K-POP
K-POP has become popular in the U.S. and all over the world. It is made up of artists whose music can range from happy, funny, and more cheerful like Psy’s “Gangnam Style” and “Right Now,” Hyuna’s “Bubble Pop,” and Girls Generation’s “Gee.” To music that is about sex and violence that has a dark undertone like Brown Eyed Girls “Abracadabra.” Or the middle ground with groups like 2ne1’s “I am the best.” In the music videos for Psy, Hyuna, and Girls Generation they have bright colors and a more energetic beat, which most people including myself would be able to tell that they are happy and having a good time. Even though I cannot speak or understand Korean I can tell by the way the music video looks if it is a song that is happy and cheerful or a song that is more violent. Psy’s music has been popular in South Korea for years and when the music video for “Gangnam Style” was uploaded to Youtube the video exploded with views and was the first video to reach one billion views on the site. The video had exposed many people to K-POP and made it more popular than it was at that point.
According to Wikipedia’s article on K-POP “the genre is characterized by a wide variety of audiovisual elements.” The music is a lot more colorful and energetic than most genres of music and myself and many others are attracted to it by the energetic beat, colorful scenes, and the background music mixed in with the poppy sound of the Korean language. According to Wikipedia “K-POP first got popular in East Asia in the late 1990s, it entered the Japanese music market toward the turn of the century and in the late 2000s went from a genre of music to a subculture for teens and young adults of East and Southeast Asia.” According to Wikipedia, “since the mid-2000s the K-POP market has experienced double digit growth, and in the first half of 2012 the market grossed US$3.4 billion.” Time magazine recognized it as South Koreas greatest export.
The music was really good music and I would highly recommend it to my friends. Once you listen to it, it gets stuck in your head and you start listening to a lot more of it. According to the Youtube video “Kids react to K-POP” and “Teens react to K-POP”, “K-POP groups aren’t formed like American groups they are formed by corporations to make a profit.” The people in the group most of the time have no idea of who the other people in the group are. When K-POP groups work together it makes the video better and it shows people a new group they can listen to. The way K-POP looks and sound I believe the popularity of it will increase and it will continue to sound better and better.