The Governors Ball Music Festival, first held on Governors Island in New York Harbor, is one of the most popular outdoor festivals in New York City. The festival, first started in 2011 by Jordan Wolowitz, Tom Russell, and Yoni Reisman, has become an all-encompassing cultural event that extends invitations to the most popular singers across all genres and even has festivities extended to the most famous restaurants and the best food trucks from all over New York. What started life as a small festival with acts like Girl Talk, Pretty Lights, Empire of the Sun, Mac Miller and Neon Indian exploded in popularity  as it grew to include huge names like OutKast, Jack White, the Strokes and Vampire Weekend by 2014, and established itself as a major, lavish event the following year with performances from hip hop artists like Drake and Kanye West. Although it retains the name Governors Ball, the festival was only ever held on its namesake island once, having since moved around to Randalls Island, Citi Field and Flushing Meadows–Corona Park. The festival was held from June 9 through 11 this year and was headlined by Lizzo, Odesza and Kendrick Lamar. aespa became the first K-pop group to perform at Governors Ball with their 40-minute set on June 10. Japanese singer-songwriter Rina Sawayama also performed as a subheadliner.

aespa will cut across the continental US to set yet another K-pop group first: taking to the stage on the opening day of Outside Lands at Golden Gate Park, San Francisco, which takes place this year from August 11 through 13. With Kendrick Lamar, Foo Fighters and Odesza headlining, you might feel some deja vu after reading about Governors Ball, but this festival is bigger and features even more performers. Formerly the Outside Lands Music & Arts Festival, it was first held back in 2008 with Radiohead as their inaugural headliner and instantly became a mainstay of the San Fran festival scene. The festival was forced to scale back operations after losing money and struggling with counterfeit tickets, but it’s since established itself as an eco-friendly festival full of fun events. And like Governors Ball, musicians playing all different genres are invited to the stage.

Do you know which Korean artist was the first to ever headline at an American music festival? It was j-hope, on July 31 last year—the fourth day of Lollapalooza in Chicago. The day before that, TOMORROW X TOGETHER made history as the first Korean group at the festival. Beginning its life as an idea put forward by rock band Jane’s Addiction lead vocalist Perry Farrell, Lollapalooza has gone on to become integral to the Chicago festival scene, and the US as a whole. It pioneered the idea of bringing together musicians of different genres for one event and has since been held in different cities across the globe, starting with its expansion to Chile in 2010 and later exporting the festival format to Brazil, Argentina, Germany, Sweden, Israel and Asia. A total of four K-pop groups will perform at this year’s Lollapalooza festivals. First up is Stray Kids, who will become the first K-pop group to headline Lollapalooza Paris, held July 21 to 23. Lollapalooza Chicago takes place August 3 through 6 and will host 170 different artists, including TOMORROW X TOGETHER, who returns to the US one year later as a headliner, and NewJeans, who’s appearance comes just one year after their debut.

With festivals that embrace a wide variety of genres having become the norm, a name like “rock festival” starts to sound outdated. But it’s a different story when the festival in question boasts so much history and tradition. Fuji Rock Festival first opened in 1997 as Japan’s first outdoor rock festival, and along with Summer Sonic—which we’ll get to in a moment—it holds the honor of being one of two major music festivals in the country, attracting some 140,000 people to its stages every year. Interestingly, much like the history of Governors Ball, Fuji Rock Festival was only ever held at Mt. Fuji for its inaugural 1997 event. The first festival took place at Fuji Tenjinyama Ski Resort but audiences and artists alike suffered under a typhoon and heavy rains, so the venue was moved to Tokyo Bayside Square the next year—where the humid summer once again made things subpar. Organizers finally settled on Naeba Ski Resort in Niigata Prefecture in 1999, where the festival has been held each year since. Despite the name, Fuji Rock Festival has opened its doors to artists spanning a variety of genres in recent years. The sole Korean artist this year will be Balming Tiger, who K-pop fans will recognize for their recent collaboration with RM, “SEXY NUKIM.”

Unlike the natural backdrop of Fuji Rock Festival, Summer Sonic is held in the middle of the city. Since starting in 2000, Summer Sonic has sought a dynamic meeting of Japanese and international musicians and is famously held simultaneously in both Chiba in the east of Japan and Osaka in the west. Artists perform in one city on the first day and then travel to the other side of the country to perform again the next day. Audiences are treated to the same lineup in two different cities while artists are able to promote themselves to huge numbers of people in the bustling metropolises of Osaka and Chiba, near Tokyo. In Chiba, performances are held at Zozo Marine Stadium and Makuhari Messe; in Osaka, they’re at Maishima Sonic Park. Organizers make venues big and small easy to find by giving them the same names in both cities; the Marine Stage, Ocean Stage, Sonic Stage, Rainbow Stage, Beach State and more await. K-pop fans are already intimately familiar with Super Sonic thanks to all the K-pop artists who have performed there. INFINITE, MONSTA X, THE BOYZ and SEVENTEEN have all performed at Summer Sonic in years past. Korean singers at the festival last year included TOMORROW X TOGETHER, CL, ZICO, KANGDANIEL, and Seori. KANGDANIEL returns this year, along with NewJeans, TREASURE, ENHYPEN and TAEYANG.

BST Hyde Park is a major UK music festival that’s been held in London’s Hyde Park since 2013, with audiences of 65,000 or more turning up each year. The highly regarded weeks-long festival runs from late June to early July and attracts major Commonwealth headliners from across a spectrum of genres. One name drew much attention for this year’s BST Hyde Park festival, which ranruns from June 23 to July 9: BLACKPINK. The group already made history earlier this year when they became the first K-pop group to headline at Coachella, the US’s premiere music festival; now BLACKPINK is also the first Korean singers and the first Asian group to headline BST Hyde Park.