Non-Koreans (Survey).... how did you learn about K-pop?

[koganbot]

While searching "Oscar song meanings," I incidentally found this thread where non-Koreans talk about how they discovered K-pop and why they love it.

"I'm just wondering...... I see many people who aren't Korean listening to Kpop.

"How did you find out and learn about kpop?
"Why do you love it?
"What is your ethnicity/nationality?
"What are your favorite groups and why? What are your favorite songs and why?"
"Do you prefer boy groups over girl groups or both?"

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20120412182534AAbtXrF

I don't think nationality matters at all because puppies of all countries listen to kpop. A norwegian puppy or a belizean puppy - they all love it! I'm central european, now living in Phnom Penh where local khmer kids dance to kpop in parks. Few nights ago they were swaying their hips to Abracadabra :D

Three people like that the groups don't have to sing about sex, money, and drugs.

I think this is my favorite bit of meta:

At first when I listened to [SNSD's] music, I didn't like it and I sorta became an anti. (I think that to like a group you have to be a bit negative to see if you prefer them. If their music and personality can persuade you then they are a good group. A group must be able to have strong persuasion to have fans)

Best food reference (in regard to Onew of SHINee):

Onew- he's adorable, he's sweet, he's kind of awkward, he loves chicken (and I do too), and his voice is amazing; though he's quiet, he's a good leader.

Most emblematic authenticity argument:

What are MY favourite groups and why?

Well .... I love mostly YG's lol. BigBang&2NE1. 2NE1, because i just love their music that they sing. I mean it's just so beautiful, and has a good feeling, it gets my emotions inside. That song ugly. It really got to me how they're calling themselves ugly. When everyone is unique, and pretty in the inside. I think their song just like gives a message to the people who think they are ugly. 2NE1 i think is just amazing, they don't care about anything. Especially Dara's hair, does she care that everyone thinks her hair is crazy no? I just love it how they all got their style, and just care about their own opinions. I love it how their different from other bands. I mean do other bands have the guts to call themselves ugly in a song? Narhh they don't! 2ne1 sings sad songs, and even their hyper songs have some feeling and emotion init for some reason !

BigBang, GOSH where do i start. Well most of the reasons are in 2NE1, some of them are not very attractive. But they don't care too, do they lolz. Bigbang's music is just A-MAZIN-G! I love their new album Alive. I like Fantastic Baby, the most yes because it's hyper. But through all the drama they went through, this is like the song that just says to me ' WOW BIGBANG IS BACK!'. With all the drama, u wud think BigBang's party-songs are gone. I love BLUE though, its like a starting-new fresh song if you get me. Like the songs 'i'm sing my bluee-oo' the songs feeling just makes me think their syaing bye to the drama and starting fresh and stuff like that. Bad Boy was like wow. I didn't understand the meaning of it, but it was a good song. What i like the most about them both is that they only got a few members! I can easily remember the members now. Bigbang - 5Members (TAEYANG, T.O.P, G-DRAGON, DAESUNG, SEUNGRI) 2NE1 - 4Members (PARK BOM, SANDARA PARK, MINZY, CL)

Anyone reading this can answer in the comments, if you'd like, even if you are Korean. How does one define "Non-Korean" anyway? I'd say that I'm non-Ukrainian, non-Belarussian, non-Russian, non-Polish, non-Austrian, nonshtetl, non-European, non-Yiddish, etc., though I could claim all those ethnicities (or whatever) under certain circumstances. By the way, the first-released (though unauthorized) version of "Tell Me Your Wish (Genie)" was not by SNSD but by an Uzbek. Not that Uzbekistan is anywhere near the Ukraine. But it's closer to the Ukraine than to Korea.

"Dineyra - Raqsga tushgin uzbek song" (Watch on YouTube)

Comments

[skyecaptain.livejournal.com]

I would say that "Jumping" works the same way freestyle tends to work, which is unpredictably and with a kind of contrapuntal emotional action. The backing makes me move, focus, while the emotions creep in unexpectedly. And, like freestyle, I've never gotten used to how that emotion (or when that emotion) creeps in. There's some relationship to a context of abundance, I suppose, but actually it's more like a context of ambush -- the way it compels movement preps me not for emotional impact, but emotional hijacking. I remember a description that Michael Freedberg (linked here: http://koganbot.livejournal.com/109530.html) made about house music's relationship to 50's rock n roll. My sense is that the experiential impact of house music is often lost on me, maybe because of its relative sophistication in terms of my own musical references. It's too easy to tune out. Freestyle and K-pop both take the best of the house groove, which may be in part the way the music is made and in part the fact that I don't understand the lyrics much of the time (I sang along to "Jumping" as "Chompin' chompy chompin' yeah," an earnest take on Ke$ha's "Cannibal" -- I only chomp YOU!). But it layers that extra thing, usually through the performance, that pierces the more experiential pleasure, turns it into something else. I think this is what I refer to when I talk about the "intellectual--visceral" axis -- and what I'm saying is that the "emotional" emerges as a kind of reverberation from that axis, like when the Magic Eye picture finally starts to pop out (except that, crucially, and unlike a Magic Eye, what pops out is not the focus, it just recontextualizes the prettiness that was there in the first place).