open discussion

Open Discussion (April 24, 2022)

Posted on by 98 Comments

Open DiscussionIt’s Sunday, which means it’s time to end the week with an open discussion post!

To keep things civil, there are a few rules:

  1. Be kind and respectful to one another. Any harassing language will be deleted.
  2. This is not a place to state what you don’t like about me and/or my blog. Move elsewhere, trolls.
  3. Video/gif/image embedding is totally fine. Just try to limit yourself to a couple per comment. Otherwise my moderation filter goes crazy.

Each week, I’ll open with a question to get the conversation going. Feel free to chat about anything, but if you’re not sure what to write you can use this question as a starting point.

This week’s question:

What’s the first K-pop song you ever heard? And, which song “hooked” you on K-pop?

98 thoughts on “Open Discussion (April 24, 2022)”

  1. For me, the first K-pop song I ever heard was probably SNSD’s Gee, back when that was the viral hit everywhere.

    I dabbled here and there after that, but I think the songs that ultimately hooked me were EXO’s History and Mama. I remember loading my playlist with their debut album and PSY’s Six Rules for a long drive home and basically having a transcendent experience that led me immediately down the rabbit hole. Haven’t looked back since!

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  2. Curious where the convo goes…

    for me…

    First was GD and Top “Knock Out” and followed quickly by 2NE1 “I am the Best.” That era of YG was well documented on America hipster music publications (pitchfork) so I caught it.

    I was hooked by BTS’s “Boy w luv” and TXT’s “Crown” and “Cat and Dog” really hooked lined and sinkered it for me.

    Relatively new fan, but been interested and aware for a while!!

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  3. Like a lot of people, the first K-Pop song I heard is Gangnam Style. Shocker, shocker lol. Anyway, that didn’t hook me unto K-Pop yet.

    It wasn’t until 2016 that I consider these three songs dear to my heart for hooking me a little more into K-Pop: BTS’ Fire and Dope, and EXID’s Up & Down.

    I wasn’t deep into K-Pop during that time, but those three songs had me thinking, “actually, K-Pop has some awesome songs!”

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  4. The first song I ever heard was “gee” by snsd. My sister showed me them. Can’t remember which song hooked me at first, but since I was mostly just a snsd fan it was probably one of their tracks. “oh” “gee” or “genie

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    • Actually, now that think about it, KARA’s “pandora” and Apink’s “My MY”/ “Hush” were what hooked me to KPOP rather than just SNSD lol

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  5. First song was sorry sorry but I only got hooked after SHINee’s Hello and Replay. I lost interest for a while during SHINee’s 2 year but then I heard b1a4’s what’s happening and bts’ danger and got into KPop again

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  6. Yes, of course, the first ever K-pop song I heard was Gangnam Style, but I’m one of those who actually did know it was K-pop. I know many consider it a meme and a dance craze and let it end at that, but I genuinely actually love the song more.

    The song that hooked me must either be PSY’s Daddy or BTS’ Not Today. A few weeks later, How You Like That released, and I remember it just straight up being my favorite song for quite a bit of time. If only I’d known better………..

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  7. So back in 2009 I was a big Milan Stankovic stan, and idk how it started but he somehow got involved in a beef with kpop cos he claimed G-Dragon was jacking his look or something (or the other way around its been 84 years). So I was like wtf is kpop and somehow landed on Super Junior. Didn’t really care for them at the time (warmed up to them around a year later) but found other acts like SHINee. I think the first group I ever considered myself a “stan” of was 4Minute.

    I don’t remember specific songs cos it’s been so long I just remember the vibes and feelings I got. My only interaction with pop music was Europop, mostly Balkan, and Jpop acts like Perfume so it was a completely new experience to discover kpop.

