Blog 1
Zoe Fogle
The music business is ever-changing and ever-expanding to include much more than just the music making and selling. In today’s digital age of streaming that has pushed record business to the side, the Korean music industry is making its way to the top with some unconventional and underutilized business techniques. At one time, the music business was more limited to and primarily focused on the sales of physical copies of albums. But that has all quickly faded and now the music isn’t everything, but rather the foundation. Instead of selling albums and songs, what’s being sold is the image, the people themselves.
The kpop labels rake in money from all sorts of things namely because the musicians aren’t just musicians, they’re idols who sing, dance and rap flawlessly and that draw people in and connect with people on a whole new level via the internet. The big companies hold auditions and take on trainees to make them over into the epitome of beauty and train them for sometimes years to speak various languages, interact with the public, perform intricate dances in perfect synchronization, and sing or rap, or often both, before putting them into groups and marketing them.
My personal favorite kpop group, Got7. They inspired me to explore the music business.
There is an entire video service used by idols to connect with fans all over the world in real time. Logging on, you’ll see hundreds of thousands of people viewing and chatting in the comments with both with each other and the artist. A paid subscription will unlock premium content only available for viewing by the select few who pay for it. Money is poured by the millions into the production of world-renowned and superior music videos that rack up millions of views in the first hours. Hype is built by releasing teaser clips and photos and the song list in the weeks leading up to release. And when the music video drops so does a fan reward schedule urging fans to stream the video and offering incentives such as dance practice videos and behind the scene clips for each milestone of views. Sometimes multiple versions of the music video are released as well as multiple music videos per album. The music industry over there has multiple weekly broadcasted television competition shows with live, paying audiences where groups come to perform their newest single and compete against each other for the top song of the week which is determined by votes, views, and sales.
CDs are seemingly out of fashion and outdated yet these groups sell hundreds of thousands of physical albums, namely because they’re marketed as collectibles and are much more than just a CD. Inside a kpop album is typically a lyric book, a photobook, a poster, and two random trading card like photos, referred to as photocards, of one particular member. People buy multiple copies of the same album in hopes of getting multiple different photocards or posters. Albums are even sold in multiple different packagings with a slight variation in content knowing that it will prompt sales as people aim to collect. Whereas many stateside artists may release one a full-length album a year or one every couple of years, the kpop industry has sped things up with the release of mini albums of just 4 to 6 or 7 songs and shortening the promotions of each so that by the time a fan has obtained the latest album and merch, another release is right around the corner. Each comeback has a new concept armed with a certain style of fashion, makeup, and music, and notably new hair colors to reel in the views, fans, and purchases. These concepts range from everything cute and bright, to pensive and brooding, to dark and sexy. For fans to keep up, money has to be spent and concerts have to be attended as soon as possible and that brings profits rolling in.
Concerts are held all over the world and tickets can be upgraded at a steep fee for what’s known as a “high-touch” or an even steeper fee for a group photo session. Artists build a community with their fans with fan meetings, fan signings, and appearances at pop-up stores where there often isn’t even a musical performance but just a chance for interaction and a sense of higher intimacy. Reality and variety shows, as well as vlogs and a barrage of social media posts and interactions, give eager fans glimpses into the lives and off stage personalities of their idols. Idols perform fanservice to make hearts flutter and money flow. Everything is strategically planned out so that fans are left thirsting for and willing to pay for the next glimpse and tidbit of information. Without the rapport these artists build with fans such as myself, many of the markets they profit from would be nonexistent or they would be unable to break into them.
An army of translators and captioners, music producers, makeup artists, stylists, camera operators, vocal and dance coaches, managers, marketing executives and a thousand other people work behind the scenes to make and maintain a marketable, presentable, accessible, and profitable image. For a fan of the industry with no musical talent, there are plenty of ways to be involved in the process and business and the kpop world is constantly reminding me of that. The volume of merchandise put out is outrageous and the faces of idols can be seen in commercials for or on the packaging of drinks, feminine hygiene products (no joke, see the picture below for male idols advertising pads), makeup, skincare and just about everything else. Billions are brought in by flashing a certain brand during a livestream or music video. All this makes the Korean music industry into more than just the business of making, recording, and selling music. It expands upward from and rests on the foundation of that to form a billion dollar empire that creates an increase in revenue, jobs, and other outlets for creativity that I want to somehow be a part of.
