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Welcome to my first non-drag race blog! As I said in last week’s blog, I’ll be dipping my foot in to Drag Race Canada at some point, but for now I’m going to indulge in some other dumb lists.
In this desperate solitary time, I have been dying for a new obsession to fill my isolated days. And how do you like that? K Pop has emerged as a never-ending source of entertainment. While US pop music has been essentially sidelined to zoom live shows and albums without any singles or music videos, South Korea’s better handle on the coronavirus means there are new “comebacks” (or singles) and highly produced new music videos popping up every day from K Pop. K Pop also allows for an endless treasure trove of dumb lists- there are countless line distribution, scene distribution, “era rankings” and stage mixes (where you get to critique the author’s editing skills and also critique all the outfits a group has performed the same choreography in) on YouTube for each K Pop group or star.
I’m pretty exclusively enthralled with the girl groups and female stars of K Pop. As a gay man, I am drawn and feel a kinship to the tension between adhering to strict gender expectations and taking the opportunity for sassy feminine expression that female pop stars exhibit. At the same time, I try to keep in mind and question how this adoration is in a lot of ways interlaced with misogyny and cooption of the female experience. With K Pop in particular, it is also important to be aware of othering this culture’s media in a prejudicial nature. With those important caveats, I still have found a lot of fairly mindless enjoyment in K Pop these past few months.
One last wordy pretext for K Pop is of course the often-harmful system of “training” that many K Pop stars undergo. Here is a description of some of the things (living in barren dormitories, paying for plastic surgeries, being weighed publicly, etc.) that many K Pop trainees go through. Obviously, this is awful and should be changed. However, do we really think most US pop stars aren’t forced to go through similar things? Don’t say no. I find it important to call attention to the problems with all pop music, but also still thoroughly enjoy art that it produces.
One other K Pop treat on YouTube is lots of fun moving charts. I used the amazing chart by Data Throne on YouTube below of the most viewed K Pop music videos by female stars and girl groups of 2020 below to make my list for this blog!
I simply updated the list and expanded the list from the video to include the top 25 most viewed female/ girl group music videos of 2020 so far. Each song title is hyperlinked to the music videos and I discuss my favorites later in the blog. Enjoy!
| # | Song Name | Artist | Views |
| 1 | How You Like That | Blackpink | 401,186,84 |
| 2 | Wannabe | Itzy | 181,572,914 |
| 3 | More and More | Twice | 161,208,407 |
| 4 | Dun Dun | Everyglow | 143,806,621 |
| 5 | Oh My God | G-Idle | 105,964,572 |
| 6 | Make You Happy | NiziU | 78,820,998 |
| 7 | Eight | IU | 77,995,402 |
| 8 | Dumdi Dumdi | G-Idle | 48,805,995 |
| 9 | Fiesta | Iz*One | 48,393,023 |
| 10 | Monster | RV (Irene and Seulgi) | 43,556,371 |
| 11 | Nonstop | Oh My Girl | 40,468,930 |
| 12 | Secret Story of the Swan | Iz*One | 39,621,315 |
| 13 | Maria | Hwa Sa | 38,156,034 |
| 14 | Bazooka! | GWSN | 24,485,800 |
| 15 | Who Dis? | Secret Number | 24,109,919 |
| 16 | Crossroads | Gfriend | 23,173,798 |
| 17 | Dumhdurum | Apink | 23,065,007 |
| 18 | So What? | Loona | 20,804,325 |
| 19 | Butterfly | WJSN | 19,781,297 |
| 20 | Scream | Dreamcatcher | 19,674,941 |
| 21 | What You Waiting For | Somi | 18,032,014 |
| 22 | Stay Tonight | Chungha | 15,382,947 |
| 23 | Here I Am Again | Yerin Baek | 15,001,745 |
| 24 | Play | Chungha | 14,171,884 |
| 25 | Hands Up | Cherry Bullet | 13,825,222 |
Below I go through my favorite other hits from ladies on the list.
Blackpink (#1- How You Like That)
Blackpink is in your area and is the most popular K Pop girl group internationally of the moment. By a wide margin. How You Like That is classic Blackpink and includes a truly epic dance break at the end. My favorite Blackpink song however is “Kick It”, a b side from their last album Kill This Love. It starts off dark and solemn and by the end somehow devolves into a peppy chanting fest that reminds me of Icona Pop’s “I Love It”. It’s amazing.