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    • I am Newbie when it comes to Kpop, it was never really on my radar until 2020. Until friends of my teenage daughter kept playing BTS Boys with Luv and at the beginning I thought what most grown ups in Europe think when they first see a Kpop video… Why do they all look like teenagers? Whats with the hair and why are boys wearing make up and jewellery??
      But then I came across BTS Black Swan MV and that was it. That was the MV that got me into Kpop. From there I went on a journey of disovery and Kpop is really a big hobby of mine now. I moved on from BTS (but still love their older stuff) and discovered that there is so, so much excellent music coming out of Korea, not just Kpop there is KRock, HipHop, Rap, Indie, R/B you name it its all there. There is so much that it can get a bit overwhelming. I also find frustrating as I cannot find anybody I can nerd about it or go to concerts with. My daughter thinks Kpop is mega lame (not enough bad language or angsty and Xrated lyrics) and my friends just give me this blank look when I tell them.
      Nick, maybe you need to to a open disussion on how to deal with the fact you like Kpop but grew up with Duran Duran, The Cure, Kate Bush and yes Janet!

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  8. I think I came across Lucifer around 2011 when I was just a little kid but Gangnam Style would probably be the song that I would consider my “first” k-pop since it was literally everywhere it came out.

    But the song that hooked me onto K-pop was probably Blood Sweat and Tears. My mate kept going on about DNA when it came out and so I decided to check BTS out. Loved DNA on first listen but fell head over heels for Blood Sweat and Tears.

    And the rest is history lmao.

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  11. Technically it was Gangnam Style. But the first kpop song I heard and knew it was kpop was Dynamite. Mainly cuz i saw it trending on twitter during the release date and got curious. The one that hooked me was probably Blackpink’s D4 like late 2020 after I watched their netflix documentary.

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  12. thank you, Nick….this is an excellent question and one that brings back a lot of beautiful kpop memories for me….i never will forget at the end of 2013 i was looking at some videos on Youtube and on the side panel, you have a long list of suggested videos to watch….i did not pay any of it much attention, at first, as was trying to concentrate on the videos and songs i was listening to, but for some reason, a video with two pretty Asian women kept popping up as i clicked from video to video….

    i finally decided to stop for a few minutes and check out that video….keep in mind, prior to this, i had no knowledge of kpop at all….clicking on that video was something that changed my musical life forever….i was in awe of all the beautiful women, the different and inviting sound of kpop….it was amazing!….i stopped everything else i was doing and had to have watched that video close to 20 times, writing down the names of the groups and songs i really caught on to so that i could open another window and watch the actual videos….almost every group on that year-end ranking i liked….

    many of the groups from that video are no longer active, but that video at the end of 2013 made me very thirsty to find out more about this phenomenon called kpop, and i researched and listened to more and more kpop groups and artists over the next several days until i was a fan….

    the first kpop song i ever heard was C-REAL’s “No No No” and i absolutely loved it and still do love it to this day….like i said, after that video i clicked on, and searching for more kpop songs and groups, i came across After School’s “First Love”….upon being hypnotized by Nana’s radiant beauty and Kaeun’s sexy appeal, i’d say it was “First Love” for me….then, the very next month, January 2014, a group called AOA released “Miniskirt” and it was a wrap for me after that….if C-REAL got me to listening to kpop, and After School made me want a lot more, then it was definitely AOA that got me hooked on kpop….Choa munchin on that strawberry in “Miniskirt”….damn!

    -t. bumbo

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    • Dammit! I’ve re-watched that video 3 times now and I’m depressed. I know every song in the video and about 85% of them are still in my playlists.

      I hate to be “that” guy, but those were the days…

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      • no shame, my friend….because all i can do is cry when i go back to that video to remember that precious time that i came into kpop….most of the groups on that video are no longer active….some of my favorites are no longer a group: Spica (my all-time second favorite female kpop group) and Girls’ Generation (well, they may as well have disbanded….we have not heard a peep from them in 5 years, but nonetheless, GG is still my #1 all-time favorite female kpop group)….Sistar (self-explanatory), A-Pink (also self-explanatory), 9Muses (oh my Muses), After School (never really reached their peak), and AOA (what an amazingly awesome group when they were at their peak, and although I know there are supposedly 3 members left….well, what exactly can we expect from them?)….these were groups who were in my top 10 favorite female kpop groups….i also like many more groups in that video: Chocolat, C-REAL, Tahiti, Stellar, and more….

        for me, nothing compares to that 2012-2013 era….

        thanks for your thoughts and comments….

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  13. The first kpop I ever heard was gangnam style obviously. But the first song I consciously heard was Fake love in 2019. And the song that seriously got me hooked was EXO’ Obsession and Moonbyul’s Eclipse.

