I mean, just look at what it is now: PSY's now infamous, viral Gangnam Style song and video (including addicting, intense memetic dance).
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| Oppan Gangnam Style! |
Want to see just how popular it's become? Check out its Wikipedia entry about the video's Youtube popularity. An average of over 6 million views per day and 1.6 million likes within just 2 months? That's insane.
Suddenly, K-Pop is all around the world (even if it's just primarily one song for now). That's really what it boils down to. Has K-Pop been cool worldwide? Sure, in League of Legends we have two Champions (Ahri and Syndra) that have dance animations that are taken directly from K-Pop songs (in this case, Run Devil Run and Hoot respectively). But what other things make K-Pop big all around the world? What else is mentioned on the news or publicly showcased in iTunes/Amazon/other music retailers? Not really anything, unless I've been living under a rock. Nothing else is really advertised or promoted. Sure, Gangnam Style has taken the world by storm, and PSY was even featured on the Today Show where he performed Gangnam Style live. Twice. The song, the video, the dance: they're fiery, catchy, sexy and shameless.
K-Pop in general is just...catchy in a different way. It's an entirely new flavor of musical delight for entertaining the ears, eyes and feet. It sounds similar, yet foreign. But now most people worldwide are aware of PSY and his Gangnam Style. What else is out there? One glimpse into K-Pop is simply not enough: from Super Junior to T-ARA to SHINee to Girls' Generation to TVXQ, among many other groups (each with their own official fan-represented color), there is much more out there then at first glance. When the Korean wave hit in the 90s, it mostly took Asia by storm, but it never really filtered out much further. Now we'll hopefully start to see much more K-Pop sweep the world off its feet.
These K-Pop artists are HUGE in Korea and most of Asia, and now (hopefully soon-to-be) the world. What makes their music so addicting, refreshing, unique and captivating? Is it the music video style? Is it the way the Korean vocals sound? Is it how they look when singing and dancing?
It's all three, and more. The following sections will be mostly conclusions drawn from my opinion and observations as an American, and attempt to dive deeper into why K-Pop in its entirety is a worthy distraction.
Foreign Appeal
PSY's Gangnam Style features a well-known Korean singer and dancing star from 4Minute named HYUNA (they even did a studio version with much more emphasis on her).
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| She sounds like Pikachu in the studio version? Better make a picture of it! |
HYUNA is sexy, cute and saucy, but there are a lot of women in US musical productions that fulfill those criteria as well. So what makes HYUNA so appealing? It's a combination of two factors: she has a deliciously slender and clean body (duh), and we can't fully understand what she's saying. Because we as Americans mostly just speak English (and certainly don't specialize in understanding Korean as a second language), we can sit back and listen to the music and vocals as they sound instead of trying to weigh in what they mean. Music is not something that needs to be understood down to the language level to enjoy. Because of this, we can focus on things aside from what the lyrics may mean up front, watching body language and gestures in the music videos...and sometimes catch bits and pieces of English that we may hear in K-Pop songs. An analogy would be if you were unable to see; in theory, all of your other senses get heightened. In the same way, being unable to understand what's being said allows for our attention to go elsewhere.
This means we zero in on all of the other important features of K-Pop songs and music videos. Take GEE by Girls' Generation (SNSD) for example. This is a group of 9 prominent performers and vocalists, and they are about as girly as you can get without going over the top. Gee, now the second most viewed K-Pop music video on Youtube (second to PSY's Gangnam Style), demonstrates it all: plentiful yet subtle colors, beautiful women, flawless hair and fashion, femininity, an addicting beat, truckloads of happiness and yearning emotion...and the only parts us English speakers can understand are the first few lines of the song uttered by SNSD's Tiffany and the ever-repeating "Gee Gee Gee Gee Baby Baby Baby~". You don't have to know what they're saying, the song is plenty enjoyable enough without knowing what 95% of the lyrics mean. This is a song you want to dance to. The music video and overall presence of the song speaks volumes; it's little wonder why this song/video combination is so popular (and if you want feminine overload, continue on to Oh!. Cheerleader screenshot below). But while on the topic of portrayal...
