Sometime toward the end of last year, it seemed interest in Japanese music was too booming to be overlooked in Korea. At the time, online communities were starting to talk more and more about young singer-songwriters like Fujii Kaze and Aimyon. There had always been people talking about songs by artists like Official HIGE DANdism, Kenshi Yonezu, Vaundy and Mrs. GREEN APPLE, but the conversation had only been taking place between J-pop fans. Last year, then, I took it just to be a flash in the pan and nothing more. A few months later, though, as I’m writing this, I’m pleasantly surprised by the sudden and continuing surge in demand for Japanese music.

There’s no question that Japanese music is a minor subculture in Korea. Its glory days here are now but a faint memory. You don’t hear much about Japanese music anymore and consumption of J-pop can be frowned upon. We’re also deep in the era of K-pop, the new world leader. I’ve been plodding away for the past decade or so to cover Japanese music and try to do away with the prejudices that surround it but I’m afraid my efforts to spread the word about its charm have fallen short. But strangely enough, the winds of fortune appear to have shifted recently. A quick spin around social media reveals all kinds of exciting posts and well-respected music channels on YouTube are all talking about J-pop now.

This unusual spread is taking place through a few different avenues. The first one I want to talk about is short-form media. “Shinunoga E-Wa” by Fujii Kaze, “Ai Wo Tsutaetaidatoka” by Aimyon and “BETELGEUSE” by Yuuri have all been used extensively in short, user-generated videos. It’s important to note that even people who never had an interest in Japanese music before are completely on board with this trend. Examples like this prove that those people who used to lump all Japanese music together or never heard any of it at all are now finding something refreshing about the emotions and styles of these songs. Because songs like these are spreading through short-form video, TikTok now plays a larger role in the Japanese music market too. Its use in promotions after an artist debuts is the same in both Japan and Korea but what sets Japan apart is that TikTok represents a major route through which amateurs can become professionals. In Japan, musicians first share their work on TikTok. Then, once they gain a following on the platform, they get a proper start to their career by signing a contract with one of the major labels.

That’s exactly how it happened for imase, who recently became the first J-pop artist to land on the Melon TOP100 with “Night Dancer.” Because musicians who get their start on TikTok target social media users to begin with, they’re already perfectly primed to appeal to Gen Z. It can also be said that the trendy sound of these songs breaks down preconceptions about Japanese music and meets the needs of a new generation that likes to discover music that other people don’t know about first. It would be complacent to claim that Japanese music’s newfound footing in Korea that goes beyond expected levels of popularity was a fluke.

I personally find it interesting how this boost given to Japanese music through short-form video has shifted it from resting in the hands of fans exclusively and into the general public. It used to be that the main way J-pop was propagated was through tie-ins with anime and other TV shows, but this also ultimately limited the spread. The songs are now all over YouTube Shorts, meaning they’ve become the kind of bite-sized content that people easily stumble upon. It’s also worth noting that the songs that go viral are more about the songs themselves than the artists who make them. You can see this in the way that each singer only has one or two songs that go viral and how the songs that become popular weren’t released that recently. In other words, when people listen to these songs, they don’t think of them as strictly Japanese but simply as good music.

What’s certain is that, thanks to social media, people in both countries are listening to music from the other with the mindset of it just being something good to listen to and without consciously thinking about it as Korean or Japanese music. Since the explosion of social media in Japan in the mid-2010s, teens there were already viewing Korean culture, including K-pop, as trendy. Now something similar is happening in Korea. Looking back, there was always a subculture interested in songs like “Cherry (Sakuranbo),” “Bakamitai” (featured in the Yazuka game franchise) and “Kawaikutegomen.” But while songs like these originally had to be cushioned in memes to be passed around, now we’re in a place where people are enjoying the music for what it is.

People just coming to the trend say it’s not what they picture when they think of Japanese music. Since 2010, Japanese music’s image has undergone a major transformation, becoming far different from the J-rock and idol music Korea once associated it with. This ties back into the Japanese music market: With streaming taking over in the mid-2010s, listeners and musicians in Japan alike have become more attuned to global trends.

The 2016 song “STAY TUNE” by six-person band Suchmos was the biggest turning point. “STAY TUNE” was a smash hit and brought the rock-and-Black-music-infused sound to the forefront at just the right time. Looking back, both bands and solo artists who debuted toward the end of the 2010s and found popularity draw heavily on funk, R&B, disco and hip hop for their vocals and overall sound. In this way, they enthusiastically imported some sophisticated sounds and attitudes onto their own turf. This process and how it created a trendy and universal sound in Japanese music might account for why songs out of Japan now have so many more listeners.

Another factor is that the songs see a big bump when they’re featured in box office hits. The momentum that the songs off THE FIRST SLAM DUNK’s soundtrack gained is almost scary. Audiences flocked to theaters for the movie and interest in the OST was reflected in those numbers, especially for the opening song, “LOVE ROCKETS” by The Birthday. But “Dai Zero Kan” by 10-FEET, which adds to the rising action, also became exceptionally popular, even prompting the group to visit Korea for a live event that fans came to in droves. I can’t forget to mention RADWIMPS, either, who have had their music included in Makoto Shinkai’s movies three times, most recently in Suzume. After riding a wave of fame following the inclusion of their song “Zenzenzense” in Shinkai’s Your Name., RADWIMPS once again rose to popularity on the back of Suzume’s release and their song “Suzume” (feat. Toaka) in it. They’re even holding a concert in Korea in July.

Finally, I think it helps to look at all this by breaking it down to its basics. This trend seems to prove that, ultimately, more and more people are looking to enjoy a wider variety of music. Whether looking for songs with good messages or a wider variety of singer-songwriters, and whether into anything from relatively big bands to Vocaloids, people are finding alternatives in Japanese music at a time when there aren’t many good options outside of K-pop. And while Korea has great musicians working in all kinds of genres, it’s hard to deny that few of them have the size, variety and quality all together that K-pop does.

For that, Japanese music is a ideal alternative. The music is similar emotionally and fans don’t have to travel far to see a concert. When you stop and think about it, pop lovers have had their eyes on Japan for a long time. Just recently, acts like the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Arctic Monkeys played huge concerts on the Japanese archipelago but stopped short of visiting Korea. Koreans can’t depend on local events so they go to Fuji Rock Festival or Summer Sonic instead. As fewer and fewer musicians from around the world visit Korea, the concerts in Japan born out of such huge demand have the artist lineups, resources and atmosphere that give them a clear advantage over those held in Korea.

Listeners have moved on from choosing Japanese music for the ease of accessibility and now make their decisions purely based on their tastes, but I don’t think that’s changed the fact that they still benefit from the foundations that are in place. Plus, finding the content that you enjoy most and basking in it is second nature and all about finding what makes you personally happy. It might seem like it would have always been easy to just enjoy listening to Japanese music, especially when people are so open to the idea of Japanese games and manga, but in fact it hasn’t been that way for the longest time. I want to believe that we’re nearly at a place where it can be a universally accepted idea.