Peter Crouch wrote in one of his autobiographies abt the importance of British politicians showing some interest in football. Even if they aren’t actly concerned abt it, they gotta at least pretend they are. Otherwise, they’d be seen as “abnormal” or “out of touch” wif the common person, and nobody’s gonna wanna vote for some detached “weirdo”…
As a result we have the royal family supporting Aston Villa (supposedly). Liz Truss supporting Norwich City (which is funny becos they’re club’s colours are the same as the lettuce dat outlasted her).
And an Italian politician supporting Southampton…a very mid English club, for whatever reason….
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But hey, I support Wolves while living >6000 miles away and having never been to the West Midlands in England. So who am I to speak, ye?
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Anyways, I think dat has some similarities to my relationship wif K-pop.
Part of me always felt like my interest in dat genre is mostly performative, to fit in better wif peers, as well as to make better small talks wif them.
I wld say I’m a fan of K-pop, but I’d be lying, lol. I do like certain songs from certain bands, but I don’t exactly love the genre as a whole. It doesn’t appeal to me dat much. Especially nowadays, wif how westernized it’s been made to sound, for more international marketability.
I oso tend to be biased, and am more willing to give songs a listen when they’re by oready popular bands.
So it’s like I hear a song dats decent, but then I see dat they were sung by some random group I’ve never heard of, then I wldn’t listen to it again 🫠
At the same time, I hear some song dat I wld like… otherwise not fancy. Maybe something like “Chk Chk Boom”. But then I see it’s by Stray Kids (a reputable group), and I’ll somehow convince myself dat it’s alright.
Off topic, but I am oso quite a big fan of J-pop. At the same time, I can’t actly rmb a whole lot of artists or bands by their names.
Besides the fact dat their names are in Japanese characters (which I can’t read 🙃), it’s oso the fact dat I judge J-pop songs differently. I will usually like their songs before I like the artists. It’s like their music speaks for themselves, u noe? I dun have to get to noe the characters in the band, before I learn to appreciate their music.
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But dun get me wrong. Going back to K-pop, there r songs I genuinely like, without all those mental gymnastics going on. I’m not a BTS ARMY, but I like the songs “Fake Love” and “Permission to Dance”. I oso enjoy aespa’s “Supernova”, LE SSERAFIM’s “Perfect Night”, as well as “New Jeans” by…. NewJeans (hehe).
Those are despite me not rlly being a fan of those bands…
But among all of them, there is one song dat I find stands above the rest. I only tell dis to ppl older than me, becos otherwise I get called an ‘unc’.
SHINEE’s Stand by Me is very interesting sounding. It’s like, somehow both familiar yet different. It has the perfect blend of wholesome and goofy, but somehow beautiful sounding. Like, it shouldn’t be dat good, but is anyway. Dats the best kind of combination in a song, for me.
It’s definitely a product of its time, so it sounds quite different from today’s K-pop. It’s more upbeat, and actly like a pop song. Its oso infectious. Like, I dun have to be in the mood to listen to it, u noe? It’s the song dat puts me in a positive mood instead.
But then I realised, hmmmm, das the same feeling I get when listening to Southern All Stars, nobodyknows+, and all dat good J-pop stuff I mentioned. Maybe there’s some kinda connection? So I asked ChatGPT: why like dat 🤔?
It turns out (based on wat they said, and whatever sites and pages they linked me), dat K-pop was still heavily influenced by J-pop during dat time. Other bands like SNSD, TVXQ and Super Junior oso had songs dat sound pretty “J-pop” because of dis.
Which makes sense, becos K-pop bands back then were still figuring out wat works to reach out to a bigger, international audience. Japan was oso the “it” country during those days, popular around the world (especially in Southeast Asia), before the Hallyu wave sorta usurped them off their throne.
It was only around after 2010 onwards (around the time Big Bang became… big…) dat they started becoming internationally recognised for having their own distinct style.
Taking inspiration from different Western music genres like hip-hop, EDM, and rock, then mixing them wif whatever they oready had, turned K-pop into wat it has been, and continues to be, for the past almost 15 years (wif constant development along the way).
Das some pretty neat stuff, don’t u think? Always fun to see how trends and pop culture change throughout the years.
Personally, part of me is happy to see K-pop evolve into wat it is today, and making so many fans happy wif their adored idols and biases.
But another part wished it remained more similar in style to J-pop. Dat way, when I get bored of Japanese music, I can divert to Korea for a lil bit, and won’t feel too different, 🤭. Times were fun when the market wasn’t so big, ye? Times were oso fun when funky Japanese hairstyles was the trend among the young guys here, as I wld commonly see when I was little.
Perhaps I shld oso write more abt my undying love for J-pop one day. Dat shld be fun… ☺️
27.10.2025
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