K-pop, even from the first and second generations, has always had its foot in western influences for sure, like obviously we had Kesha and Dr Luke selling demos to SNSD and shit like that. It's never been J-pop levels of idiosyncratic, but even still, there was definitely very much "a sound" that you didn't really find in its entirety in western pop. Now though, it honestly feels like almost everything is just biting off of current western trends to the T, there's a lot more foreign outsourcing to production groups in the US and Sweden rather than domestic circles now. And that's not to say it's bad or anything, like at all; there's a lot of stuff I still really like right now, but it's definitely feeling like I care less and less about what's new and hot right now unless it does something to really make me go "oh, this is new/refreshing/nostalgic" right out the gate. We're not getting these aegyo/girlcrush concept levels of "uniquely South Korean" anymore. It's definitely making it harder to find anything that feels "worth" listening to now, is my problem. It's like okay why would I listen to this new K-pop group doing soft liquid DnB stuff when I could just listen to Pinkpantheress or Piri do it better, y'know? Or why would I listen to XYZ group doing trap sounds when I could just listen to any rapper at all, or a synthwavey throwback song when I could just listen to like The Midnight or even Carly Rae Jepsen? The DnB/jersey thing was novel when NewJeans first came on the scene doing it, but now it's like every fucking agency saw how trendy that was and oversaturated the market in less than two years. And I get that's how trends work, but it hasn't gotten this stale this fast before. Maybe I just want that sugary aegyo stuff again, it's honestly refreshing when I hear a newer song doing that sound again, which is kind of ironic. Maybe I'm just getting older. Maybe it really is boring. I don't think this'll last forever or anything, I honestly think this TikTok era of immediate oversaturation and moving onto the next thing all-too-fast isn't sustainable and we're already starting to see it die off this year, which like, fucking awesome, good riddance, let's hurry it along and get back to doing things the right way. Man maybe I am old, I sound like a fucking boomer saying that. idk, maybe I'm not articulating the thought accurately right now because I'm hella burnt out rn, I just feel like the bubble is ready to burst. At least the Demon Hunters soundtrack was kinda cool. I feel like they made that shit knowing their target demographic was like second/third gen K-pop fans who were there in the mid/late-2010s. submitted by /u/TomoAries [link] [comments]
