Full disclosure, I’m not saying that people care only about the vocals, or even that there is no other factors they care about more (like visuals or stage presence), but I do disagree with the notion that fans don’t pay attention to the vocals. Arguably bad singing is one of the few things that do get a widespread response / reaction.
Cultural appropriation issues, dating, even polarizing comebacks and other “instances” do get some initial pushback, but in almost all cases people forget and move on pretty quickly, but vocals? That reputation sticks. One bad encore or underwhelming festival performance, and that gets held against idols for months if not years. I won’t bring up specific examples since the point of this post is not to rehash those, but I think we all know a few groups that have gone through hard times due to the singing related controversies.
And you know that it’s an important aspect, when vocals are the area where idols improve most throughout their careers, their labels are clearly putting some emphasis on that when faced with criticism. just compare IVE in their rookie years vs IVE now. Or even Blackpink and Twice, the biggest girl groups on the planet. as a blink I don’t think Blackpink have become much better dancers in a decade, but they for sure have become much better live singers.
Fans also reward better singers much more solely based on their reputations. Aespa for example have a long track record of lipsync, and we can talk about if that’s the fault of SM or not, but the truth is that a lot of people do excuse them for not singing purely because most of us know that they can sing. If they were bad vocalists, they wouldn’t be given the same grace.
And groups with a reputation for being great singers get a much more nuanced treatment when releasing polarizing songs. BabyMonster and NMIXX (in the past) for example always received the “damn they are such good vocalists, but the companies are doing them dirty, I hope their next comeback will highlight their talent” sentiment, while a group like ITZY did not get the same nuance at all. They were immediately doomposted to a much harsher degree. And you can see it in the results as well. NMIXX eventually topped the charts, once they released a general public friendly song, K-pop fans were clearly giving them chances. Even BabyMonster had their songs like Sheesh and Drip charting pretty high solely because of live performances etc. Obviously the opinion on KIOF has soured after the infamous livestream, but they also rose thanks to the amazing live skills, despite being from a pretty much nugu label.
TLDR: K-pop fans might not prioritize vocals over other factors, but they definitely care about the live singing. Also I don’t really follow boy groups, so my post was based only my perception of the gg scene.
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