Another one of my groups, Astro, in a pad ad.
Word Count: 996
More information on how kpop has gained popularity, fans, and its billions of dollars:
https://www.cnn.com/2013/12/10/business/k-pop-business/index.html
https://www.soompi.com/article/820843wpp/7-ways-k-pop-is-so-much-more-than-just-music
https://www.thedailystar.net/shout/pop-culture/why-k-pop-so-popular-1521217
https://www.lifehack.org/articles/lifestyle/wondering-why-pop-popular-here-are-10-reasons.html
Photos:
ccmubs 
Great post, Zoe:
You kind of got right to the heart of what this class is about:
“But that has all quickly faded and now the music isn’t everything, but rather the foundation. Instead of selling albums and songs, what’s being sold is the image, the people themselves.”
Question: Are these people being formed into a marketable image or is each performer projecting a marketable image of herself (or himself)? Where does the performer end and where does the branding end? How much is “authentic?”
These are all questions to ask as we dive more deeply into the major question: Art vs. Commerce.
I wish you’d told more about you. I appreciated very much your comment at the very end, about how you’d like to be a part of this massive machine — one that apparently doesn’t exist here to anywhere the same extent as it does in South Korea. In other words, something like: “If I were involved in the Kpop music-industrial complex, I would …” Or: “I could help bring the Kpop business model to the U.S. by doing …”
Your writing is great, your research is terrific — nothing I love better than learning about stuff I don’t know, and your post taught me a lot, thank you! Just a bit more Zoe here, and we’re off to the races.
Good work.
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The Kpop industry seems to be a really unique one that spends a lot of time focusing on the people themselves and using the band members as a way to promote the music. The South Korean music industry evidently spends a lot of time helping their artists develop multiple skills, ranging all the way from singing to learning new languages in order to better interact with their audience. Although the Korean music industry seems a bit more artist-driven than much American music, there are obvious commonalities. Many Americans also focus on celebrities themselves rather than what they do. I myself tend to use social media to keep up with the singers and bands I like. Social media allows me to keep up with not only the music but also the lives of the artists, their other interests and things like that; things that you can’t get simply from advertisements of their music. Like Kpop, the artists I listen to also hold meet and greets and photo sessions, both as a way to bring in more revenue and as a way to genuinely attempt to connect with their audience. In earlier decades, music was simply about the enjoyment of listening to good tunes and music. While it’s still about that now for some people, it’s also about connecting more personally with the artists and, ultimately, using that connection as a promotion advantage.
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This was a great post. I had never heard of this group until I read your post. I didn’t know Kpop was a genre of music that was breaking out of Korea. With your post you have opened my eyes to see that music can come from all over the world and can have many didfeeenr forms. Your research was terrific and I was entertained while reading it. Great work.
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This goes along so well with our in-class conversation from last week on Beyonce’s album and her ability to entice consumers with an image rather than the music, necessarily. We stay very self-focused as Americans, including when talking about the music industry, so it is nice to read an article about what artists are doing in other countries.
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This is a great entry! The kpop genre all within itself is a whole different beast entirely when it comes to entertainment and it’s about time that the rest of the world learns of this new level pf entertainment an branding. Their ability to know what their fans want and to take that and completely capitalize on that is mind blowing.
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Wow I had no idea how intense this really was. Not only are the musicians invested but the fans are super invested! It takes a lot of dedication from fans and just society in general for there to be so much response to the new music and potentiality of a star . I agree with the idea that it is not just about the music anymore, that is not the only thing people are trying to sell, it includes the look and everything else. That is definitely what is shown here, that people go nuts over all the extra things and any little things that have to do with the person more and more than just the music. Very informative and interesting. – Harley Haynes
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I have only heard of K-pop through my friend but it sounds absolutely wonderful! It’s really interesting that they sell CDs despite how out of style they are but I can see they being popular if they are sold as collectors items.
-Caroline
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