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  14. Gangnam style, maybe. I didn’t get into kpop through it, but I did like it a lot. It’s cool now that Psy is coming back after all these years, lol.

    Blackpink got me interested in Kpop, but Shinee got me “hooked”. Sherlock’s chorus is good and thus, ascended me. In heaven, Yves looked the song up for me and guided me towards your post – you also stanned the chorus, “This is the MOMENT”.

    The song kept me occupied for a few months before I became CURIOUS for more.

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  15. I’m absolutely abysmal at recalling my childhood but this is such a great question so I’m gonna try my best here lol. I was in my later years of primary (elementary) school when I first started getting tutored by a family friend and she was a huge fan of Korean media at the time. This was 2009 (a massive year for the Hallyu wave) and I distinctly remember her introducing me to SHINee’s Ring Ding Dong first, then it was Gee and Sorry Sorry shortly after.

    From that moment, I was pretty much listening to only SM artists for three years. I’d say I cemented my love for the kpop as a whole when I stumbled across an Asian pop program on a local television channel and witnessed INFINITE’s The Chaser for the first time. Sungyeol in that MV was quite literally everything I wanted to be (LOL) and thankfully my interest in kpop had a really positive effect on my body image and confidence heading into my later high school years. Mama, Catch Me, and Tried to Walk also defined that year for me and there was certainly no looking back at that point.

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  16. First one I *remember* hearing is Wonder Girls’ “Nobody.”
    Wait, actually it was this song called “Answer The Phone” by Shim Mina.
    I dunno how, but somehow it became something of a hit in the Philippines.
    But I will confess I never knew who sang it until years later, and most people back home weren’t even aware it was a Korean song!
    A few songs that became big in my country (or at least the ones my roommates were singing) around that time (mostly my college years):

    Girls’ Generation – “Gee”
    2NE1 – “I Don’t Care”
    Super Junior – “Sorry Sorry”
    SHINee – “Ring Ding Dong”
    U-KISS – “Round and Round (yeah idk how tbh lol)”
    PSY – “Gangnam Style” (because of course)

    Years later Momoland’s “BBoom BBoom” became pretty big too mostly because of people noting a resemblance between Nancy and a local actress (which I honestly don’t see but whatever).

    I may have missed a few, but these are the ones I really remember right now.

    As for what really got me hooked? Dreamcatcher – “You and I.”
    I mean I was slowly getting pushed into it because of colleagues and my sister being fans of Twice, but one night over dinner my sister mentioned a K-Pop group that sounded like J-Pop. I put it at the back of my mind to listen to them but forgot the name, so a week later, I asked her again, then looked them up on YouTube. “You and I” was the first thing I heard and I was basically immediately sold. The rest is history.

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  17. The first K-pop song I ever heard was the iconic ‘Gangnam Style’ by Psy, but uh… I didn’t know that was K-pop lol. I even heard and enjoyed BTS’ ‘Dope’ a lot back when I was an ‘animatic kid’ and I didn’t know that was K-pop! (Psst, any fellow animation nerds anyone here who knows GinjaninjaOWO’s Dope multi-animator project??)

    The first song I knew that was K-pop was Boyfriend’s ‘Janus’, thanks to a good friend of mine who introduced it to me. It didn’t hooked me into K-pop immediately, but it definitely got me intrigued on how wonderfully composed it was! Bless Sweetune.

    Now, the actual song that got me ‘hooked’ into K-pop was Pentagon’s ‘Like This’. Back then where I never thought of who created the songs, I was so impressed at the idea of an artist taking charge in their compositions. Plus the fact I got a good first impression on Pentagon’s music that I decided to become a fan.

    2 years later since I’ve fallen into the K-pop hole since and still follow K-pop (though a little less intense nowadays haha)

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  18. my first kpop song that i heard was definitely sorry sorry, back then it was played on the radio. but the song that really got me hooked was 2ne1’s i don’t care. i’ve been a fan of kpop ever since, rotating between 2nd gen/3rd gen artists especially girl groups. as of now i really only love 3rd gen girl groups and exo, with the exception of some 4th gen girl groups like stayc and loona!

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  19. Fairly recent K-pop fan here!

