 18-19, 2024 SB19 completed their world tour with a 2-Day sold out Finale concert in Manila!
The show also streamed worldwide with guest appearances by artists like veteran composer Louie Ocampo, Apl.de.Ap of The Black Eyed Peas, Filipino hip-hop pioneer Gloc-9, DJ and Producer Terry Zhong, The Voice Philippines winners VocalMyx, and semifinalists FORTEnors, and Gelou of P-pop girl group Yara.
The epic finale was a testament to their hard work, talent, love of filipino culture, as well as their global reach and popularity.
This is our SB19!
