‘K-Pop Dreaming’ Explores K-Pop History And Korean American Identity

K-pop is everywhere these days, but that wasn’t the case when Vivian Yoon was growing up in the 90s and 2000s. She listened to it secretly in her Koreatown bedroom.

“I grew up hiding my love for k-pop and not being excited to tell other people that I listened to this music because back then it wasn’t seen as cool,” said Yoon, a performer and screenwriter with an improv and sketch comedy background. “I grew up really wanting to be perceived as American and I felt like k-pop, Korean culture, Korean food all represented a side of me that was ‘other,’ the thing that made me an outsider to mainstream American society.”

So, the recent popularity of k-pop, as well as Korean film and drama—and by extension interest in Korean culture—is a phenomenon that generates complex feelings.

‘It’s weird when for 20 years you grow up feeling like, oh, this part of me is somehow inferior and doesn’t deserve to see the light of day and all of a sudden all these other people are celebrating it. I think it’s really complicated.”

The chance to explore those feelings prompted Yoon to accept an offer from LAist producer Fiona Ng to create the podcast K-Pop Dreaming, a series about the history of k-pop and Yoon’s own k-pop history growing up in LA’s Koreatown. K-Pop Dreaming is the second season of the acclaimed California Love series; the first being a coming-of-age story in Compton. The first two episodes of K-Pop Dreaming aired on Feb. 23.

“I really do think that this podcast is using k-pop as a vehicle to talk about things like identity and community,” said Yoon. “And examining and exploring not just Korean history, but Korean American history, which I think has been less explored.”

Yoon sees the series as being very much about identity.

“For me it always felt like I’m not American enough and I’m not Korean enough, so where do I fit? Through this podcast I began to realize, oh, we occupy a third space, like a third category, and we bring our own thing. That can not only bridge the two different communities, but fully exist as a completely separate thing that is worthy on its own.”

In eight-plus episodes the podcast narrative takes listeners on a musical journey from the influence of Korea’s trot music to the American presence in post-war Korea, from the 1992 LA Uprising to the present-day global popularity of k-pop.

“One of the things that I discuss through the podcast that helped me understand why k-pop is so distinctive from other kinds of music is the idea of ppongjjak,” she said. “It’s this really illusive musical element that is present in k-pop. It comes from the century-old genre of music in Korea called trot, popular during the Japanese Colonial period in Korea. Now when I listen to Korean music and hear the infectious melodies and dreamy chords all I think about is how k-pop is special and different because of Korean history. When I listen to the group New Jeans I hear it in their music.”

Yoon enlisted her friends to participate in the podcast. Each listened to k-pop before it gained international popularity, so they discuss their shared perspective. For an upcoming episode about trot and the origins of k-pop, Yoon spoke to her grandmother.

“I interviewed her and we used her tape to walk us through the history of South Korea from the 1930s, when she was born, through the colonization period, all the way through World War II and the Korean War and then seeing how the American military presence shaped Korean music,” said Yoon. “The episode after that, Moon Night, picks up that history to see how the American military presence really brought African American music and culture to Korea. We look at this small nightclub, like a CBGB-ish nightclub for early k-pop legends. It’s a lot of history.”

Yoon is currently working on a TV script centered around a Korean American character. Has the Korean wave of popular culture improved the odds of Asian American actors landing roles in the US and of scripts with Asian characters getting a second look?

“I can’t speak for all Asian Americans, but for me 1,000 percent, 100 percent, a million percent,” said Yoon. “I started pitching my own TV shows that were centered around my experiences of growing up in Koreatown and being a Korean American person and that is something that I never imagined would be possible. I didn’t think anyone would be interested in that, let alone want to hear my pitch about a tv show about that and it’s kind of incredible, the timing of it. Because it really did intersect with the blowing up of Parasite and Squid Game and NetflixNFLX
pouring millions into Korean entertainment. I come with this pitch and suddenly people are interested and it’s kind of awesome.”

If there’s one thing she hopes her podcast will accomplish, it’s creating a sense of what’s possible.

“I had a lot of secret dreams growing up, things that I wanted to do that I felt I wasn’t allowed to go for,” said Yoon. “My one hope for this podcast is that there is some Asian American kid out there listening, who feels like they feel they can go for whatever dream they felt they did not have access to. I think that would be my dream—for just one person who maybe wants to pursue music or k-pop or become whatever, that they feel like they can.”

K-Pop Dreaming is available at www.laist.com/kpop.