Refreshingly Emotional, Clean and Positive
If you look at music that's trending in the United States, you see a lot of skirting the line. You see many music videos that show women dressing skimpily and/or acting lewd or otherwise dangerously flirtatious or willing towards the strong men with earrings/tattoos/six pack abs and the whole tough guy act going for them. Like, okay. I watched Chris Brown's Don't Wake Me Up music video recently and the blatant auto tune just put me off. It's not subtle. It's not really a way to convey emotion or get you psyched up. Sure there's a beat and you can dance to it. But I just...I wouldn't want to. The song does not click with me (not to mention that Chris Brown overall is just downright awful, but I'll quickly digress). The inflections sounds wrong, especially when he repeats the same word over and over again. Combined with the auto tune it doesn't sound as good as it could. In fact, listening to most rap is not really emotional at all. It might be designed to get your blood pumping sometimes, but for me it just does not do the trick.
Now let's make a quick jump over to Owl City's Good Time feat. Carly Rae Jepsen. This song is entirely positive and is bursting with emotion! The lyrics are all about having a good time and rebounding: Adam sings about sleeping in all of his clothes in bed, taking a taxi elsewhere to have a good time; Carly sings about dropping her phone in the pool (again) but still expressing interest in having a good time. "It's always a good time", "Doesn't matter when", "Good morning and good night", "It's gonna be all right". It's a very happy song. It makes you feel better, it sends a message without having to overly abuse auto tune or sing about how heartbroken someone is, or how love is unrequited, or how hot/sexy guys or ladies look in bikinis or with six pack abs. Frankly speaking, I'm tired of that.
Well, K-Pop delivers yet again. Compared to many US artists, K-Pop artists don't really need to rely on showcasing super-buff pimp-like male singers with stripper-like women fawning over them, ready to do what they command (PSY's Gangnam Style may be an exception). K-Pop vocalists and dancers in general just do not need to have the biggest biceps, or the largest breasts. In fact, they're all incredibly skinny with little muscle or fat to be seen. The men are snappily dressed (just watch Super Junior's Super Girl for an idea) and the women are not scantily clad or they are scantily clad enough to not overly emphasize it (Girls' Generation has Run Devil Run, in which all 9 members are all incredibly well-covered but still look very shapely and attractive in their skintight garments). These songs are not saddening songs either, they're at the least neutral and usually bursting with emotion (particularly Girls' Generation with their sweet, delicate tracks).
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| Super Junior members at your service. Stay classy, South Korea. |
Sure, there are songs like T-ARA's Bo Peep Bo Peep that are incredibly sexy in general and portray lustful women, but in this case said portrayal is tied directly to the Korean legend of the gumiho, a nine-tailed seductive fox creature that can transform into a beautiful woman that lures in men and then consumes their life essence (and sometimes their livers). Said song includes specific lyrics in English that drive home a feeling of desperation and desire ("I'm so sorry" and "Not amazing").
Asians are Attractive
Ah yes, now we hit one of the clear physical winners here. Asians are well-known for being good in school, good at sports, good at playing instruments, and they are just an all-around excellent, attractive and/or intelligent ethnicity. Just take one look at the comments on SHINee's LUCIFER video. And that's just the beginning! Go to any K-Pop video and I guarantee there will be either loads of ♥'s in the comments or names mentioned repeatedly with much enthusiasm and love for these artists...or both. It's insane!
Being half-asian myself, I used to be big on liking caucasian women (since that's predominantly what I saw in my growing-up years up through high school) until I saw Girls' Generation (in particular Sunny, Yoona and Tiffany). My goodness, these women are beautiful. They come across as friendly, attractive and clean. It's like an entirely new superior species of woman lives in Korea. The way they dress, the way they swing their hips and the way they smile nonstop just leaves me feeling happy, bouncy and breathless.
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| Want. |
Needless to say, I have become more attracted to asian women in general since then. By the way, you can tell I'm incredibly biased towards Girls' Generation.
Conclusion
PSY has branched out, and now the world of K-Pop can be breached by all thanks to his incredibly viral Gangnam style. But how will it go? Will a new Korean wave hit the rest of the world, or will the relatively undiscovered greatness of what already exists be eaten up by the public? Only time will tell.
Now excuse me, I need to take a cold shower.
Oppan Gangnam Style!
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| I want YOU to check out K-Pop, sexy lady! |
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