It's pop music on crack & # 39;

On August 27, 2017, Taylor Swift's video for Look what you did me do debuted at the MTV Video Music Awards. The scenery was significant – the same VMA scene had been the birthplace of his legendary quarrel with Kanye West, who was the subject of the single. The accompanying video broke the record for the most watched video in the first 24 hours of its release, with 43.2 million views on YouTube on the first day. It was not really surprising; In the high spheres of fame, Swift and the Kardashian-West live in a league of their own.

On August 24, 2018, almost exactly a year later, according to a rather odd schedule, a boy named BTS rushed to snatch it from him. This time the record was surprising – for some. Many Irish pop consumers have responded to this news by asking a question we would never ask about Taylor Swift: who the hell are BTS? And how did they gain enough world renown to overthrow T Swift without even appearing on the radar of many Irish people?

For the uninitiated, K-pop is a confusing world that needs to be put in a South Korean context to understand

The simplest answer is that BTS is a group of K-pop (South Korean pop), which is currently making a huge world tour including an appearance. The Graham Norton Show two weeks ago. However, the phrase "K-pop" does not simply mean "South Korean pop". K-pop is a genre and an industry, a complex system of late capitalist music making. You can watch the brilliant music videos that this industry produces and know nothing about it. You must speak to a fan – whose increasingly globalized army is growing.

In what is known as Hallyu, or the Korean wave, South Korean culture has swept the planet in recent years. Dozens of video documentaries made by VICE, iD and other media brands on fashion, tattoos, plastic surgery and South Korean pop music demonstrate how South Korea is becoming a reality. object of obsession in the Western world. His kind of K-pop music was designed to be an addictive cultural export, and this goal quickly becomes a reality. Even if you do not think it has penetrated your cultural bubble, you are wrong – remember Gangnam Style in 2012?

The world of pop music is currently divided into two camps: those who have succumbed to K-pop fever and those who have not yet been infected. The Gospel is spreading rapidly and all converts seem to be instant fanatics. Matthieu Schwarzmann, 19, is one of these evangelists.

"K-pop is contagious. This is all the interest of the industry! Irish time. "It produces very simple 3 minute songs that get stuck in your head. They all have simple choreographies so everyone can dance.

What instantly strikes K-pop is the intensity of its fans and the way everything is designed to sell, sell, sell. In a BBC documentary aired earlier this year and titled K-Pop: the secret weapon of Korea?Radio 1 presenter Adele Roberts described how she witnessed a unique online response when she played a BTS song. In Seoul, she meets a Scottish fan who settled in Korea and learned Korean to better support her favorite bands.

"That's what this industry does to you," Matthew tells me. "It's pop music on crack!"

But how does it work?

A confusing world

"K-pop is run by companies that bring together groups of boys and girls. These companies have a sort of "stock" of trainees, "says Matthieu. "Trainees are recruited around the age of 10 and trained in schools for many years before joining a K-pop production company. There are three big companies in K-pop: YG, JYP, SM. If successful, companies select them to be part of a group and make their debut as an idol at age 16. "

For the uninitiated, K-pop is a confusing world that you have to place in a South Korean context to understand it. For example, talent shows are an integral part of the system. Talent shows the Irish means X factor and The voice, where random civilians vie for fame, but in South Korea, their goal is totally different. There, they are platforms for K-pop companies to present groups they have already spent years training and organizing. The stars of K-pop (called "idols") go through training schools, then combined into groups and marketed with painstaking schedules of releases through these shows.

"On these programs, the groups compete for the winners. Getting your first musical show is what separates you from all other groups of K-pop means. After that, you're basically with big kids – your fan base, and so your album sales, have skyrocketed. That's why some companies apply rules to members of their groups, such as the lack of mobile phones before the first win, "says Matthew.

How has such a tightly controlled and manufactured pop system emerged? Everything is rooted in the politics, culture, economy and history of South Korea.

