Asian Music- K-pop, J-pop and Beyond

Two of my favourite genres are J-pop and K-pop. I started listening to J-pop (Japanese pop) about 10 years ago and got into K-pop (Korean pop) a few years ago as well. I don't listen to as much music from other Asian countries but the other month I came across a Vietnamese singer (Hồ Ngọc Ha, see below), so I thought it would be fun to explore different types. :)

Note: I also like Bollywood/Hindi music but for the purposes of this post, I'm going to stick to East Asian music (apart from one crossover Bollywood song). Maybe in the future I'll do a post on South Asian music :)


J-pop

My favourite. :)  (Although there are actually more K-pop posts on here because I've been listening to more lately!). My fave singers are Koda Kumi and Namie Amuro and I also like Utada Hikaru (although I prefer her English languge music in general) and some Ayumi Hamasaki songs. I mostly know Japanese solo singers, so I'd like to listen to more groups. I like a few groups, such as boyband J Soul Brothers and EXILE and girlbands FAKY and E-girls.

For J-pop acts featured on the blog up to September 2015 (when I was doing a J-pop and K-pop month) visit this post: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2015/09/j-pop-acts.html


And here are a couple more J-pop posts:

https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2015/10/new-j-pop-crystal-kay-and-namie-amuro.html

https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/11/more-j-pop-acts.html


K-pop

I've liked K-pop for a few years. I used to come across it mostly from penpals and YouTube but last year the South Korean TV channel Arirang started showing on British TV, so since then I've also been watching K-pop programmes. :)

Check out this post for all the K-pop posts up to Oct '15: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2015/10/k-pop-acts.html


Here are some more:

MONSTA X: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2015/11/weekly-music-video_25.html

BTS: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2015/12/weekly-music-video_31.html

Reddy feat. Jay Park: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/03/weekly-music-video_16.html

NCT U- The 7th Sense: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/05/weekly-music-video.html

Hoody- Like You: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/06/weekly-music-video_22.html

Jun K: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/08/weekly-music-video_17.html

Jay Park feat. GRAY: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/10/weekly-music-video_19.html

Red Velvet and GOT7 (Girls vs Boys): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/10/girls-vs-boys-k-pop.html

New K-pop Releases

http://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/11/new-k-pop-releases.html


And go here for a mix (J-pop and K-pop): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/07/new-j-pop-and-k-pop-releases.html


C-pop

I don't listen to so much Chinese pop but my favourite C-pop singer is Coco Lee. With her though I do prefer her English stuff. Check out my posts on her below:

https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2013/02/weekly-music-video_23.html

https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2014/09/weekly-music-video_10.html


A lot of the K-pop groups have international members (mostly from Asian countries or Asian Americans or Canadians) and some also sing in Chinese and Japanese. Examples are EXO, miss A and TWICE. The girl group BP RANIA are notable for having the first non Asian K-pop idol in their group, since member Alex is a mixed race American (black and white). But their record company have been accused of discrimination for not featuring her properly in music videos or live performances. As a mixed race person myself (also black and white) I'm happy to see someone like me in a K-pop group but sad that they don't seem to be treating her that well. :(

Kris Wu is a Chinese Canadian singer who used to belong to Korean/Chinese group EXO. This is his first solo English song JULY: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/11/weekly-music-video_30.html

Meng Jia is a former member of Korean/Chinese girl group miss A. Check out her debut solo single Drip: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/12/weekly-music-video_14.html


Last year I did a Girls vs Boys post featuring Taiwanese singers Jolin Tsai and Jay Chou: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2016/08/girls-vs-boys-c-pop.html


This is Jolin's PLAY which came out in 2014:

Also in 2014 I featured the video for Ahsangsan by Tibetan Chinese singer Kelsang Metok: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2014/12/weekly-music-video.html
 

And she collaborated with Namie Amuro in 2015. Watch the video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C7wRb9adQUc



Girl group EXID have a Chinese version of their song Up & Down. This is the video:

 You can watch the original Korean video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hfXZ6ydgZyo



Jane Zhang

Jane Zhang is a popular Chinese singer who launched her career in 2005 when she came 3rd on Chinese reality TV singing competition Super Girl. She has released 7 albums to date, including The One (2006), Update (2007), Reform (2011), The Seventh Sense (2014) and her latest Starring Jane which came out last year. In addition she's released 3 EPS and one live album.

