Thanks for those articles and links, @sweetybirdtoo. Breaking into the US music business is difficult all around, but I hadn’t realized how much the industry is still divided among racial lines depending on the genre. For all of the talk and promotion of diversity these days, it surprised me that the music industry is still afraid to just properly market individuals.
As for K Pop, perhaps you are correct and the Entertainment companies didn’t want to spend the resources to try and break into the English language markets when Japan was closer and perhaps easier because they are both Asian peoples. I do not know if it is easier for Koreans to learn and speak the Japanese language as compared to English or not. I know there have been efforts by the K Pop Entertainment companies within the last 10 years or so to break into the US market, but not to the extent of releasing English language albums and marketing them. Even when a K Pop act has gained a English speaking fanbase there doesn’t seem to be any industry effort to capitalize on that and further penetrate into English speaking markets by releasing an English language album. I think proficiency in the language might be a large factor. From what I have observed, English is a difficult language to master for many non native speakers. For Koreans, you have a different alphabet and also a different grammatical structure. English has a vast vocabulary that takes a long time to master as well. I’ve noticed many times that Korean stars often have issues with English pronunciation and their accents can be very heavy so that it is difficult to clearly understand them. So perhaps many K Pop stars do not feel they are proficient enough in English to create an English language album. I don’t know. Now that BTS has firmly established a presence in US and UK markets, I would expect to see more K Pop acts on the charts for a “Korean Invasion” just like the Beatles led to a “British Invasion” of more British acts. So far it doesn’t seem to be happening. I guess we will see.
I vaguely remember watching an interview with a Korean singer (can’t remember who at this point, but I believe it was a male solo artist) who was discussing how he wanted to put just a couple lines of English lyrics in one of the songs he was writing. He thought he had done a pretty good job but then had someone in the industry who was a native speaker tell him that he got the grammatical structure all wrong. So yes, it’s a barrier. In general, though, as far as songwriting goes, the songs could all be written by native speakers, so then it just comes down to whether the members are comfortable speaking/singing in the other language and whether companies are even interested in going that route. Part of me thinks it’s only a matter of time, as the worldwide spread of Kpop continues to grow.
I also watched a video about English lyrics(MMTG’s episode with Shinee)… Shinee said Yoo Young Jin likes adding nonsensical English words that are catchy at the same time, so it keeps the kpop flavor while also having “hooks” for international fans to catch onto when they’re singing along.
Several of the songs/OSTs that I have in my collection have a line or two of English in them - often as part of the chorus which helps it be that ‘hook’ you refer to.
Not just those… have you heard weird stuff in the intros? I’m an SM fan so I kinda know Yoo Young Jin’s style(He’s one of the greatest producers in the kpop industry)… not sure if everyone uses the same tricks.
Not really, but again, I’m not terribly familiar with the Kpop scene. My exposure has really been through OSTs, idol actors, some groups I’ve seen on variety shows, and things I’ve been introduced to slowly by fellow members here in discussions.
Even though Super Junior’s Mamacita has a Latin flavour to it it still has a lot of catchy English lyrics, and if you watch for about 20sec, after Enhyuk’s rap, Shindong says something that almost makes sense, but not quite… I love this song.