    First K-pop song I heard was probably Gangnam Style, but the first K-pop song I heard and I did actually mentally connect to the idea of K-pop was probably Blackpink’s D4. At that point, I knew who BTS and Blackpink were, but didn’t care for them at all (and maybe was even a little anti-K-pop at the time lmao). I think the song that ended up hooking me was Twice’s Fancy and Feel Special, both of which I checked out when Feel Special dropped and one of my friends couldn’t stop singing it. I liked them so much I ended up learning the full choreo for both 😂 (this is also around when I started getting into dance, so seeing all these fun choreos was a big part of hooking me in too). I think I really ended up solidifying my interest in K-pop when Itzy’s Wannabe dropped and I LOVED it (little did I know that Itzy would never (as of yet) drop a better song 😔). And of course by then the pandemic hit and I was free to spend way too much time delving deeper.

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  20. I remember I had listened to one or two kpop songs before gangnam style came out but I’m not sure which? I remember hearing about shinee when in maybe 2011 through a dress up website (they had shinee merch in the in-game store lol) so I remember looking them up and seeing the ring ding dong thumbnail but I’m not sure i actually listened to it.

    I know what got me hooked on kpop though, I started actually listening to it after hearing overdose by exo and 2ne1’s crush album in 2014-2015 (+ some bts in late 2015/early 2016), then became a more active listener in 2016 when I became friends with a couple of people getting into kpop through groups like exid. It’s kinda funny to see how much my taste has changed considering the only group among these 4 I’d say I still listen to semi-often is exo, though in the case of exid/2ne1 thats also partly because theyre just… not exactly releasing music atm

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  21. If we don’t count Gangnam Style, my first k-pop experience was Callin by ACE. I saw one of their street dance video and I subscribed to their channel because I thought it was cool… but I had no idea they were actually singers. When the Callin MV appeared on my feed I had no idea that it would lead me into the k-pop universe

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  22. my first kpop song was nobody by wonder girls! i was pretty young at the time when i first heard it but the “nobody nobody but you” *clap* *clap* stuck with me pretty strongly for some reason, although i didnt know it was kpop at the time. After that i recall crooked by g-dragon, and of course gangnam style, to which both i also did not know was kpop. It was just the choruses that was so memorable. The first time i went consciously looking for kpop was fire by bts, because they were rising rapidly at the time (2017?) and then the hyyh albums got me hooked. After that i just expanded to whatever was popular at the time, looking into those “iconic songs every kpop fan must know” kind of videos HAHAHA. Looked more into 2nd gen and i now have a collection of a 1000+ kpop songs and counting downloaded to which i just hit shuffle on

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  23. If i was to be super technical I think the first kpop song i ever heard was Gangnam Style when I was in high school and it went viral but I dont really count that as I did not even know it was a kpop song then.

    My first true kpop song and the song that hooked me was Shinee’s Tell Me What To Do, which remains one of my favorite title tracks ever. In early 2018 a random youtube recomendation lead me down the kdrama rabbit hole and I was immediately hooked. I devoured new shows at a rapid pace for about five months before I stared watching one called Hwarang. That show had Shinee’s Minho and BTS’s V as cast members and because I google every actor I watch in anything I found my way to Minho’s wiki page. I remember being surprised by how crazy long his page was and that most of his work was with some boy band called Shinee. I was curious so I went to youtube and just typed in Shinee and Tell Me What To Do popped up first, probably because it was their most recent korean comeback at the time. I watched it and fell in love with that song instantly. I dont think at any point in my entire life have I replayed a song more than that one when I first found it. From there I fell for all of Shinee, watching music show stages, tokyo dome concerts, explored their extensive discography, and just in time to catch my first ever kpop comeback with The Story of Light. Four years later and I have grown to love many groups and songs but no one has ever topped Shinee for me, and I cant imagine anyone ever will.
    Looking back sometimes it almost feels like fate because if I am being totally honest I have never been into BTS at all and had I looked up V before Minho in the cast list of that show I wonder if I would have become a fan the way I did or even at all. It’s funny how things work out sometimes but i guess thats the beauty of it, you never know what seemingly little moments might change you in such a big way.

