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David D. Lee

In an industry built on going global, K-pop’s freshest phenomenon has succeeded by doing the exact opposite: staying home.
Rescene, a five-member girl group from little-known agency The Muze Entertainment, debuted in 2024 but largely flew under the radar until recently.
Now, they are the talk of the town – chart-toppers, brand ambassadors and a name that is suddenly inescapable across South Korea.
No stadium tours preceded their rapid ascent from relative obscurity. No Hybe-scale marketing budget was behind their rise. Instead, viral YouTube clips and old-fashioned word of mouth did all the hard work.

Their breakthrough, dubbed a “small agency miracle”, was a rare feat in an industry dominated by the big four entertainment agencies – Hybe, SM, JYP and YG.
But Rescene’s rise is more than just a plucky underdog tale.
Their melodic, unhurried songs have more of 2000s K-pop about them than today’s hybrid, genre-blending sounds, setting the group apart with music made for Korean fans first.
In an increasingly globalised industry obsessed with world domination, Rescene has become that rarest of things: a genuine domestic phenomenon.
Humble beginnings
Two years ago, it was a very different story. Back in 2024, major broadcasters and music festivals had little interest in a group from an unproven agency, so the quintet spent their early years playing whatever venues they could find, from junior school field days to local community centres.
Their fortunes changed after Woni, the group’s leader, was chosen to host a self-titled YouTube channel created by a producer with a track record of viral video hits. Rather than polished idol content, the series highlighted each member’s distinct background and personality.
Japanese member Minami’s gleefully exaggerated homage to 1990s Japanese gyaru subculture spawned the now-ubiquitous catchphrase “Geoje, Yahho!”, while later episodes leaned into the Gyeongsang satoori (dialect) of members Woni and Zena, deepening the connection with fans.

A Rescene track soon topped the South Korean music charts, with a follow-up also reaching the top 10, and all five members have now cracked the top 13 of the Korea Corporate Reputation Research Institute’s brand reputation girl-group index, with Woni taking the top spot ahead of idols from Hybe and YG.
They were not the first K-pop group to find major success on a minor label, however.
EXID’s “Up & Down” caught fire in 2014 off a single fan-filmed clip that went viral. A year later, GFriend won the country over when footage emerged showing the group’s members repeatedly slipping on a rain-slicked stage but refusing to stop performing.
And BB Girls, who first made a name for themselves as Brave Girls in 2011, experienced a revival a decade later after videos of soldiers singing along to their songs on military bases spread online.
The BTS playbook
“This is ultimately the power of digital platforms,” said Kim Jeong-sub, a professor of K-culture and entertainment at Sungshin Women’s University in Seoul and author of The Universe of BTS.
“In the past, songs usually became popular first because of a specific moment,” he said, citing appearances in television dramas or a viral sing-along.
“With Rescene, the process worked in reverse. People first became interested in the members themselves and that interest naturally extended to their music.”
He compared the strategy to that of Hybe’s foundational group, BTS. Before they became K-pop royalty, the boy band “couldn’t rely on expensive television promotions, so they documented their daily lives through blogs and YouTube”, Kim said.

By building intimacy with video diaries and personal messages, the group laid the emotional groundwork for what became their global fan base: the BTS Army.
“Rescene has taken that one step further,” Kim said. “Their success has been built on carefully produced content that highlights each member’s personality and individuality.”
The group’s rise has not gone unnoticed by policymakers. South Korea’s culture ministry plans to almost double funding next year for a programme supporting independent agencies abroad.
This year, Rescene’s agency was among 10 that were awarded up to 300 million won (US$203,700) in annual government support, from a 3 billion won pot, for album production, music videos and overseas marketing.
More ‘K’ in K-pop
For pop culture critic Kim Hern-shik, however, the real story is not Rescene’s rise, but what that rise reveals about how much K-pop has changed.
“The reason the group attracted so much attention is precisely because K-pop has spent the past few years looking overseas,” he said.
Since the pandemic, entertainment agencies have poured resources into international tours and global fandom building, often before groups had even established themselves at home.
As that became more common, Korean fans increasingly felt like an afterthought, Kim Hern-shik said, with groups like Stray Kids and XG finding global fame while remaining, in his words, “relatively unfamiliar to the Korean general public”.

Rescene, by contrast, built their popularity by being distinctly Korean. Rather than presenting a polished, placeless image that many idols cultivate for export, they openly celebrate their hometowns, regional dialects and local culture.
“The members proudly talk about where they come from,” Kim Hern-shik said. “In the past, idols from major agencies sometimes even tried to hide their regional backgrounds.”
The ripple effects have been felt in domestic tourism too. South Gyeongsang, Woni’s home province, logged a record 5 million visitors in the first half of this year, with the eponymous Geoje city of “Geoje, Yahho!” fame becoming one of the region’s most-visited spots thanks to Rescene’s videos.
Kim Hern-shik said this reflected a certain reassertion of Korean specificity across the country’s culture industry, pointing to the runaway global success of the animated hit KPop Demon Hunters – which foregrounds Korean culture, despite being American made – and BTS’ decision to stage their long-awaited reunion concert at Seoul’s Gwanghwamun Square with a comeback centred around the Korean folk song “Arirang”.
“Interest in Korea today extends beyond Seoul and the surrounding metropolitan area,” he said. “People are increasingly curious about smaller cities and different regions of the country.”
Rescene reminds people that K-pop also has roots
Kim Hern-shik, Korean pop culture critic
He compared this longing for a “sense of place” to that experienced by practitioners of the Korean martial art taekwondo. Millions practise it worldwide, yet people still travel to Kukkiwon in Seoul because they want “to experience the birthplace”.
“Rescene reminds people that K-pop also has roots,” he added. “Although we use the term ‘K-pop’, what people are ultimately consuming is content produced by individual entertainment companies. The problem is that when fans come to Korea, there often isn’t a physical place that embodies that experience.”
Rescene’s success is proof that authenticity and global appeal were never mutually exclusive, according to Kim Hern-shik.
“By proudly showcasing Korea, and local Korea in particular, Rescene has shown that authenticity itself can attract global attention,” he said.


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Rescene members (from left) Zena, May, Minami, Woni and Liv. Photos: Instagram/rescene_official

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While major labels chase global fame, Rescene won over South Korea by putting local culture front and centre


While major labels chase global fame, Rescene won over South Korea by putting local culture front and centre.


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Putting the ‘K’ back in K-pop: how Rescene charmed South Korea

.css-1c6uqr6{color:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-size:inherit;font-family:inherit;line-height:inherit;overflow-wrap:break-word;}While major labels chase global fame, Rescene won over South Korea by putting local culture front and centre

While major labels chase global fame, Rescene won over South Korea by putting local culture front and centre