K-Pop Music Videos That Took The World By Storm
Videos that have won awards, topped the charts, and captured a western audience.
Best K-pop
The MTV Video Music Awards debuted their “Best K-Pop” category in 2019 after K-Pop acts began sweeping the western award shows.
“Rockstar” by LISA was voted “Best K-Pop” at the 2024 MTV Video Music Awards. Other nominations included: “Seven” by Jungkook featuring Latto, “Smoothie” by NCT Dream, “Super Shy” by NewJeans, “LALALALA” by Stray Kids, and “Deja Vu” by TXT (Tomorrow x Together).
LISA also won two years prior for her release “LALISA,” a flashy music video that took the title of most viewed music video by a solo artist in 24 hours on YouTube. The video gained 73.6 million views in 24 hours, landing LISA’s solo debut in the Guiness World Records.
BTS and Stray Kids are the only other acts to win MTV’s “Best K-Pop” award with BTS taking home three awards and Stray Kids taking home one in 2023.
Hot 100
It seems like nowadays we hear about K-Pop acts entering the Billboard charts left and right, however this trend had to start somewhere. The first K-Pop song to enter the Hot 100 was “Nobody” by Wonder Girls which peaked at No. 76 in 2009. This comedic Motown-inspired video features Wonder Girls as the backup singers of J.Y. Park who take over when he can’t perform.
Everyone knows that you can’t talk about K-Pop in the west without mentioning “GANGNAM STYLE.” PSY became the first South Korean artist to hit top 10 on the Hot 100 back in 2012. “GANGNAM STYLE” wouldn’t be half of the sensation it is without its music video that’s characterized by its iconic horse riding dance. The song peaked at No. 2 and spent over half a year on the Hot 100. The video also became the first video ever to reach 1 billion views and still remains among the top 10 on the list.
In 2020, BTS became the first South Korean act to reach No. 1 on the chart with the English single “Dynamite.” The music video experiments with unique camera angles that give the video the same relaxed and lighthearted vibe as the song.