Korean WAVE
Not only next but also the biggest step
that Korean music experienced was called Korean wave. Korean wave, or called
Korean Fever, is the new era that K-POP music faces. This is called wave
because K-POP becomes popular over regions and regions. For example, it firstly
became popular in China and in Southeast Asian countries, but K-POP eventually
became popular in the Europe and the America as well. This is not the only
reason why people make the word Korean wave; K-POP gave new and unique paradigm
to all country’s music markets. These are reasons why spread of Korean music is
called Korean wave.
As mentioned, Korean wave began in 1999 by Chinese reporters who called enormous increase of the import of Korean music and drama as Korean wave. Even though Korean dramas were at first exported more than Korean music, TVXQ and BOA exemplify first export of Korean music to China and Japan. BOA and TVXQ became popular in Japan in mid 2000s especially in Japan. For instance, TVXQ’s live tour in Japan in 2008 sold over 850 thousands of tickets that gave out more that 92 millions of dollars of revenue, and their albums were placed top of Oricon chart in Japan, which is similar to Billboard chart. BOA also sold more than 200 thousands of her Japanese album copies in Japan in 2008 as well and became one of the most popular singers in Japan. However, those two are just beginners; Psy, Girls Generation, and many other Korean artists began to be extremely popular after 2008 and 2009. The usage of YouTube can be one of the other reasons that Korean pop songs can be more popular than past few years. Psy’s Gangnam Style, Girl’s Generation, and the power of YouTube will be thoroughly discussed in next few pages. Back To HyperEssay Main |