Friday, December 4, 2015

Korean Indie rock vs. K-POP

Article in Asia Pacific Review this week, http://japanfocus.org/-Stephen-Epstein/4401/article.html

Stephen Epstein, "Us and Them: Korean Indie Rock in a K-Pop World", The Asia-Pacific Journal, Vol. 13, Issue 46, No. 1, November 30, 2015

Précis: This article, intended as a companion to the recent documentary Us and Them: Korean Indie Rock in a K-Pop World co-produced by Stephen Epstein and Timothy Tangherlini, situates Korean indie and punk rock within a broader context in order to demonstrate how what may seem a byway within Korean culture serves as a useful index of important recent societal transformations. As the nature of not only global media flows and musical circulation but Korean national identity and economic structures all undergo significant change, how should observers understand "Korean" "indie" music and its meanings as of 2015? How have the local punk and indie scenes developed in concert with, and in contrast to, K-pop?

Key words: South Korea, popular music, indie music, punk, K-pop.

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