Echo (single album)

Saena, Aran, and Sio were previously members of South Korean girl group Fifty Fifty, where they gained popularity for their viral bubblegum song "Cupid" (2023).^[1] The three members filed an injunction to suspend their exclusive contracts with record label Attrakt on June 19, citing a lack of financial transparency, failure to fulfill contractual obligations, and medical negligence.^[2] Afterwards, the Seoul Central District Court dismissed it in its entirety on August 28,^[3] with their exclusive contracts terminated for breach of contract on October 19.^[4]

The three former members announced they had signed an exclusive contract with Massive E&C on August 12, 2024.^[5] Two months later, the trio reintroduced themselves as girl group Ablume throughout social media on October 15.^[6] The group spent their December on producing music videos, photoshoots, and uploading choreograph content online in Los Angeles, United States.^[7]

Massive E&C later announced on February 26, 2025, that the members' former manager Ahn Sung-il would be joining them to produce their upcoming debut album,^[8] set to be released in the first half of the year at the earliest. This was upon the request of Ablume during the process of discussing their future activities.^[9]

The girl group soon began to release a weekly webseries named The Story of Ablume, through video sharing platform YouTube starting on March 31, consisting of six episodes.^[10] A live performance video was uploaded on April 20, being a prologue version for the song "Never Far Away".^[11] Ablume revealed their debut single album titled Echo, would be released the next month and made it available for pre-save via different streaming services.^[12]

Ablume released the single album through entertainment agency Massive E&C on May 9, 2025, worldwide digitally for music download and streaming. The song with the same name had a music video premiering the same day.^[13]