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Meet PSY. You may not know his name, but according to the YouTube stats, some 28 million of you have watched the video for his highly addictive song, “Gangnam Style” in the month since it was uploaded. While the South Korean performer and reality TV judge is little known outside of his own country, “Gangnam Style” and its weird, wonderfully watchable video is now a certified viral hit.
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Much of the video features PSY riding an invisible horse through the streets of the Seoul’s Gangnam district, which gives you a pretty good sense of the clip’s tongue-in-cheek vibe. (In fact, the video has sparked a dance craze, aptly called “the invisible horse.”) “Gangnam means, it’s like Beverly Hills of Korea,” said PSY, a.k.a. Jae-Sang Park, in an interview with ABC News.
“But the guy doesn’t look like Beverly Hills. Dance doesn’t look like Beverly Hills. … And the situation in music video doesn’t look like Beverly Hills. But he keeps saying I’m Beverly Hills style. So that’s the point. It’s sort of a twist.”
PSY’s meteoric rise to internet superstardom hasn’t gone unnoticed by other celebrities. According to ABC News, both T-Pain and Josh Groban have tweeted about the singer’s viral hit, and PSY’s management company claims that Justin Bieber has shown interest in collaborating with the artist.
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PSY released a new video Tuesday for “Oppa Is Just My Style,” set to the “Gangnam Style” beat but featuring Hyun-a of K-pop girl group 4Minute (who their own viral hit with “Bubble Pop!“). It’s a glitzier, glossier and more more choreographed video than the original, but PSY manages to get in a few moves worthy of a giggle or two. Whether or not it will be a viral hit, well, that’s in the eyes — and clicks — of the beholder.
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