If I spent less time thinking about K-pop since 2005, my jiu-jitsu would be better.
But here we are with another playlist for BJJ instead.
Get the Playlist
K-pop is commercial music, and commercial music sucks.
At least it's supposed to, right? It's what the music snob in me says.
But I'm more of a music nerd than a snob nowadays, so I'll spend time thinking about how effectively K-pop has infiltrated my psyche the way it has.
As a child of the 80s and radio rock, the formula is simple: write a hook, put it in the right order with the other elements of a song, and you've got me.
But K-pop didn't stop there.
It blasted itself from passing cars, from loudspeakers outside convenience stores, loudspeakers alongside dancing girls and a balloon arches at new business openings, in food courts paired with the music videos, from the phones of children (via DMB) and from the ringtones of adults.
(The Sang-dong HomePlus played almost exclusively gangsta rap our first year there, to it's credit.)
I heard a serious amount of shit music.
But bad art is still art, and there's some legitimately good pop songs too, and those made the list.
But music isn't the whole of K-pop.
It's attractive performers, interesting dancing, charismatic personalities, the staging of everything—the illusion, it's omnipresence in advertising and television and social media spots, the cross-promoting of it all, and even the dirt.
It's all the front end of the culture.
The back end is business.
The commercial export of conglomerates. Subsidized by the Korean government.
I can't get enough of it.
I was there for a few years and witnessed the moving parts up close, but nowadays there's a lot of news in English so it's easier to follow.
But even this end is a pipeline to the talent, as far as I'm concerned.
How the hell else would I have learned about NewJeans?
I get exposed to new (to me) acts from reading stock reports and business news.
Stories about corporate infighting were the gateway drug to their track on this playlist:
K-Pop Primer
- One (feat. Ji Sun) - Epik High
- Girls On Top - BoA
- I CAN'T STOP ME - TWICE
- ExtraL - JENNIE & Doechii
- Phone Number - JINUSEAN
- True Romance (feat. Yoonmirae) - Drunken Tiger
- Magnetic - ILLIT
- WANNABE - ITZY
- Lies - BIGBANG
- Married To the Music - SHINee
- Standing Next to You (Usher Remix) - Jung Kook & USHER
- 10 Minutes - Lee Hyori
- Fire (feat. Jinsil) - Mad Clown
- Discord - QWER
- "O"-正.反.合. - TVXQ! 동방신기
- Chaos (feat. Microdot & YDG) [From "Unpretty Rapstar 2 Track 8"] - KittiB
- It's Raining - RAIN
- I Know (feat. Teddy) - SE7EN
- The Moment - YUKIKA & Pat Lok
- God of Music - SEVENTEEN
- LALALALA - Stray Kids
- Super Shy - NewJeans
- U - SUPER JUNIOR
- JAJAJA (feat. Dynamic Duo & Crush) - YDG Series VOL.1 JAJAJA - Single
- on the street - j-hope & J. Cole
- Call Me (feat. 화사) - Basick & lIlBOI
- Say Hi (feat. Woody) [Instrumental]
- 마이동풍 - Baechigi
- Love's Battery - HONG JIN YOUNG
- Let's See - MUSHVENOM
I can rank order the CEOs I'd like to meet (방시혁, 박진영 & Tiger JK) just like I can the celebs (홍진영, Yezi & 권은비).
And I'm sucked in. And I'm trapped and I don't want to give any of it up.
This playlist fits the bill around here. All of the songs are badass for jiujitsu or working out.
I know because at least half of these songs I've heard while rolling in Korea. The other half are just to my taste. The whole thing spans about 20 years, but there's a commercial aspect to all of them.
They're the songs that I think are good for jiu-jitsu—the best of K-pop.
...
I deserve all of the physical abuse that's coming my way when I put this on at the gym.