John Lie is a sociology professor born at the University of Berkeley, originally from South Korea, and author of the book. Han Unbound: The Political Economy of South Korea. Originally k-pop, he explains, "South Korea had its own folk music tradition. But K-pop is a distinct genre created by several producers and entrepreneurs eager to generate popular music geared towards exporting. In South Korea, some genres of popular music resemble those of the United States, or even Irish pop music (from folk to rock), but K-pop appeared almost de novo in the 1990s.

K-pop is the result of the democratization and globalization that followed in South Korea. As detailed in The transformation of South Korea: reform and reconstruction in the sixth republic under Roh Tae Woo, 1987-1992 Robert Bedeski, the establishment of the Sixth Republic ushered in a new era of freedom, with the lifting of censorship of the press. Previously, the state had only two broadcast networks that controlled what the public saw and presented only specific musical acts through artist performances on these two networks. Once the Sixth Republic was created, global cultural influences flooded into the already existing mold of the talent television series, which continued to dominate culture. Groups like Seo Taiji and Boys appeared in these shows in the 1990s, promoting a new type of pop: an existing Korean pop hybrid with American pop, R & B and hip-hop music. This new genre was dubbed K-pop and the 3 big companies quickly formed around it, seeing its huge market potential.

The Big 3 has set up a production line where artists are selected as children and then driven to fame – every step of the process is under their control. Dr. Lie explains that they were able to do it "in the early 1990s, because there was not a large independent music scene (amateur musicians or local venues)," record companies such as we we know them in the West did not exist, and there was "an extreme concentration of power and wealth in Seoul", where the three big companies are based.

Exploitatif

The companies have set up training schools, which have become the only way to succeed in K-pop. Children pass an audition at the age of 11 or 12 years old. If they succeed, they will be asked to sign long-term contracts if exploited that they are now known as "slave contracts". They are so extreme that Variety reported in 2017 that South Korea's Fair Trade Commission had asked companies to revise conditions. The contracts were up to thirteen years old, but a separate FTC decision in 2011 ultimately limited them to seven years.

Many K-pop groups collapsed as individual members sued their companies to escape sweltering contracts – the Korea Joongang Daily reported in 2014 that the EXO group had disbanded because former members Kris and Luhan had sued SM Entertainment, citing unfair profit sharing, tight timelines and an invasion of privacy. YouTube is littered with "confession" videos of former K-pop interns, detailing the appalling lifestyle. "I was only 13 years old. It was extremely tiring. I could not stand it, "reveals Jessica Lee in one of these vlogs. "I had to lose weight. I could not eat. It is widely reported that K-pop trainees are denied access to smartphones, are prohibited from being in a relationship and are forced to follow a strict diet.

A key term of many slave contracts is that idols must repay businesses the cost of their decade of intensive training once they are profitable.

This seems like a high price to pay for fame and fortune, but fortune is not normally in the picture. A key term of many slave contracts is that idols must repay businesses the cost of their decade of intensive training once they are profitable. The bill can easily represent millions of dollars, which means that idols do not have much to show, financially, for their suffering.

The only question you have after hearing all of this is this: why would you go there? There are economic and cultural conditions in Korea that are essential to maintaining the system. "The main reason for low wages and poor working conditions is that South Korea is a degree-based society (more than 80% attend colleges / universities) and that few paid jobs are available for people with low levels of education. K-pop is one of them. As a result, there is a substantial population of South Korean parents and children who seek fame and fortune in K-pop and who are willing to spend long years of training and even earn a modest salary in the K-pop. start to have the chance to become rich, "said Dr. Lie explains

Al Jazeera reported in 2011 that South Korean students are committing suicide because of the incredibly high system and the competitive system of college entrance. K-pop training schools, for many families, may seem like the lesser of two evils.

"Many budding K-pop stars think this is the only way to success," says Lie. "It is probably true that unlike the United States – where the ideology of genius and talent is strong – South Koreans tend to believe in the virtues of dedication. That is, hard work can defeat the talents born, whether by passing exams to enter the best schools or becoming a pop star.