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  25. ZE:A Ghost of the Wind was my first real kpop song. It came right after I binged watched The Moon Embracing the Sun on Netflix then googled around in youtube for kpop. Rawr, Kim Soo Hyun, Jung Il Woo, and featuring a young Im Siwan from ZE:A. Also Kim Dong Jun of ZE:A may as well be The Moon’s Han Ga In’s twin brother.

    Fun fact, Im Siwan can play violin too. Here is the ult theatrical rendition, with mostly live live vocals.

    Funny thing is, although I love it, the whole song is pitched too low for the whole group. The verses are in the baritone register and the boys do as best as they can with no baritones. But you can hear in the mostly live live version how they hit the notes in tune but the volume is really soft. And the audio guy never pushes up those levers on the left side up enough to compensate. I just want to go over there and push them up every time.

    Pft, whatev, enjoy.

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    • First Korean Drama to put me into hunter/seeker mode was Dream High; followed almost immediately by Dream High 2. Half of the Dream High 2 OST album ended up in my playlists for the longest time. “Hello to Myself” (Yenny-HA:TFELT) & “Together” (JB & Jiyeon) still are.

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      • Dream High OST is a serious guilty pleasure for me. Kim Soo Hyun, singing and dancing. Also, Ok Taecyeon, yes please. And let us not forget Bae Suzy who has a really clean pure voice that is so easy to listen to.

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        • I want them to play Ghost of Wind at the Olympic closing ceremonies if SK hosts them again. I want to all those young athletes bopping to that epic chorus.

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  26. I first heard Gangnam Style when it was the big thing, but I was pretty young back then and it didn’t make much of an impression on me.

    Fast forward to 2018. Some people made me listen to Fake Love by BTS and… I didn’t really like it. You see, I was something of a “purist” with music and sparkly men dancing around didn’t count as “real” music for me. So for a long time, I refused to listen to any K-Pop. THEN I came across Idol and all my old rules about what music should be like went right out the window. I mean, for a long time, I tried to deny to myself that I liked it, even though I listened to the song all day long. But a few months later, I had to admit it to myself… and it was a hell of a ride since then. I started with BTS, and then slowly branched off to listen to other groups as well.

    So in conclusion: my first song technically was Gangnam Style by PSY, but the song that got me hooked was Idol by BTS.

    Yes, I’m not proud of my anti-Kpop days lol.

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  27. Other than gangnam style, the first kpop song I ever heard was twice’s Likey, back in 2017. In 2018 “oh” by snsd was one of my favorite songs so i guess it’s the song that got me “hooked,” since none of my other favorites had been kpop songs at that time.

    I guess i could say that “fancy” by twice or “boy with luv” by bts also got me hooked, as they were the songs i was hearing the most by the time i had decided to actually consider myself as a “kpop fan” and not just “a person who sometimes listens to and likes kpop”

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  28. My first song would be Gangnam Style, but I was pretty young at the time and didn’t even know what Kpop was. Other than that, the first Kpop song I heard was Blackpink’s Ddux4. Maybe a year after that, random covers of it kept popping up, and the song finally ended up pulling me into Blackpink and then Kpop as a whole (yeah, I’m fairly new).

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  29. Hi!! The first KPop song I listened to (besides Gangnam Style lol) was Airplane Pt. 2 by BTS, and it immediately got me hooked. The first time I heard it was on The Ellen Show and I thought BTS were so funny and charming! I know Airplane pt. 2 isn’t one of their more popular tracks but for me, it’s the reason I got into the world of KPop.

    My BTS phase lasted roughly a year, then they started releasing their English tracks and I couldn’t help but drift away. Then suddenly in early 2021 I heard Call Me Baby by EXO and was hooked on them, which led to becoming a fan of other groups too, like NCT, RV, and Twice. But today, EXO is still my favorite. Congrats to Chen on his discharge!!

    Thank you Nick for this question, it was fun to reminisce 🙂

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      • Given that you’re posting about that today, I trust it worked out well for you, so congratulations on vanquishing that beast. /headbow

        As for myself, I was malnourished from years of unpalatable western music, so K-Pop was the sustenance my body was craving. I just didn’t count on the joyous fevers that came with it. Oh, and the nosebleeds. Lots and lots of nosebleeds.

