Any Advice For People Who Want To Be K-Pop Fans?

Seeing how quite a few of my online friends and followees are into K-Pop, I'm thinking I might as well try to get into it myself. Is there any advice existing fans might want to give me before I go ahead?

edited 8th Feb '13 1:09:29 PM by CompassionateSadist

Okay, I will...

edited 8th Feb '13 1:10:22 PM by CompassionateSadist

The only K-Pop I know is stuff I've been exposed to through my little sister, but I find some of Big Bang's stuff enjoyable.

Hyori lee. older K pop like G.O.D. and H.O.T.

Are you looking for mainstream Kpop (mostly idol music) or just Korean music in general? Idol Kpop (ex. Super Junior, SNSD) is a very visual medium, based more on providing entertainment instead of solely music. They usually contain very catchy songs and dance moves, "concepts" for each album, sappy lyrics, and some very questionable outfits. Also, you will need a very high tolerance for Gratuitous English / Konglish, especially in raps. It's fun, not very deep, and pretty much my guilty pleasure .

The Korean music scene also contains a variety of other genres that are not as well known internationally as Kpop. There's K-rock groups like Boohwal and Sinawe, more jazzy acts like Winterplay, and lots of indie acts like Standing Egg, Vodka Rain and Lucid Fall. Clazziquai has been mentioned above —they're very good. I don't know as much about these acts, but if you get tired of the bubblegum stuff or think that's all there is you should check them out.

I'm a Korean, but to be honest? The only advice I want to give is this:

Don't.

Well, mainstream Kpop is pretty shallow but harmless. The fandom on the other hand...

I'm thinking more of idol K-Pop, I guess. It seems silly and playful, and I like that sort of stuff.

& I'm pretty much immune to horrible fandoms, as long as I can enjoy the works without said fandoms forcing themselves onto me...

Yes, Jesus Christ some of the fandoms are nuts. :/

I assumed that Fusch was looking for Korean idol pop when he made the thread...Would it be a good or bad idea to start an all-purpose Korean music thread?

It can't hurt.

Though it may die a terrible death like the general Japanese music thread.

WARNING: Massive post below.

Since you asked for idol Kpop, here's a list of songs from the bands/soloists I know (yes, I have way too much time on my hands). I only got into Kpop about a year ago so this is in no way complete or representative:

• 2AM - You Wouldn't Answer My Calls, I Did Wrong
• 2PM - Again and Again
• 2NE1 - Fire, It Hurts, Go Away, Lonely
• After School - Because of You, When I Fall
• B 2 ST - Fiction
• Big Bang - Haru Haru, Lies
• Boa - Live Mix, Bad Drive Live
• Brown Eyed Girls - Abracadabra, Sixth Sense, How Could I Love You
• CN Blue - I'm a Loner, Love Light
• CSJH - My Everything, Piranha, A Little Bit of Good
• Da Vichi - Time, Please Stop, A Goose's Dream Live Cover
• DBSK/TVXQ:
  • 5 members: 2008 MKMF Live Performance, Love in the Ice Live
  • JYJ: Get Out, In Heaven
  • Yunho&Changmin: Keep Your Head Down, Before You Go
• f(x) : NU ABO
• Girls Generation / SNSD : Gee, Genie, Into The New World, Let It Rain
• IU : Mia, Good Day, Cruel Fairy Tale, Almost Lover Live Cover
• KARA : Honey, Lupin
• miss A : Bad Girl, Good Girl , Goodbye Baby Live
• SHINee : Replay, Ring Ding Dong, Lucifer
• Super Junior : Sorry Sorry, It's You
  • Super Junior KRY: Sorry Sorry Answer
  • Super Junior M : Super Girl, In My Arms

• Misc:
  • S.M The Ballad : Hot Times
  • Zhang Li Yin ft. Junsu : Timeless Part 1 , Part 2 (Yes, this is a cover of the song by Kelly Clarkson)

I agree with everything on that list, with regards to Idol Kpop. There are more songs I would have added, but that's a good starting point.

What I am disappointed about are three groups left off:

• 4Minute: Heart to Heart and Mirror, Mirror
• Girl's Day: Twinkle Twinkle, and Don't Let Your Eyes Wander.
• T-ARA: Bo Peep Bo Peep, TTL(Time to Love), and Roly Poly.

I was intending on putting up Orange Caramel(an After School subgroup), but I've been told they take Tastes Like Diabetes to a new level... And while I can see where they're coming from, I enjoy it...

Edit: Screw it. Here's Orange Caramel's A~ing. You be the judge.

edited 2nd Nov '11 5:06:11 PM by Swish

Hmmm, I haven't paid much attention to the new wave of girl groups and boy bands (there are sooo many of them), so the only song I've heard by Girl's Day is their track off the City Hunter OST (which is awesome, btw). Completely forgot about T-ara and 4Minute.

....well, count me surprised that "DBSK" actually stands for something. I thought they strung together random English letters, but I guess I was wrong?

I'm slowly listening through that list, and I seem to favor the dance-y stuff. Ballads aren't my favorite, but they're tolerable at the very least.

Edit: And it turns out SNSD isn't just random letters! Count me doubly surprised.

Edit 2: I'm never going to not be disappointed that F(x) doesn't have math references in their songs.

edited 5th Nov '11 10:07:04 PM by Tumbril

I KNOW! I mean, DBSK's O had 'Mobius strip' in it's lyrics, and U-Kiss somehow managed to incorporate the formula for the geometric area of a circle into one of their songs, but you have a group with a name like f(x) and you *don't* make any math references? The math nerd in me is disappointed.

Inb4 xkcd uses a fake girl group called cos(x) to remark on the Korean wave...

Munroe is not that much of a dweeb.

No, no, I guess he isn't...

If f(x) ever has a spinoff group I demand that they name themselves f'(x).

...math jokes aside, I like "Bad Girl Good Girl" a lot! Some of the other songs are nice too but I'm not gonna bother typing them all out.

edited 6th Nov '11 5:19:58 PM by Tumbril

Yeah, I like miss A. They're one of the few new groups I bother keeping up with anymore. They kinda remind me of Brown Eyed Girls (one of my favourite Kpop girl groups), albeit a younger and less mature version.

Added a page for IU, who'd just released her new album Last Fantasy.

The 500 character limit on Youtube comments always struck me as a little unnecessary, until I realized the tendency of the fangirls to go around spamming the comment sec—
TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥
TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥
TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥
TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥TAEMIN♥

Admittedly sometimes it's not so bad, when they throw in extra tildes:

And, occasionally, they spam more than one name in the same comment because "they love all the oppas equally!"

Or you might even get both in the same comment for double strength!

I've never had to go so far out of my way to actively avoid reading comments and shelter myself from the fandom. Thankfully I can usually open the video statistics and look at pretty maps and charts instead (apparently Mongolians are bigger Shinee fans than the Chinese—or there's one really devoted Mongolian fan).

....I'm complaining, but I'll still waste hours watching videos anyway. But really, I love this fandom.

edited 13th Dec '11 12:57:39 AM by Tumbril

Lol, I learned to not read those type of comments a loonnnngggg time ago. Though sometimes it can be entertaining to watch the fanwars break out. Not that all kpop-fandom related comments are thoughtless fangirling/fanboying—SeoulBeats is a Kpop editorial site which usually has pretty sane and mature discussions in the comments section, for example.

RE: Shinee: Maybe it's because more fans in Mongolia have access to Youtube as opposed to Chinese fans?