Korean Hip Hop - Hip Hop Music

Hip Hop Music

Early artists included 3534, Seo Taiji and Boys, Deux, and DJ DOC. The Korean language was used almost exclusively. Seo Taiji, coming from a heavy metal music background, often featured heavy metal guitars in his mixes, and other artists also incorporated techno influences. A few artists, such as Seo Taiji and Yuk Kak Soo (육각수), also incorporated influences from traditional Korean music such as pansori or nongak (farmers' music). One that was distinctive was Seo Taiji's "Come Back Home", with its vocal/production style resembling Cypress Hill. The first "rap" album that featured rap in every track was Kim Jin Pyo's first album in 1997. First Hip-Hop song in South Korea was Gim-sat-gat(김삿갓) by Hong-seo-bum(홍서범). According to Epik High's rapper Tablo, "The form, at least, has definitely been mastered now — the beats, the rhymes, the performances, the look — it’s indistinguishable from the United States scene. The social relevance, however, has a long way to go. The message is slowly catching up to the medium."

Many rap artists have been successful in the mainstream of Korean music. These include rappers such as Verbal Jint, Jinusean, T.O.P., G-Dragon, Zico, Outsider, 1TYM, MC Sniper, Psy, Cho PD, Dynamic Duo, Drunken Tiger, Jay Park, Supreme Team, Untouchable, dok2, Leessang and Epik High.

As elsewhere, there has always been a conflict between mainstream and underground listeners. As many K-pop groups use hiphop in their songs, people became used to associating hip-hop with these sugar-coated lyrics. Underground rappers and their fans have heavily criticized this, which fuelled many skilled underground rappers to stick with working as an independent artist rather than under a major mainstream label.