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  32. Gee from snsd. Monty Oum made a video with all the girls from his dead fantasy series dancing to it and that is how i got into kpop

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  33. Ooooh, this is difficult to answer. My memory is shoddy to begin with even just with 19 years of living, so I can’t fully say what the first k-pop song that I knew.

    That said, I live in the Philippines and k-pop got its hooks into that country pretty early with 2NE1 and Wonder Girls. The first song was either Fire, I Don’t Care, Come Back Home or Nobody. Probably Nobody to be honest, but honestly these four are very nostalgic for some reason, so probably happened in childhood.

    What hooked me into k-pop was Russian Roulette by Red Velvet.

    Though, in truth Carly Rae Jepsen and by extension Todd In the Shadows was how I got into pop. He recommended the pop queen herself in one of his videos, by which I discovered r/popheads, a subreddit of pop whose existence was made because of Carly Rae Jepsen, which led me to discovering k-pop through one of their ranking threads and the winner of the Girl Groups K-Pop Singles battle was “Russian Roulette” and the rest is history. Truthfully, I don’t think it should’ve won now that I know a LOT more about K-pop but hey, it got me into k-pop.

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    • Hmm, I should elaborate that last part a bit more. Actually, Taylor Swift is what got me into pop (everyone in school seemed obsessed and turns out I liked it too), where I discovered Todd In The Shadows, who then introduced me to Carly Rae Jepsen, where I ended up discovering r/popheads, which then led me to actually paying attention k-pop.

      As a kid, my sister made us dance to Russian Roulette but I never actually cared about it because I just didn’t care about pop music at the time. Wasn’t until high school where I started actively liking pop enough to accept k-pop (I also realized I was gay and loved dance so that probably helped), so by the time I got to listen to Russian Roulette once more, I had gotten rid of all those weird pretensions I had as a kid and voila, here we are.

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  34. here is the article that really introduced me to K-pop

    https://pitchfork.com/features/article/8700-to-anyone-the-rise-of-korean-wave/

    also I’m remembering that Elite Gymnastics (defunct Canadian synth pop group) would put K-pop in their mixtapes.

    https://www.thefader.com/2011/08/09/elite-gymnastics-made-a-mix-and-it-is-hard-to-figure-out

    this one is crazy because it has Kahee, Girl’s Day, Afterschool and IU…which for the time (2011) pretty hard for American’s/Canadian’s to hear about.

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    • sorry to keep double posting…but this quote from the pitchfork article

      ” This music can be flat, derivative, and sometimes really, really annoying. It can also deliver the kind of senses-shattering, hands-in-the-air euphoria that’s a defining marker of great pop.”

      It’s funny this quote is from 2011, over 10 years ago, because I think this currently applies to the current state of K-pop!

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  35. 2008: My elementary-grade Chinese school dances to a sanitized version of “Bo-Peep Bo-Peep” by T-ara

    2011: I hear 2NE1’s “I Love You” and SNSD’s “Gee” as background music for a Taiwanese dating show my mom watches

    2013: “Gangnam Style” goes viral

    2017: My kpop-adoring friend shows me CLC’s “Black Dress” and Red Velvet’s “Russian Roulette.” I think they’re okay; not really my thing.

    2019: I listen to Twice’s “Fancy” and LOVE it, actually memorizing the words so I can sing along despite not speaking Korean. I then hear Red Velvet’s “Umpah Umpah” and “Psycho,” which further hook me in.

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  36. Being of a certain age I was among many kpop lovers that first heard ‘Abracadabra’ as their first initiation to the scene LOL

    For hook I think it was so hot by Wonder Girls that had me following them but not until Dolls by Nine Muses did I feel the need to just follow girl groups as a whole and then ‘We are Bulletproof’ by BTS caught my ear but ‘No’ was the song of theirs that made me check for them/. Now I still follow mostly the girls – groups or soloists – and the HYBE guys

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  37. I think I got into K-pop because of K-dramas actually! I liked the OSTs a lot and then saw a drama by IU and her OST and then got into K-Pop. Not sure exactly of which song first got me into but I think it was BTS’s Buy wid Love. That was a good song.

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    • Dramas seem to be many people’s gateway. I can totally see how that would happen.