Twice (#3- More and More )
Twice is the second most popular girl group in Korea and was put together years ago on a popular Korean reality show. They are peppy beyond belief, but their Wikipedia is a surprisingly fun and dramatic read (Vietnam flag scandals, members taking breaks due to anxiety, reality show result scandals). More and More’s rustic fashions don’t do much for me TBH, but I deeply appreciate the Britney Spears style spastic dance break and the lyrics’ barely disguised allusions to sex. My favorite Twice song is “Feel Special” from their last album. The video has some amazing dance scenes in fabulous purple sequin jumpsuits, and the lyrics are actually quite touching even though I’m sure a lot is misconstrued in the translation. Mostly the beat is amazing and gives me all the early 2000s US pop music realness I need.
G-Idle (#5 Oh My God and #8 Dumdi Dumdi) and Hwa Sa (#13 Maria )
Again, what do I know, but to my untrained eye G-Idle and Mamamoo (the girl group that Hwa Sa comes from) stand out for their versatile and creative musical styles. G-Idle’s new song “Dumdi Dumdi” has amassed a huge amount of views in the short time that it’s been out, but their standout song for me is “Oh My God”, which feels like the song Evanescence always should have created. Mamamoo had a long and successful career before Hwa Sa went solo (“Maria” is such a fun hyper sexy jam). My favorite Mamamoo song is “Hip”, which is about how few fucks they give about critics insulting their outfits. Love it.
Iz*One (# 9 Fiesta and #12 Secret Story of the Swan)
Iz*One was put together on Produce 48, the most recent season of the Produce reality series. The top 12 (12!) contestants on the show are the members of the group. Their career was temporarily sidelined for a short time due to a voting scandal from the show. They are as corny and cheesy as you would expect a highly produced group to be, but Fiesta and Swan are still super catchy fun. My favorite Iz*One song though is their first single, “La Vie En Rose”. I find the dancing and beat very captivating, but what I enjoy most is the sheer bizarreness that this super produced group’s first single lyrically was a weird sloppy (“I’ll make it red”) reference to a French song from over 70 years ago.
RV Irene and Seulgi (#10 Monster )
Irene and Seulgi are a subgroup of the hugely popular K Pop girl group Red Velvet. It is a common practice in K Pop for girl groups to split into subgroups and Irene and Seulgi are the first subgroup of Red Velvet. Red Velvet has been creating great music for years, and “Psycho” from last year was my most recent favorite of their work. However, my all-time fall will likely always be Red Flavor. The song is an incredibly catchy fun romp, and the video as far as I can tell, has them psychoanalyzing fruit that they then make into wine and enjoy. What more could you ask for?
Apink (#17 Dumhdurum )
Apink is one of the many groups that followed the Girls Generation blueprint (NPR references it in their guide to K Pop here)of starting off as cutesy pop girls and transitioning over time into adult pop women. Dumhdurum is a perfectly pleasant song very typical of current Apink fare, but my favorite APink song is “So Sick”, which does what my favorite pop songs do- pair an amazing dancey beat with dramatic needy lyrics about heartbreak (“DO YOU LOVE ME?). It’s perfect.
Somi (#21What You Waiting For ) and Chungha (#22 Stay Tonight and #24 Play)
Hey, remember the reality show from Iz*One? Somi and Chungha were both a part of I.O.I., the girl group formed from Produce 101, the first season of the reality show. I.O.I. released one album, including the insanely catchy and annoying “Very Very” Very before they disbanded due to conflict issues. Somi and Chungha both have gone to successful solo careers. “What You Waiting For” is a truly charming jam with a lot to offer (Somi’s shockingly messy room, her flawless track running in a cocktail dress, and the zest with which she shouts “RING THE ALARM!” are just some of the treasures in the video below). Chungha is, in my opinion, a truly amazing diva complete with killer dance moves and an amazing voice. Roller Coaster is an INCREDIBLE song- it serves full early 2000s US pop realness just like “Feel Special”. Honestly, nothing makes me feel more fabulous and gayer than when I am dancing along to it in the shower. What a ride.
Ok this is the longest blog ever, but a few more parting shots are linked below before I go. I would remiss if I didn’t include some of my favorites from the beautiful Sumni, the foremothers of modern Kpop Girls Generation, and this dumb catchy song from April. You can find all of them on my Spotify K Pop playlist, along with all the songs above, here: https://open.spotify.com/playlist/54ADflgPkQoU1tGUO3WvPV?si=9pJyZ-R8QiKgHyZvB-mWwQ
Until next time!
Dumb Pop Culture Lists 