South Korean singer Psy, full name Park Jae-sang, has been on the scene there for many years, and after releasing the song “Gangnam Style” in 2012, he broke all internet records.
His hit was released on July 15, 2012, and by mid-December of that year, it had garnered a billion views on YouTube. He broke the record and became the first performer in the world to do so. YouTube executives then said that because of it, they had to change the display of numbers on the videos and expanded it to a billion. To date, “Gangnam Style” has collected as many as 3.6 billion views.
Psy became the “King of YouTube,” as the media called him, eight years ago, and everyone was amazed at his popularity. At the same time, every party was followed by Gangnam style dance, and it was unquestionable that he made a big fuss in the world music scene.
In October 2012, the singer met with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, who expressed a desire to work with him because Psy has a global reach. After the great fame, Psy retired but is still involved in music.
Today he has his own company
Even before he became planetarily popular, the singer was discovered by local producers in South Korea. With his dance that mocked current trends, he caught the eye of many in 2000 on Korean national television, and a year later, he released his debut album. Psy interrupted his career because he had to join the army, and returned in 2009 after his dismissal.
By 2012, he was working intensively on his career and became one of the first South Korean performers to break into the world stage. Along with him, the K-pop movement began.
The famous singer also admitted in 2013 how great fame negatively affected his life. He turned to alcohol and said vodka was his best friend, and he drank it if he was happy or sad.
He had talked about his difficult childhood in interviews before. Psy disagreed with his father, and in his youth, he ended up in prison for marijuana possession.
After the single “Gangnam Style”, he released the song “Gentleman” a year later, which also won a lot of viewership, but after that, his popularity began to decline. Although he worked with several stars, such as Snoop Dogg and Katy Perry, he was slowly disappearing from the world stage.
Still, he devoted himself to the work behind the cameras. Psy founded his own company, “P Nation”, which operates as a record company and today helps many local stars in their breakthrough into the world market.
As he pointed out in the interviews, he chose the name Psy because of the word psycho. Everything he did seemed a little crazy to him, so he chose such an artistic name according to that.