      Also, I’m cackling at the autocorrect for “Boy with Luv.” Have HYBE hijacked your comment for some sort of subliminal messaging? lol

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      • oh lolol, just noticed that! I wouldn’t put it past these big companies actually. With their acquisition of NFT and these avatars and what not, they would really love to get into our virtual lives lol.
        Also, FYI, I actually typed it like that because I thought they were using these weird texting short forms which became outdated some decades back I would think lol. Why do they love to complicate their titles like this? I really like TXT’s Love song but can never remember the full name.

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  38. It was Girls Generation (Gee specifically) via a indie pop blog way back when. Tried to explore kpop more at that point but the lack of subtitles and the emphasis on weight and perfection and some of the unhealthier dynamics in the industry kept me from getting too far.

    Gave it another go when I was in Korea in 2019 and got hooked by Bigbang, which was terrible timing on my part, but you can’t help the music you like. And that lead to AKMU and Epic High and many more.

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  39. Definitely Nobody by the Wonder Girls. I was seven, I think, and didn’t know K-Pop existed. I first heard it when a concert in my Christian kindergarten played it and afterwards spent my time learning the moves as much as I could. Hell, when I saw this performance I thought I was watching J-Pop and it was only a few years later I realised they were a K-Pop group.

    But I didn’t really get into K-Pop until Fantastic Baby. The kids at one of my tuition centres loved playing it during break time.

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  40. Aside from PSY’s “Gangnam Style”, my first k-pop song is “Save Me” by BTS. The MV was on recommended one hot summer day in 2016 and I decided to watch it. And I loved it a lot.

    It was BTS’s first win at the BBMA’s a year later that got me to dig in to BTS’s discography and k-pop in general. Although I don’t listen to their songs as often as before, I still have a soft spot for BTS being my gateway into the k-pop world and how they stood out.

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  41. So let’s get into this!

    My first K-Pop song was TVXQ’s Mirotic, which I listened to back in 2010/11. Despite the song being a much-deserved classic in my books now, I was actually quite unimpressed with the band (embarrassing…), though Changmin’s high-note interested me… Same with Junus’s fluid dancing.

    As a dancer, my favorite songs were those with the best dance versions, which is why it took me so long to give Sorry Sorry a chance lol. It also meant SHINee and Super Junior got me into K-Pop. I was the last in my family to appreciate the genre, and I don’t think one song hooked me. It was more a mix of four, SHINee’s Hello and Love Like Oxygen (I will defend Hello till the bitter end), both of which are remakes lol. Super Junior’s Super Girl and Bonamana also played a part. It would be only a bit of time before I would get into TVXQ though (Break Out interested me in them).

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    • Wait, holdup. 108ent dancer? :O
      Dancer 108ent era when??

      Ok all kidding aside, that’s cool you do dancing (regardless if you study it or as a hobby)! Do you still dance today?

      And also I find it ironic you were initially not impressed with Mirotic, and then years later you’re a big fan of TVXQ!. K-pop works in mysterious ways, huh?

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      • Haha, trust me, it isn’t as impressive as it sounds. I took a few dance classes back in the day, and was not too bad at it. I still love a good choreo, though I probably dance like a dying chicken lol. Most K-Pop choreos are not too challenging, but I recently tried Taemin’s Move, and golly is it the most difficult dance I have ever done! Easy to do, hard to do right haha!

        It could be that K-Pop works in mysterious ways, or that my family (all Cassies btw) showed me more of their songs, and I slowly grew to appreciate them. And besides, Changmin’s voice and Junsu’s dance had me kinda interested to see what they could do in the future.

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        • Taemin’s Move is deceptively hard, as you aren’t moving much, but moving the right wave with a certain groove. Its about tension and release. A lanky looseness that is strangely controlled.

          There is the little shuffle skip step he does in “Advice”, its just little thing but great.

          Max Changmin is a similar dancer, but because he is taller and skinnier (somehow), he has a more string bean effect. Here is an oldie but goodie. He out dances SuJu on their own songs. ‘https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AFyckv9s_jQ

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  42. Long time reader making my first (and hopefully not last) post on here!

    For me, my dive into KPOP came in waves. Like many, Gangnam Style was the first KPOP song I heard. But honestly…I didn’t connect PSY or the song to what I now consider to be “KPOP.”

