What comes to mind when you see the word “K-Pop”?; Idols with radically bright hair, slick choreography, addictive melodies or frenzies of screaming teenage girls? Well K-Pop is actually all of that.
It’s actually incredibly hard to pinpoint a moment in which K-Pop truly became global, but for me it would definitely be 2012. 2012 was a mixture of defining moments for everyone; The Olympics here in the UK, the year in which people were testing if the 2009 film’s predictions would come true and of course Gangnam Style. Released on the 15th July 2012, it was the first Youtube video to reach the 1 billion views threshold. With its popularity not only sweeping the nation but the world, everyone was in this contagious frenzy from major political leaders like Barack Obama to primary school kids at a sleepover (shoutout Perra). By the end of 2012, "Gangnam Style" had topped the music charts of more than 30 countries.
Gangnam style was just one K-Pop song and not even the most well-renowned, however it was the stepping stone to the Hallyu outbreak across the world.
There is one main reason for K-Pop’s surge in popularity...it’s well K-Pop. It’s dominance over music can be attributed to 3 main elements of the genre; high-quality performances - like the dancing, a carefully crafted and polished aesthetic and a certain method of studio-production of idols reminiscent to an assembly-line for cars.
Through highly competitive auditions for the main big three Korean companies: SM Entertainment, YG and JYP, young children become K-Pop idols. The children attend special schools where they take tailored singing and dancing lessons; they learn how to moderate their public behavior and prepare for life as a pop star and when they’re old enough, if they’re really one of the lucky few, the studios will place them into an idol group and “debut”. After more training in the idol group, the studios will generate the songs for them, market them, put them on tv, send them on tour and do it all again for another “comeback”. Due to the control they hold over their acts, South Korean music studios are directly responsible for shaping the global image of K-pop as a genre. But the industry is rather exploitative, performers are regularly signed to long-term contracts, known as “slave contracts,” when they are still children, which closely dictate their private behavior, dating life, and public life. The whole process has been incredibly industrialized making room for no errors. It’s almost like an algorithm for success - and the fans love it because their favourite idol group is seemingly perfect.
K-Pop is a relatively new genre with it coming up in 1992, so the wave is essentially fresh. Whether it’s popularity will continue soaring or become stagnant is hard to say however with several Korean Pop artists taking seemingly permanent places in the global public eye and prestigious music award ceremonies, it’s safe to say that it’s tempo won’t be messed up for a very long time.
