How can mass culture empower people?: Girls' Generation and k-pop

Today especially I would like to recommend you one of the most popular and my favorite k-pop girl group, Girls’ Generation, and their song “I Got a Boy”. But at first, let us investigate the background of this unique music genre, k-pop.

K-pop (abbreviation of Korean-pop) is a music genre originated from South Korea that is characterized by the integration of foreign musical style with Korean musical elements. It covers a wide variety of pop music including hip-hop, electronic, rock, R&B, dance-pop, and ballad. Largely incorporated American popular music styles like rap, rock, hip-hop, and techno in their music, k-pop artists use catchy lyrics and dance moves, memorable choruses, and brilliant stage performance to storm Korean audiences. In 1992 the successful debut of Seo Taiji & Boys brought more audience awareness to K-pop, especially teenagers, which later led to the emergence of a wave of young idol groups or bands.

Not satisfied with only the South Korean market, K-pop music artists are interested in spreading their music and dance to other regions of the world such as Asia, Middle East, Europe, and the Americas. There are also several instances where foreign songwriters, dance composers, and music producers are composing songs and dance for k-pop artists. For example, Teddy Riley produced K-pop girl group Girls’ Generation’s “The Boy” for their first English single and first international release in 2012. This mix of foreign and local songwriting styles has really helped k-pop artists in furthering their success in promoting in the global market.

Although fuelled with dreams and hopes, several singers at first did not make a successful debut in the global mainstream market. But recently, marked by the popularity of the release of PSY’s “Gangnam Style” which accumulated over 1.7 billion views on Youtube, k-pop music and dance is proven to be accepted by Western music market. Several other milestones attained by other k-pop bands and artists include Wonder Girls’ successful single “Nobody” and its entering of the US Billboard Hot 100 music chart, Girls’ Generation’s successful single “Gee” surpassing more than 100 million views and their announcement of their first world tour after 5 years since debut. Through hooky lyrics, fusion of both singing and rap, colorful visual, mixture of Western and Korean music style, perfectly synchronized and easy-to-learn dance moves and complex gestures, great live performance, k-pop is taking a big stand in the global music market.

Girls’ Generation is a nine-member girl group formed by S.M. Entertainment in 2007. The group gained immediate attention at the beginning of their career with their debut song "Into the New World". Following their debut in 2007, the girls have become a significant figure in k-pop music industry, with music critics honoring them as the representative figure of South Korean culture and k-pop music. In their second year since debut, in 2009, with the strong hit songs "Gee" and "Genie", they have become the most popular girl group in Korean music industry. Particularly the song "Gee" was named as South Korea's "Song of the Decade". Following up with a series of best-selling hit songs such like "Oh", "Run Devil Run", "Hoot", "Mr. Taxi", "The Boys" and this year "I Got a Boy", the group has solidified their stand in k-pop industry. Their immense popularity in their native South Korea, Asia, and growing popularity in Europe and the Americas has earned them titles "The Nation's Singers" and "The Nation's Girl Group" in South Korea. Thus Forbes has ranked them the first place the most powerful and influential celebrity in South Korea in 2011 and 2012 and second place in 2010 and 2013. On January 1, 2013, the girls released their fourth album "I Got a Boy". The album sold more than 265000 copies in January and topped not only the South Korean album chart, but also many world Billboard's album charts, such as the rank of the number-one spot on the World Album chart.

The title track "I Got A Boy", differed from their previous songs and many other k-pop songs, is an electronic dance song with a mixture of many different elements from different musical genres such as pop, retro, and urban. The song is about the girls falling in love with a handsome man and their worries about how to build a good relationship. Interchanging between members singing and rapping, each rhythmic or beat change in the song represents a different love story told from the members' perspectives. Adding to the complex organization of the choreography, this song receives different reactions. Some find it difficult to understand each beat change and their necessary and some find it interesting to watch. But I can guarantee that this is one of those songs that you may find it weird at first but stay in your mind forever after listening to it for a couple of times and you will just love it like I do.
Billboard released a review for this song and praised it as "one of the most-forward thinking lead pop singles heard in any country" for its intense mix of different sounds and melodies. Thus, Grantland.com ranked "I Got a Boy" first in its "Songs of the Week" article and Amos Barshad mentioned this song as an example of k-pop break into the American music industry along with PSY's "Gangnam Style". Also Beating the record of PSY's "Gangnam Style", the girls' "I Got A Boy"surpassed over 10 million views in barely 55 hours upon release on Youtube. It was the fastest k-pop music video in history to make such a record. Below is their music video of the song "I Got A Boy".

Also attached to this post are some live performances of their best-selling songs. They are "Gee", "Genie", "Oh", "Hoot", "The Boys" and "I Got a Boy".