    A few years later, I listed to a few solo songs by Rain, Hoya, and Taeyang. I enjoyed them, but it still hadn’t registered in my mind that I was listening to KPOP.

    Finally in 2017, I checked out Blackpink. Between their music videos and live performances, I became a fan! However, I didn’t think I would get into any other groups. In particular, I remembered watching “Red Flavor” by Red Velvet and feeling like I just couldn’t connect with them (the interview scenes with the fruits and the production of the song threw me for a loop).

    Things changed with “Perfect Velvet” and, in particular, “Peek-A-Boo.” The entire video had me in awe. After watching it, I immediately looked up their comeback stages and grew even more excited. Finally, I decided to listen to the album one day at work and was blown away. The experience of hearing a body of work in another language that resonated with me was so special.

    By the middle of 2018, two more albums made a similar mark on me:

    – Love Yourself: Tear by BTS
    – Everyday by Winner

    Add in another Red Velvet comeback with “Bad Boy” and discovering EXO through the Olympics and the rest is history!

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  44. For me, the first song that introduced me to Kpop was Nobody by Wonder Girls. Everyone was singing the English version everywhere!! But the true songs that got me into the Kpop fandom was in fact not even a Korean song but I was hooked to SJJD Paparrazi (aka SNSD) and then later Twinkle, Holler and Lion Heart got me sold to Girls Generation and that started my journey.

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  46. how you like that. i know it’s a weird one but that song is KILLER and i will be standing by her side FOREVER! i do not care what anyone says!!!

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  47. funnily enough, my dad was a huge kim jong kook fan back when he was on xman / family outing so my first exposure to kpop would probably be turbo’s cyber lover!

    in terms of the song that really got me into kpop, it’s super junior m’s super girl! still a bop to this day 🙂

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  48. The first song for me was 100% “DNA” by BTS. I remember mutual friends telling me they were huge fans in 2017 and looking up the band immediately, then pretty much ignoring them for years after I watched it.

    Later I got hooked on Blackpink a year ish ahead with D4 (obviously), but the song that really, really got me sucked into Kpop for good was (full-circle moment for me) DNA again. Huge army phase, then I really started delving into more groups. Glad it made that much of an impression on me haha!

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  49. My first kpop song ever was SNSD’s Genie. It was in 2010/2011 when I heard it playing through the speaker at a local mall. I was around 10 back then with my parents and I directly got hooked! Asked my parents to buy the CD and we brought it home lol.

    They are my first kpop group, first kpop song (Genie), first bias (Taeyeon), first physical albums (Run Devil Run and Hoot), and even after years that’s why they always have a special spot in my heart

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  50. The Kpop craze in the Philippines started as early as 2008. I didn’t even know Wonder Girls “Nobody” was a Kpop song, so I think it was the first Kpop song I heard in my childhood. I remember there was a video of a prisoner dance group performing them and it became a hit in the country, then Kpop became even more popular in the country when 2NE1 debuted, Sandara Park (Dara) was there and our country was so proud to have her debuted into a Korean group and we celebrated her debut. Following that there came a series 2nd gen wave, I remember SHINee’s Ring Ding Dong, Super Junior’s Sorry Sorry, 4MINUTE’s Hot Issue, SNSD’s Oh! and Gee, SISTAR’s Push Push Push, BIGBANG’s Fantastic Baby, and PSY’s Gangnam Style circulating on television and the radio.

    I remember fading out from the 2nd gen K-pop as I focused more on retro, indie, and Western sounds as during 2010-2014 almost all K-pop groups sounded and looked the same to me. Few years later, it was about 2016/2017 when one my classmates introduced me to BTS during their Wings era, but I never fully dived into K-pop until I listened to their “Spring Day”. It was a wake-up call to me that K-pop wasn’t just a manufactured idol industry and that many idols have the opportunity to be this creative. Around this time I looked to past 2nd gen groups that I grown with and saw that BIGBANG was about to enlist, 2NE1 disbanded, Super Junior faded away from their peak.. its sad for me to come back only to find them disappearing as I came.

    P.S There was even a more earlier song than Wonder Girls that we didn’t know was Korean, we thought it was like Spanish, it was Mina’s “Answer the Phone” (2002) I think..

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