Her singles include Dream Party, Dear Jane, I Didn't Know, Change Your World with Dutch DJ Tiësto and Dust My Shoulders Off featuring American rapper and producer Timbaland.

As well as singing in both Cantonese and Mandarin, Jane sings in English and Spanish. Some of her songs are R'n'B and jazz. I only discovered her recently but look forward to hearing more of her music. :)

This is one of Jane's songs that was uploaded to YouTube last October. To be honest I'm not sure what it's called because I can't read the Chinese characters! lol. But someone in the comments says it's called Forever.


Update 15/8/17: The original video has gone because apparently Jane's official YouTube channel has been banned! Here's another one and hopefully it will stay up.

                                


Also check out Dust My Shoulders Off (English language): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZgnClGC8-WQ

This version doesn't feature Timbaland.


For more on Jane visit her website: http://jane.social/PC/index.html


TFBOYS

While writing this I realised that I didn't know any fully Chinese boybands. Well, let's remedy that! lol. These are TFBOYS(their name stands for The Fighting Boys), a teenage band who debuted in 2013 when they were 12 and 13. (So young!). The members are Wang Junkai (aka Karry), Wang Yuan (Roy) and Yiyang Qianxi (Jackson).* They've released 3 mini albums so far, Heart, Dream go 2013), Manual of Youth (2014) and Big Dreamer (2015).

This is It's You which was uploaded to YouTube in November.

Indonesian


Anggun

Anggun (full name Anggun Cipta Sasmi) is one of my fave singers She's from Indonesia and sings in Indonesian, French and English. Check out these posts:

Lyrics Project (click Anggun Lyrics Project for all posts): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2013/02/anggun-lyrics-project.html

Face au vent (Facing the wind): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2017/01/weekly-music-video_11.html


Mongolian

I recently came across a couple of Mongolian videos. I was originally looking for Mongolian throat singing after reading about it in an article and through that I came across these.

First of all this is a healing song:

                                 

Update 16/10/17: The original video is gone so I had to replace it. I think this is the same one though. :)



And this is Qinghai Lake by Daichin or Daiching Tana who is Upper Mongol.

                                                                 

Update 16/10/17: I had to replace this video as well. Hopefully it's the right one. Also check out this one which is a bit shorter: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSZ3EEUxvWg


If you're interested in Mongolian throat singing check ot this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1rmo3fKeveo


Thai

I also like Thai singer Tata Young. She's half Thai and half American and grew-up in Thailand. Here are a few of her videos:

Zoom: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2012/11/weekly-music-video.html

Mila Mila:  https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2013/05/weekly-music-video.html

Dhoom Dhoom (from the Bollywood film Dhoom): https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2013/10/weekly-music-video_23.html



Vietnamese

A couple of years ago I posted the video for Xin Anh Dung by Vietnamese singer Emily featuring rapper LiL Knight (LK) and singer JustaTee: https://starsparklex.blogspot.com/2014/09/weekly-music-video.html

And more recently I included the song What Is Love? by Hồ Ngọc Ha in my latest New Music/Videos update. As well as singing, Ha (I think that's her first name) models and acts. She reminds me of Anggun, especially in this song.

Hope you enjoyed this post and it gave you a  bit of an insight into Asian music if you don't already know it. :) This isn't an intensive, scholarly type post, just a fun one, but if you're looking for more info you might like these links:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Music_of_Asia

http://www.amc.org.uk

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/J-pop

https://spinditty.com/genres/A-Brief-History-of-Japanese-Pop-J-pop-Music 

http://www.last.fm/tag/j-pop 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/K-pop 

http://emailquechi.wixsite.com/kpopworld 

UK and European K-pop site: http://unitedkpop.com/

 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C-pop
 
 https://ninchanese.com/blog/2016/02/25/top-10-2016-chinese-pop-songs/



P.S. If you're on Pinterest you're welcome to follow my J-pop and K-pop board: https://www.pinterest.co.uk/moonsparkle84/j-pop-and-k-pop/



*These are Chinese names, so the surname is first.