Bias & Beyond

  Apologies for the long gap between posts! I have been extremely busy with daily life here including getting ready to change jobs and hosting my sister for her first ever visit to Asia for the Seollal holidays. We are now slowly escaping the end of the extreme winter we have been having here in South Korea. At one point in January the average daily temperatures in Seoul were not creeping above -6c. For the most part I was simply trying to keep myself warm so I don’t freeze off my extremities while commuting to and from work. During one of those freezing days, I was at the gym with one of my closest friends who currently works at an entertainment company. We were on the treadmill gossiping about life when NCT 127’s Fact Check came on over the speakers. We both paused in mid conversation and ended up dancing on the treadmill, cracking up as we had realised what had happened. After our mini jam session on the treadmill, we continued as normal but a thought crossed my mind at that po...

I have a feeling that this particular article is going to ruffle a few feathers out there. And honestly, I do not care. It truly needs to be said. The more people that fear speaking out, the more it gets ignored. So, here it goes. The K-Pop industry needs to take accountability more in terms of the influence that Black American culture has had on its music. Now, here’s my disclaimer. I am not American. I am British. I have American relatives (in fact, not including those in my family who remained in the West Indies, the majority of my family on both sides either resides in or was born and raised in the States) but that is as far as my link to the Americas goes. But in the U.K. we were influenced a lot by American media so while I wouldn’t profess myself to be some sort of expert on Black American culture, I have been immersed in it somewhat. Disclaimer over. What I will say is that there are a lot of companies out there who are willing to be “influenced” by certain aspects of Black Ame...

A couple of weeks ago I started this site on the back of a conversation that I had with my personal trainer about how the nostalgia of K-Pop can be affected by actually (and finally) fully understanding the lyrics of songs from the past. I took a dive into this by looking at some of the songs from my favourite girl groups, particularly focusing on Girls Generation’s “Oh!” as a prime example of songs specifically tailored to the male gaze to drive sales and devotion to the fandom. Back then, it was a very clear divide of girl groups were for male fans and boy groups were for girls (something that took me a long while to wrap my head around as it is quite different in the west, if not completely the opposite) But hey, if the girl groups had lyrics specifically tailored to male fans to appeal to and praise them for their devotion, then the same must be true for the boy groups and their female fans right? … right? Well, yes and no. And for different reasons. Of course you had your SHINee “...

A fun little tidbit of an adventure happened to me a couple of weeks ago. I went to support my friend who was performing on stage for a K-Pop cover dance festival (shout out to you, Nat, please check out her YouTube channel here ). There was a lot of modern songs and artists that were being performed during the show such as MEOVV and ILLIT. Then, out of the blue, the intro to AOA’s Heart Attack started to play and my ears perked up. I looked at my friends and saw that they had the same surprised but excited expression that I had. THIS was the K-Pop I enjoyed! It was amusing to see that we were the only people in the audience who had this particular reaction. One of my friends commented that we had now become those aunties at parties who talk about how ‘old skool’ music was better compared to the new-fangled modern rubbish… but with K-Pop. We then started talking about what other artists would be great to see covers of and oh boy, we came up with some gems. Teen Top. Fiestar. B1A4. Rain...

As of the middle of 2025, all of the members of BTS had served their mandatory military service and were out in the wild, wild world again. ARMY (and I am sure a few media people as well) were crying, sobbing, and shaking in relief. I had a few people asking for my opinion on what I think will be the next step for them. As if I am some sort of oracle able to predict the future of what is going to be the future for one of the biggest names in K-Pop. I mean, I could hazard a few guesses but the reality is… I don’t know. When BTS really started making waves outside of Asia, they were still one of the very few to be doing so on a base level. But what made them and their promotional campaigns different was that they were the first to try and market to a widespread international market. At the time of their debut, companies were only using YouTube as a means of uploading their music videos (and the odd dance practice) on the platform, wanting to instead focus their video efforts on the homeg...

Another thing that has died out in recent years was the formulation of sub-units in K-Pop. An idea where within a main group, there would be another group containing some (not all) of the members attempting a different sound or genre to one that the group is normally known for. Since the beginning of the 4th generation, this is a concept that doesn’t really exist anymore except for pre-existing groups to suddenly debut a new duo or trio sub-unit (such as Monsta X’s HxS, the newly debuted Astro sub-unit Zoonizini, and the entire concept of NCT - these all came from 3rd gen groups.) Whether it is because companies feel that sub-units would not work with these newer gen groups is definitely a question to be asked. Personally, I think its because there is already such an influx of groups in the market right now that having a sub-unit within all of that mess would be a waste of finances and resources for a company if that group hasn’t already made one before. But I am not here to have a de...

This is something that actually came to my mind a short while ago and I had to think about it for a long time. I was chilling out listening to some classic K-Pop tracks when some classic Girls Generation (SNSD) came through as the next track. It was the classic, “Oh” which was something that I probably had not heard fully since I moved to South Korea. But in hearing the song again and enjoying the rhythms that took me back to my late 20s, I clocked the lyrics in the chorus: Oh, oh, oh, 오빠를 사랑해 Oh! Oh! Oh! Oppa I love you Ah, ah, ah, ah, 많이, 많이 해 Ah! Ah! Ah! Ah! So much, so much 수줍으니, 제발 웃지 마요 I’m shy so please don’t laugh 진심이니, 놀리지도 말아요 I’m sincere so please don’t tease me 또 바보 같은 말뿐야 Again it’s only foolish words    Oh. OH. (And no, I am not exclaiming the song title but actually realising something.) This was basically declaring their love and/or interest in a man. And that was it. After the initial shock, I sta...