The South Korean education system and the K-pop system have more of a parallel: they both require tremendous dedication from their participants – and they both can kill. Kim Jong-hyun of the SHINee Group committed suicide last December and Seo Minwoo of the 100% group died of cardiac arrest this year. Although the heart attack is not directly attributable to the pressures of performance, the countless videos of K-pop stars that collapse on stage are rather overwhelming.

The world of K-pop can seem cruel, but like Euny Hong, author of The birth of Korean Cool, tells Irish timeYou really need to step back and see things in context: "Yes, K-pop band members have been following the lives very closely – Hyuna has just been fired from her label for choosing her boyfriend. But this is not so different from the Hollywood pre-union, where the actors were essentially the exclusive property of a studio and did not have the right to reign over their own physical appearance. Watch how Rita Hayworth debuted, there is K-pop written on it.

"In addition, young Koreans study like crazy or work like crazy. The long hours of K-pop stars are the norm in Korea, even if they had chosen a different profession, "she says.

Lucrative

The Western world can quickly jump to conclusions when it sees the K-pop industry, simply because it does not understand the socio-political context from which it flows. One of the reasons for Western success of BTS is that they differ from other K-pop bands in many ways: they write their own music, they are relatively free to use social media and to express, and they signed Big Hit Entertainment – Youngdae Kim is a Korean music critic who believes that the success of BTS in the West was a happy coincidence – they were designed as a Japanese export. "Japan is generally an easier and more lucrative market than the United States in terms of record sales and touring," he said.

K-pop has always been a strange hybrid of Korean and Western culture. The music is inspired by American genres, but the extreme work ethic and management system are a product of the Korean culture and economy. Big Hit Entertainment's new management seems to be an unexpected shift towards more American-style standards, which could unintentionally help BTS break into this market. "The fact that they co-wrote the music would definitely be an important factor in the American market, especially for those who attach importance to the" authenticity "of music and who would not listen to K-music. pop out of disapproval, "says Kim. "But I do not think it's actually a deliberate plan of society."

The entire genre has become a lightning rod for discussions about cultural appropriation.

"BTS came on the scene when a new type of idol format began to be popularized, namely" hip-hop idol, "Kim explains. "Pop and hip-hop have been considered two mutually exclusive concepts in the history of American popular music. Although the subject is a little less sensitive to the Korean public, it was aware that hip-hop was essentially based on the idea of ​​authenticity and "loyalty to who you are". In other words, you must at least write your lyrics if you want to be legitimate! As a result, idols were given more creative freedom than ever before, actively participating in the composition process – although the final product was generally polished by professionals. It was a smart but inevitable choice.

K-pop is a well-oiled, late-capitalist machine designed as a cultural export to attract millions of people to South Korea. It is also a source of immense joy for millions of people around the world. It is the center of a cultural dialogue that has a huge influence on the worlds of music, fashion and plastic surgery (as fans try to create the perfect image of K-pop idols) , while continuing to borrow other musical genres. .

The entire genre has become a lightning rod for discussions about cultural appropriation. A VICE documentary following the first-ever EXP EXP edition of the American K-pop group has become viral online. The documentary explores the number of Western fans who have accused the cultural appropriation group, claiming in particular: "No whites in my K-pop". The group's creator, a Korean named Bora Kim, explained that the attitude of such Western fans was: Orientalist. As she points out, many K-pop bands have Chinese and Japanese members, who have been specifically selected by the production companies so that bands can be marketed more easily in their respective countries, but Western fans do not never complain about these non-Korean members, because they are all Asians. "It's exotising, devaluing and orientalist," she says.

"In Korea, we do not get a hate reaction," she says. "When you really look at K-pop, there is nothing Korean in its tradition." K-pop is itself built on the borrowing of tropes from other cultures, particularly hip-hop, from the African-American Bronx community. in the 1970s in New York. The Western fans' conversation about what is appropriative and what is not seems selective and, as Bora Kim says, orientalist.

One thing is certain: K-pop is not going anywhere. Hallyu continues to flood the world with fashion, aesthetics and sounds of K-pop. This month, BTS's address to the UN. As this cultural phenomenon continues to grow, you'd better get mixed up or get out of it.