Eyes on Kpop: How Kpop became a global phenomenon
As I Kpop fan and a data scientist, I have been doing data analytics on Kpop, trying to mine data-driven insights about Kpop idol industry. I did the profiling of this industry, analyzed major agencies’ business performance, their international marketing strategies, and Kpop music videos on YouTube. If you are interested in the statistics which backed my findings, please see my Kpop Data Analysis:
I studied two different subjects overlapped together — Kpop and Idol. Kpop is a music genre. Idol is a type of entertainer. A Kpop singer, like PSY who sings Gangnam Style, is not necessarily an idol. An idol, like Bogum Park, is more an idol actor than a K-pop singer. I will further explain the difference in my next article talking about Idol. But in this article, I will focus on Kpop music and talk about my opinions after all the research.
Baby Steps
Kpop the music genre was created by Seotaiji and Boys in 1992 and they mingled pop, hip-hop, R&B, and dance-pop together with fashionable clothing and dynamic performance. It was a huge success as they brought the music that young people like to Korea and even made Korean government gave up the censorship on music. As the policy no longer restricted the development of music industry, Seotaiji and Boys have paved the way for the development of Kpop although they just existed for 3 years. From 1992 to 1995, Kpop strode from 0 to 1. But in my opinion, the producer Lee Sooman and his company SM Entertainment really made Kpop boom. I think the best way to understand Kpop is to follow SM’s footprint because they industrialized Kpop and has always been the powerhouse of this industry.
Music Performance
In 1990s, Lee Sooman was so touched by American boy bands. He found that as television are going universal, people did not just buy CDs and listen to music but began to like watching music performance. It was important to produce visible music and show it on screens. Music should not merely be sung by good voices, but also be performed with good-looking singers with trendy clothing, dynamic dance moves and interesting music videos full of bright colors.
Also in 1990s, Japan already had a very great music market and well-developed idol industry. Jpop idols under the total management by their agencies. Teenager idols are recruited and trained by those entertainment companies before their debut. After the debut, their songs, choreography, clothing, and make-up are all designed by companies; their activities are all managed by companies. Producers from the agency, instead of idols themselves, are the real “artists” who are making music.
SM Entertainment brought visible music and total management together and invented a key concept — SM Music Performance. This music performance consists of vocal and dance performance by good-looking idols. These elements are not separable. Only listening to the music is not enough, you must listen and watch the music video or live show simultaneously to feel the charm of music performance; because the music, the lyrics, the choreography, the clothing, the visuals, the stage design, and the music video are all designed together for a wholesome experience. Although this concept was introduced by SM Entertainment, it is also widely adopted by other agencies and Kpop idols. The emphasis of music performance is already a key characteristic of Kpop. This is also the reason why idols need to look great, sing well, dance well and perform spectacular group dance.
You may also notice that there is so much code-switching between English and Korean in Kpop lyrics. English words are sprinkled around Korean lyrics. It is quite strange because you will not speak with so much code-switching in daily conversation. I think the main purpose of this is to make Kpop international. Maybe because Lee Sooman was inspired by American boy bands, SM Entertainment likes purchasing songs from Western composers, with English Lyrics in their demo. When SM’s producers translate the English lyrics into Korean, the original catchy English phrases are remained. Those English sounds cool and can easily be remembered by international audience, like Super Junior’s catchy “Sorry Sorry”.
Industrial Revolution
In the way mentioned above, SM Entertainment produced the first Kpop idol group ever in 1996 — H.O.T., and it was a huge success not just domestically, but also internationally. Since then, SM and many other agencies began to produce other 1st generation idols in the similar way as H.O.T. Since then, Kpop is industrialized. Agencies are like star “factories” as they train their own artists and debut the idols as “brands”. For the artists, they make “comebacks”, usually one time or more each year. “Comebacks” are like the products of this “brand”.
A comeback consists of releasing the new album, the new music video, the new hit song and even idols’ new looks (idols change their hairstyle frequently to stay fresh). Idols promote their comeback songs on music program like KBS Music Bank, Mnet M Countdown, SBS Inkigayo and MBC Music Core. On every episode of those music programs, there are multiple idols making their comeback promotions and compete for the first place according to the sales and fans’ votes FOR FREE. I was shocked when I knew that music programs will not pay the idols. On the contrary, idols need to pay so much for their expensive stage designs and clothing for a comeback performance.
Therefore, I think there is a major difference between Kpop idols and singers from other genres. When pop stars release a new song, they really want to sell the song well. Kpop stars, also want to sell the song well, but the major purpose of their comebacks is to attract attention. Songs are like idols’ ads, advertising themselves to fans and advertising agencies. Yes, Kpop is very commercial. Kpop idols pay so much effort and money for promotion because they want to win first-places. They release expensive music videos and promotion videos free on YouTube for high view counts. Because how much first-places and awards they win, and how many view counts they get, are key metrics that advertising agencies care. They also did the comebacks for “acquisition” of new fans and “activation” of old fans because fan economy and popularity is idols’ major source of income.
