The Wonder Girls have had quite a year in America. Blastro.com caught up with them at their fan meet and greet in New Jersey. The girls talk about their tour with the Jonas Brothers, their experiences in America, including their opinions about American boys, and what's up next for them. Blastro.com is supportive of K-pop's ambition to build its audience in America. Coverage of a fan meet and greet is a great way to introduce our music video audience to its big stars such as the Wonder Girls. The audience can see their authenticity and the passion they've built with their fans. The meet and greet was held at a Justice store in a shopping mall where the girls were promoting the new Jason Nevins remix of "Nobody," which will be sold exclusively at Justice stores in the U.S.
Click Here to Watch
Rob Campanell Director of Content Programming Blastro.com
Let Ebengregory tell it - the story of his drunken trip to the VMAs with his homeboy Kanye, that is! Things get crazy...
Click here to Watch EbenGregory - Kanye Gets Wasted At The VMAs
Let EbenGregory tell it - It looks like Kanye is blamin' it on the Henny and heading off to rehab. What?!
Click here to Watch EbenGregory - Kanye Going To Rehab?
Jay Sean may be considered an overnight success in America, but he has been working hard in the United Kingdom for the past five years just to get where he is now career-wise. Building his fanbase in the British Asian/Desi music scene, his popularity grew into the mainstream R&B genre, and his songs were charting with the likes of Ne-Yo and Rihanna in the UK. He had the good fortune to be "discovered" by Cash Money Records, which gave him instant creditability with the urban music elite in America.
The Jay Sean story is a great example of the grassroots development that has been going on for over a decade. UK urban artists stopped looking toward America for direction, and started forging their own identity. Along with this came trendy new names for their different styles. Garage, grime, drum & bass, dubstep, bassline and niche were thrown alongside hip hop and R&B. Media also rose up to nurture the UK urban scene as BBC Radio began producing numerous shows dedicated to the urban subgenres, and Channel AKA was programming the music videos on satellite television.
Click Here to Watch the International Spotlight - UK Urban Artists.
College kids have voted on who has made this biggest impression on them in music this year!
Here are the 2009 mtvU Award Nominees.
This month's feature is South Korea. The producers and artists from this country have infused pop music with hip-hop freestyle dances and created a worldwide craze known as K-pop. Although it has some obstacles to overcome to make it big in America, K-pop shows promise to become the new face in pop music.
Some people may think it's far-fetched that pop music originating from a small Asian country can become the next big thing, but there are a number of opportunities that have opened for them.
1) Renewed interest in Michael Jackson. If there is one major influence around K-pop, it's Michael Jackson. The K-pop artists are skilled in hip-hop style dance and singing, and they have followed Michael's dedication to rigorous dance training.
2) The global Idols TV show franchise has waned interest in pop music. The show continues to be popular for large television audiences, but it's resulting music by-product has not fared so well. Pop music is singing and dancing, but the Idols encompass only the singing part. Pop music was king ten years ago with Britney Spears, Nsync and Destiny's Child, and their music videos featured both singing and dancing. One can look at Idols such as America's Jordan Sparks, South Africa's Jody Williams, or Australia's Jessica Mauboy and note the lack of differentiation in their sound and style.
3) It's American too. Several of the K-pop groups have American members, and the songs are sung in both Korean and English.
4) Competitive producers. There are three major producers in the K-pop scene. Each are trying to innovate and outdo one another. One noticeable difference between the pop groups from a decade ago to today's K-pop groups is their size. Older pop groups were three to five members, but the number is seven to nine for K-pop. This allows for bigger dance numbers and more publicity opportunities.
K-pop has a very enthusiastic and dedicated fan base. I hope they will enjoy this month's International Spotlight of BoA, Wonder Girls, Big Bang, 2PM, 2NE1, and Se7en.
Click here to watch the K-pop videos.
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