Meet EXP Edition—
the world's first non-Korean K-pop band.
They've spent the last two-and-a-half years
living and performing in Korea,
studying K-pop dance,
taking vocal lessons,
and learning Korean.
- We've got the opportunity to perform on
some of the biggest K-pop live TV shows,
which we never even imagined would be an option.
This isn't how this kind of thing usually happens.
Plenty of Western musicians take musical influences
from elsewhere.
But they sing the songs for Western audiences,
and almost always in English.
EXP Edition is different,
because K-pop is different.
It's reversing that cross-cultural collaboration
and spreading without the support of the big Western labels.
With scientific precision
K-pop has crafted a new path for world pop domination.
And the world may never be the same.
- I believe it's really narrow
to just pin it down to some kind of musical genre.
It's a cultural scene,
it's a social phenomena.
I'm Phoebe Bradford.
This is Quartz.
K-pop is this hybrid genre
with a calculated Korean spin.
It pulls in R&B,
hip-hop,
EDM,
and a bunch of other pop styles—
sometimes all in the same song.
From the start, K-pop record labels,
behemoths like S.M. Entertainment and YG,
focused on creating a recipe to spread K-pop around the world.
- They have really kind of scientifically manufactured
the formula of success.
Professor Suk-Young Kim has studied how these labels
have basically become K-pop idol factories,
recruiting and training young stars
to build groups with global appeal.
- S.M. Entertainment has a manual
that really kind of
establishes the system of what they call
cultural technology.
And it's really a hands-on manual as to how to shoot a music video
and what kind of eyeshadow
would work better for certain markets.
And everything about the music,
from band names to their incredible videos,
have been designed to be understood
even if you don't speak Korean.
- K-pop focuses on visual elements,
and it has to be that way,
because K-pop is targeting global audiences
from its very inception.
The labels have groomed Thai,
Chinese,
Japanese,
and even Indian K-pop stars
to target specific powerful markets.
And they've brought in Western producers and musicians,
crafting songs now topping U.S. charts.
BTS's Mike drop was remixed by Steve Aoki,
and was the first song by a K-pop group
to reach number one
on the U.S. iTunes Top Songs chart.
BLACKPINK's two hits on the Billboard Hot 100
are both Western collaborations.
Even Nicki Minaj helped launch a BTS song
to the 11th spot on the Hot 100.
Western musicians are excited to work with K-pop bands.
- I think that's, you know,
displayed best in this song
with the drum programming, especially.
This is Jordan Young,
better known as DJ Swivel.
He's produced and mixed songs
with some of the biggest names in Western music,
and, most recently, BTS,
the biggest K-pop band of all time.
- What's amazing about K-pop,
you have seven members that all need their moment,
which really lends itself to
having extra melodies and extra parts.
K-pop songs are musically complex.
The average American song is four melodies.
But the average K-pop song is eight to 10.
- You have a lot of freedom
to experiment and try new things
and pretty much any record I write
I could probably send to them.
if it's a strong record.
But it's not just the creativity that's appealing.
- Do you think that's helping
attract all these Western producers to K-pop?
- Truthfully, I think what's attracting
Western producers to K-pop
is the success of it.
On Spotify, fans have streamed over 46 billion minutes
of K-pop songs, since 2015.
Because a big part of K-pop strategy
focuses on reaching fans directly,
online.
- How important is it that K-pop matured alongside
things like the Internet and social media?
- K-pop wouldn't exist without social media,
and especially YouTube.
Outside of Korea,
their early fans didn't hear them on the radio.
They watched their videos online
and it created a powerful network.
- K-pop fans are one of the most passionate,
almost fanatic fandom
that you will see in today's pop cultural scene.
They see themselves not as passive customers
or consumers, but
they see themselves as significant participants
and producers in making or breaking
the success of their idols.
- There's really no substitute for the
utter support and passion of K-pop fans.
Vanessa Augsbach is part of the team that runs KCON,
the largest fan celebration
and concert of its kind in the United States.
- When we started it's 12,000,
and that was just the Irvine event.
In 2018, we had 147,000.
And BTS, arguably,
has the most powerful fan base of them all.
They call themselves the ARMY.
- Man they love you, yo, they love you.
And for the ARMY,
it's not just about the music.
- ARMY seems to
recognize themselves as a kind of major player
in creating cultural movement
and social justice movement.
A social justice movement.
The ARMY has donated to organizations,
like UNICEF, in the name of BTS,
and lobbied for the band's appearance
at the United Nations,
where they promoted their "Love Yourself" message.
- And launching the "Love Myself" campaign
and started to hear remarkable stories
from our fans all over the world.
- It's all possible because
fans are demanding it.
Approaching, you know, radio stations
to play BTS music,
writing to Billboard to feature their beloved idols.
Currently, of Billboard's Social 50,
eight of the top 20 artists are K-pop bands.
BTS has comfortably sat in the number one spot
for over 100 weeks.
Mainstream markets, like the U.S.,
may be losing their iron grip
on the global music market.
And YouTube's global music charts show
that top players are not predominantly American
or English-language musicians,
which is significant,
because almost half of all global music streaming hours
came from YouTube in 2017.
This is a recent radical shift.
Now you'll see Spanish-language musicians,.
like Anuel AA,
Bad Bunny,
Daddy Yankee,
and Indian artists,
like Neha Kakkar,
comfortably holding top positions.
And, of course,
K-pop.
And that may mean
that our most popular music
is starting to look more like our world.