21 K-Pop Groups You Need To Be Listening To | Glamour UK

Korean pop music, or ‘K-pop’ as it’s better known, is catchy, fun and full of energy, so if you’re not on board yet, what are you waiting for?

Thanks to toe-tapping techno beats, crazy-colourful aesthetic, trend-defining fashion and perfectly choreographed videos, K-pop has become something of a global phenomenon, and its stars are smashing records (BTS made history with their AMA win last year).

The group has been at the forefront of pushing K-pop into the mainstream music scene for years, and their efforts were recognised at the 2021 American Music Awards when they won Artist of the Year – the biggest award of the night. But it wasn’t just any old win, it’s one to go down in history as BTS are now the first Asian act to win in the category at the AMAs. It also marked their third consecutive year winning Favourite Pop Duo or Group – one of many other milestones they’ve reached in the past couple of years. Impressive.

K-pop is part of what is called ‘Hallyu’ – literally meaning ‘Korean wave’ – used to refer to the colossal and ever-growing impact of South Korean culture, shown in the popularity of everything from K-dramas on Netflix to the meteoric rise of K-beauty.

Yet K-pop is one cultural export you may not know as much about, despite the fact it’s an industry worth $5 billion. In fact, one of K-pop’s most successful bands, BTS, sold more albums than Taylor Swift, Billie Eilish and Ariana Grande back in 2020. The same year BTS became the first K-pop musicians to receive a Grammy nomination, with ‘Dynamite’ up for ‘Best Pop Duo/Group Performance’.

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But while BTS have achieved inevitable success, it has been announced that members of the group will start their mandatory military service next month, as all able-bodied South Korean men between the ages of 18 and 28 are required to serve in the military for 18-21 months, as the country is still at war with the North.