#I'm sorry for the 2am caffeine-induced and school inspired text post

[doiebun]

In Regards to Kpop

I apologize for the longer post in advance.

I recently realized something I think is really cool that I haven’t really seen be addressed in the Kpop community, which is a crying shame.

We are the generation of the Korean Invasion.

We are the first generation (I’m talking fans from the last decade or so) to be interested in this entirely new genre of music internationally.

People can @ me and argue with me, but this started with older groups like TVXQ, Big Bang, 2ne1, Wonder Girls, Super Junior, Girl’s Generation, T-ARA, Kara, Sistar, 2pm and 2am, etc.

These groups were the Hallyu groups that sowed the seeds of Kpop in America. The international fans of these groups were the ones who were ridiculed and hid their love of their groups. They’re the ones who never had anyone to talk to about Kpop except for people online. They’re the ones who could never hear their favorite artists on the radio or see them on TV. They were the ones who were judged not just by people on Twitter, but by people in their own lives because their music choice was different.

The fans of these Hallyu groups were the beginning, just like the Beatles’ international fans were before they became wildly known.

These first Beatles fans in the late 50s and early 60s were confined to their own little worlds from town to town, from state to state. They listened to what everyone else listened to until they discovered something new. These first fans discovered the Beatles, these weird guys making weird music out in England. They shared these guys with their friends and families and more and more people slowly liked them. Then, a concert happened and a newspaper article rocked their world and the Beatles started the British Invasion, which was the phenomenon of British artists suddenly becoming wildly popular.

Well, I consider us to be in the time of the Korean Invasion, the invasion of our generation.

Fans from the late y2k to early 2010s were those first Beatles fans. These fans watched as their “Beatles” came to America in the form of Gangnam Style by Psy and then in the form of BTS.

Now, Kpop is way more popular than ever. People used to be lucky to even have their idols step foot in America. Now, we have half of the major Kpop groups going to America every year, like BTS, NCT, EXO, Stray Kids, Twice, Red velvet, Blackpink, Monsta X, Got7, etc. (I don’t think anyone will ever forget the stress of having to choose which group to see like this last spring of 2019.)

We have idols being interviewed and shown on Buzzfeed, Good Morning America, Billboard, the AMA’s, Jimmy Kimmel, and a whole bunch of other classic American shows and outlets.

We have idols doing more and more collabs with western artists like Halsey, Steve Aoki, French Montana, Jason Derulo, Ava Max, HRVY, and many more. We have western artists acknowledging these groups as well (which isn’t necessary but is a huge deal).

We have our idols growing more and more popular in America and it’s all because of us. It’s because we demanded they be there. It’s because we supported them and showed them to the world, just like those early Beatles fans showed the Beatles to the world.

We are the new generation of a new genre in America. We are changing America, and that’s something to be proud of our idols for, as well as ourselves.

(Side note: people can argue with me abt the BTS being the Beatles of Kpop thing, but as a casual listener from 2011, to an avid fan starting in 2015, I have seen the changes in the international Kpop community and I have seen what BTS has done for Kpop. THIS DOES NOT MEAN I THINK BTS HAS GAINED THEIR FAME AND SUCCESS AND GAINED TRACTION ENTIRELY BECAUSE OF THEMSELVES. People forget the Hallyu wave existed and they shouldn’t because like I said, they sowed the seeds of the rewards that BTS and other current idols have now in America. I mean ALL IDOLS. EVERY. SINGLE. ONE. I do think that BTS’s music, style, and general existence and career was timed perfectly for America to begin truly accepting foreign music in a language other than English. This does not discredit their hard work and their growth as artists, nor does it discredit anyone else’s.)