Lately, most western songwriters want to work with K-pop or J-pop songs. But Beckuh Boom – the American songwriter behind BLACKPINK and Twice's hits – remembers when that wasn't the case. “When I started doing trips to Seoul in 2012, everyone I talked to about it either laughed at me or just didn't get it,” he says. “They would say, 'Why waste your time? It's not even close to the biggest market.”
It took the global breakthroughs of Korean acts like BTS and BLACKPINK and Japanese acts like XG a few years later for Western talent to take songwriting opportunities in Asia's two biggest pop markets as seriously as Boom. Now, it's one of the most lucrative and sought-after gigs in the global publishing business, attracting top American creators like Ryan Tedder, Victoria Monet and Jacob Kasher “JKash” Hindlin.
But to find success in Korea or Japan, Western songwriters must conform to local ways of doing business, and both markets have clear distinctions from the American industry. Typically, this involves English-language demos being funneled to a native, local songwriter, who then rewrites or translates most or all of the original lyrics into Korean or Japanese, earning a song credit in the process. Some sources estimate that about 80% of K-pop songs and 30%-40% of J-pop songs released today have ties to American or other Western sources — usually with completely different lyrics.
“When demos are sent to Korean labels, they're almost always in English,” he says Kevin W, a former K-pop idol who now works as a songwriter and has translated English demos into Korean. “This is how we hear the songs for the first time as artists and idols — in English. Then we pick whatever song we feel like, and then that song is translated into Korean.” Japanese music executives say this is similar to how it works in J-pop.
This is a rapidly growing part of the job description for Korean or Japanese writers, as more songs are imported by Westerners every year. Naoki Osadafounder/CEO of Avex USA, the American arm of the Japanese entertainment powerhouse, says that since he started in the Japanese music industry 20 years ago, the number of songs written by Americans has more than doubled.
To accommodate these English-speaking voices, Young Chance, a Korean songwriter and producer, says “we usually keep the song title from the demo, but then when we translate, we have a different take on the same title.” In Japan, where speaking English as a second language is less common and there is less emphasis on appealing to a global audience overall, it is even more important to rephrase the words of a Western demo to suit the needs of the local listener.
Common words and phrases like “let's go” or “boom” or slang like “Westside”, often derived from American rap music, might still make the cut in a K-pop or J-pop song, but that's about it . Unless, of course, it's a song destined to be a Western crossover hit, like the Billboard Hot 100 No. 1 by BTS or BLACKPINK's “Ice Cream” featuring Selena Gomez — both were written entirely by Americans and kept in English.
Chance says he recently completed a soon-to-be-released “word-for-word English translation” with a “major Korean act,” but says this approach to rewriting is much less common given the difficulties of adapting the same story and which means in the same measure and rhyme as before. Because Western songwriters now expect their lyrics to be almost entirely thrown away, lyric writing is not given much emphasis when writing for K-pop and J-pop.
There are other distinctions between K-pop and Western songwriting. Torsten Ingvaldsen, an independent A&R that is part of the growing class of middlemen connecting Western writers with Korean idols, says that translated K-pop songs also often edit out explicit words or inappropriate themes. This, he says, is due to the young age of the average K-pop superfan, as well as cultural differences — although Jung Kook's recent sexually charged single “Seven” may herald a shift in attitudes toward explicit topics in Korea.
On the business side, Western songwriters know that when pitching to Korean and Japanese labels, they'll have to give up a significant portion of releases to local songwriters they'll likely never meet or work with directly. In Korea, it is customary to give 12.5% to the person who rewrites the lyrics. “Sometimes they ask for a bit more, but that's almost such a hard and fast rule that it's often not even negotiated,” he says. Mary Megan Peer, CEO of peermusic, an indie publisher with offices in Korea and Japan. In Japan, however, 50% is usually expected, due to differences in the publishing industries of Western countries and that of Japan.
“In Japan, versions are completely split into two halves: one verse, one melody,” says Osada. “Copyright ownership is 50/50 and has been fixed.” In America, songwriters are often also the producers—creating lyrics, melody, and track—and work on all three elements with other creatives in the same session. In Japan, songwriters and producers take a very different approach. “There are three roles: one is the producer, also called the 'track creator' or arranger,” Osada says. “Some topliners do lyrics and melodies, but there are people who only write lyrics. Each of the three work alone in their own room and then send the completed demo. It's not like Western writers where they all work together.”
The Korean publishing business is somewhere in the middle, given its stronger and longer-term ties to Western music. There is still a clear distinction between the roles of producer and songwriter, as in Japan, and toplining is the main focus of the Korean songwriter's mission, but the way lyrics are weighted is not the same.
Western songwriters largely believe that these overseas opportunities are worth it, even though half of their releases are given away. At a time when the popularity of streaming has eroded the potential earnings of songwriters in the United States and other Western countries, pop audiences in Korea and Japan still buy full albums, physically and digitally, meaning “the money for publishing [in Korea and Japan] it really is like nothing else for a writer,” says Ingvaldsen.
But why do Japanese and Korean record labels use so many songs by Western songwriters when their local industries are thriving? First, J-pop and K-pop have always found inspiration in American music, especially pop and rap, so many believe that working with Western—especially American—talent is a natural fit. Getting foreign records can also increase a K-pop or J-pop act's ability to capture the attention (and dollars) of the music market overseas as well as domestically.
Ingvaldsen also personally believes that there is a “lack of local songwriters. I found there are only a few big ones [Korean] songwriters featured on everything from every major label.” Osada says that in Japan the pool of working songwriters is “definitely more condensed.” He adds that it is a more “hidden role” in the Japanese industry as well. “I see big differences in the personality of writers there and in the U.S. In the U.S. there are writers who are almost like artists — very creatively outgoing, honest. Japanese writers and producers are introverts.”
A Seoul-based songwriter, who wished to remain anonymous, echoes that sentiment. “There aren't many Korean writers who actually work on the big hit songs — that go into the Western industry,” he says. “The major labels are working together [fewer] Korean Songwriters”.
And this trend shows no signs of stopping, as major Japanese and Korean labels continue to strengthen their ties with the West, particularly in the United States. Hajime Harada, A&R at Avex USA, says that “since I started at Avex USA in 2022, the percentage of US songs that have landed with Japanese artists has easily doubled.” His boss, Osada, believes this is due to Avex's increasing investment in their American outpost in West Hollywood, California. Korean music companies have also aligned more closely with the Western music industry: In late March, HYBE inked a new distribution deal with Universal Music Group, while JYP has a partnership with Republic and Starship Entertainment has a deal with Columbia, to name a few.
The new AI technology may also present more opportunities to rewrite lyrics in the future. Woo was recently hired by AI voiceover startup Hooky and American pop artist Lauv to translate the singer-songwriter's new single 'Love U Like That' into Korean. Woo then sang his own Korean version of the song and Lauv's voice was mapped onto it using Hooky's technology as a way to cut down on the difficult process of Lauv learning Korean pronunciation. “I think these kinds of opportunities will increase [bilingual songwriters] in the future as artificial intelligence grows,” says Woo.
Osada could see it working for Japanese audiences as well, who have appreciated Japanese K-pop translations in the past and may be open to AI making those translations more commonplace. “I think there's some market there,” Osada says. “Japanese people see lyrics as a very important factor in enjoying songs, so I think translating them into the local language could help.”
As the music market becomes increasingly global, publishing professionals are convinced that the trend of promoting Western records to Eastern talent will continue to expand, with some even looking to China and India as possible future frontiers. “The money [in exporting pitch records] it's too good to ignore,” says Ingvladsen.
