I’m not talking about the number of album/single/CD sales or streams, but I’m talking about cultural, social, or generational impact. The idols or groups that maybe everyone around you, or in your country’s social media space, knows and loves – the ones who make people in your country fight and take blood baths just to get tickets to see, and the ones whose fanbase consists of people in almost all kinds of demographics – no matter the ages, races, social classes… maybe.
E.g., In my home country Vietnam, if I exclude BTS and BLACKPINK in this conversation, I feel like it has to be BIGBANG, especially given the recent Hanoi concerts. We have waited more than a decade for them to come back to Vietnam. Tickets for both days are sold out within approximately 10 minutes. Companies and banks all joined in with the fans to participate in this BIGBANG trend. Moreover, in Vietnam, K-pop is still often frowned upon and considered “niche” for teenage girls and “feminine” boys, but BIGBANG is one of the exceptions, they have fans in almost all kind of age and ethnicity demographics, even the middle-aged parents and grandparents. Our Vietnamese celebrities also love BIGBANG as well, and we Vietnamese know all the BIGBANG hits by heart that if you watch the clips and videos of the Hanoi concerts, we’d still sing even after the concerts.
After BIGBANG, I feel like 2NE1 and T-ARA must come in second (concerts get sold out fast, fans across demographics, songs still get played regularly in public, parties, schools,…), then probably EXO as well. Basically, in Vietnam, 2nd and 3rd generation of K-pop idols and groups still dominate the K-pop space here. And I feel like 4th and 5th generation of K-pop and beyond are still not able to dominate in Vietnam the way 2nd and 3rd gen of K-pop have (of course NewJeans, aespa, and recently Cortis have the most fans in Vietnam within 4th and 5th gen, but maybe that is about it).
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