One thing has been bothering me about K-pop for the last few years: why are girl groups generally superior to boy groups? This was not always the case. During the golden age of the second generation, the imperial grandeur of BIGBANG and Super Junior, boy groups were at least as good as their female counterparts. Similarly, EXO and the NCT groups and subgroups during the peak of the third generation had apparently limitless energy.
The answer is of course national service. Men in South Korea are required to participate in national service during their twenties, and this has ruptured the careers of many boy groups. BIGBANG in particular have never really managed to pull themselves back together in spite of the enormous success they enjoyed in the period before serving their nations, and for this reason it’s notable that Taeyang’s solo career since BIGBANG has been the exception rather than the rule. This year he slinked across the stage like everyone’s favourite K-pop big brother, dropping bangers that collaborate with the great and the good from fourth generation acts like BTS and BLACKPINK.
SHINee alumni Taemin also gave us another excellent solo album this year, as did Kai from EXO, before both of them were dragged off for military service. There appears to be some sort of system in place at SM Entertainment for ensuring that idols set up their legacy before this hiatus in their career, and many of their NCT-related acts are sufficiently flexible in terms of their membership that an ongoing throughput of bangers is still feasible, and indeed the various NCTs have been doing solid business this year, and the long-awaited return of EXO was very welcome, although it remains to be seen how long we’ll have to wait for this less flexible group to reform in the future.
Beyond the hit factories of SM Entertainment, we’ve been very much enjoying Zior Park’s fantastic new material, which has been examining gender identity, as well as the legacies of masculinity. However, since he operates outside of the large corporates, it will interesting to see how he copes with the upcoming call from his nation state.
But yes, in spite of all of the above, we still find it difficult to account for how girl groups have weathered the pandemic years better than boy groups. Maybe it’s just personal bias, and perhaps the expansible bubble expressed in the huge success of girl groups such as NewJeans and LE SSERAFIM cannot be maintained for much longer, or perhaps the next BIGBANG is just around the corner.
Watch this space!