Breaking out of Korea
In late 2000s and early 2010s. 2nd Generation enters the Kpop industry with brand new blood. They aggressively expanded their fandom to other Asian countries and achieved sweeping success. Especially, Japan the 2nd largest music market in the world, accounts for 60% of Kpop’s international income. China, another big market for Kpop, offers 20% of Kpop’s international income. Southeast Asia also contributes 10%. However, Kpop was not successful in the western world. Especially, America has always been the largest music market in the world. Kpop also wanted to go west and get a share from this gigantic economic body.
The most successful Kpop girl group in 2008, Wonder Girls, tried promoting their music in US with English versions of their songs. But it was not successful. On the other hand, as Wonder Girls spent 2 years in US, they also lost their popularity in Korea. That was really an unfortunate loss. So, why did Kpop not work there?
There were many reasons. Boy bands and girl groups were very popular in 1990s and early 2000s in America. While American idol groups inspired Kpop, American audience got bored of idol groups since they were manufactured in the same way. Americans like singer-songwriters with distinctive personality who sing their own unique music. As I watched Wonder Girls’ music videos of their English songs, I just subjectively compared them with Western singers and felt weird because 5 girls performed in same clothing and even same hairstyle. I wondered why it needed 5 similar girls to sing 1 song if 1 singer could do that.
But recently, Kpop became more and more successful in Western countries as BTS and Blackpink leading the 3rd generation Kpop idols to the world. In my opinion, social media, and Gangnam Style paved way for Kpop’s globalization. Gangnam Style let the whole world know Kpop and brought a lot of capital to industry. Meanwhile, social media let the music performance spread across the world.
During Wonder Girls’ era, smartphone was not even a thing. Now, smartphone and video platforms make everybody be able to watch idol singing and dancing just on their hands. Especially, short video platforms like Tik Tok created a huge need for music that can dance to — Kpop. I think that is the reason why ‘vivi trend’, ‘any song challenge’, and ‘Permission to dance challenge” can be so viral.
More Dancing, Less Singing
Thanks to the fast development of social media and video platforms, Kpop has been focusing less on vocal but more on dance. The choreography is generally becoming harder, more powerful, and more sophisticated throughout Kpop’s development. On the other hand, Kpop are having less singing. In 2000s and early 2010s, besides dance group, band was also a popular form of idol groups. By “band”, I mean the idol group with only one main vocalists with other members playing instruments. But this form gradually faded away, as the audience’s focus moves to the music performance than the music itself. People like watching beautiful dance moves more than pure singing. This also explains another trend — lip-syncing.
2nd generation Kpop idols did not have intense dance moves. Their choreography was designed to be smooth, so that Kpop idols could sing along with the dance. Therefore, they usually use live vocals or a mix of live vocals and pre-recorded vocals to sing. Lip-syncing was quite a shame. However, for the 3rd generation Kpop idols, their dance moves become more and more intense. It is even hard to keep breathing with the dance, leaving alone the singing. They rarely use live vocals. Using the mix of live vocals and pre-recorded vocals is already a norm. Even lip-syncing is not a taboo anymore. Today, fans are willing to accept lip-syncing as long as the performance is visually appealing enough.
Will Kpop’s world-wide success last long?
Kpop achieves world-wide success as BTS and Blackpink built global fanbases. These 2 groups’ concepts are more adapted to world-wide audiences than Korean audiences. They also did a number of collaborations with Western singers like Lady Gaga, Dua Lipa, Halsey and Selena Gomez to promote on international stage.
However, BTS and Blackpink’s success does not necessarily represent Kpop’s global success, because we do not know whether this trend will last or not. After 2022, BTS members will have to serve Korean military one after another. Blackpink’s contract will end in 2023. We do not know whether Blackpink will renew their contract and stay together. By then, we will know that whether the world like Kpop this music genre or they just like the freshness of boy bands and girl groups.
As I mentioned above, Asian countries like Korea and Japan have a long history of idol music, proving that idol music are sustainable there. However, in America and other Western countries, boy bands and girl groups’ trends can fade away when people get bored of these. There is a fundamental difference between Western singers and Kpop idols’ career development. Western singers get famous because they are talented in music. They are singer-songwriters who have good music to share with the world, so they become singer. Many singers started as lounge singers at local bars and gradually get fame, thus becoming stars. On the other hand, Kpop idols are produced to be stars as trainees at their companies. After they debut, Kpop idols do not have much freedom under total management by their agencies. Their music is assigned by their companies. It is quite normal for the Kpop idols to dislike their own songs, but they still have to sing and dance to it for group activity.
Western singers hire managers to help manage their activities. Singers are the employers, while managers being employees. But for Kpop, Agencies or Entertainment companies hire idols and manage their activities in the way the companies want. Agencies are the employers, while idols being employees. We can say this is merely cultural difference, but we can also say that it is putting cart before the horse. Luckily, in recent days, self-producing groups also get great success, such as BTS, Seventeen, and (G)-I-dle. More and more idols talented in music production and choreography joined this industry and smoothed this cultural difference. Soyeon, the leader of (G)-I-dle once pointed out that she suggested her company Cube Entertainment to stop vocal trainings for (G)-I-dle’s members so that they would not sing in the same way, but sing with their own charisma. Unlike other groups, BTS’ activities are not assigned solely according to their company Big Hit’s decision but are carried out according to both the members’ and their producer’s wills. I think this is a great sign of Kpop’s development because members are getting more involved in their own music production, so that they can persist their personality and unique characteristics, keep this global phenomenon sustainable.
