Lily Peng

Through cross-cultural music combining K-pop traditions and Western experimentation, KATSEYE has revolutionized the pop landscape.

Stage lights illuminate six female figures. Six different ethnicities, six unique personalities, six distinctive stories. Cheers erupt in the audience. This is KATSEYE.

KATSEYE formed through the joint collaboration of South Korean-based entertainment company HYBE and U.S.-based Geffen Records in the 2023 reality competition “The Debut: Dream Academy.” The six-member girl group consists of Daniela Avanzini, Lara Raj, Manon Bannerman, Megan Skiendiel, Sophia Laforteza and Yoonchae Jeung. Through cross-cultural music combining K-pop traditions and Western experimentation, KATSEYE has revolutionized the pop landscape.

Popular singles like “Touch” (2024), “Gnarly” (2025) and “Gabriela” (2025) showcase the group’s unique style. “Touch” embodies KATSEYE’s K-pop roots through its playful pop production and choreography, while “Gnarly” experiments with a loud, abrasive beat and quirky, unpredictable rap lyrics that reflect their Western influence. Their most recent single, “Gabriela,” released June 20th this year, further emphasizes their global appeal through a Latin-inspired instrumental and a verse entirely in Spanish sung by Cuban-Venezuelan American member Daniela.

Junior Kayla Chen believes that the group’s blending of bold songs like “Gnarly” while retaining the conventional K-pop use of “nonsensical” phrases added for sound rather than meaning has been key to their success. 

“The popularity that they gained after ‘Gnarly’ was pretty insane,” Kayla said. “After ‘Touch’ they still largely had a K-pop fan base. A lot of their fans came from people who also listen to K-pop, but after ‘Gnarly,’ it seemed like a lot of people who are just regular people who don’t listen to K-pop or who are just pop fans really got into KATSEYE, so after that, they really widened their global audience.”

While “Gnarly” helped KATSEYE expand their Western audience, junior dancer Evan Yuan found KATSEYE through their unique choreography that has allowed the group to go viral.

“They’ve never failed to do well with their choreography,” Evan said. “The choreographers know how to create iconic movements. The ‘Gabriela’ hand movements, that’s happening a lot in my dance studio. They really know what they’re doing and know what works well with KATSEYE’s movement quality.”

As their music continues to blur cultural barriers, KATSEYE’s image also challenges expectations placed on K-pop idols. The current industry confines idols to strict standards and forces them to fit into a “perfect” mold through media training, plastic surgery and strict diets. Fans sometimes question the authenticity of idol interactions, since their media training emphasizes showing only positive and often crafted sides of their personality to express their dedication to their fans. Senior Celina Xu feels that KATSEYE breaches these stringent norms.

“They have a lot more freedom,” Celina said. “You can tell a lot of K-pop groups have a polished image, but KATSEYE’s label gives them freedom to go on their own sidequests. They feel more relatable than K-pop, because the K-pop industry is very manufactured.”

Kayla echoed this sentiment, noting how KATSEYE deviates from formulaic Korean industry trends through their past backgrounds. For example, Daniela appeared in a variety of dance competitions like America’s Got Talent at seven years old, Lara practiced Indian classical dance and singing from a young age and Megan trained as a J-pop idol in Japan before joining the group.

“They’re very diverse, not only with their nationalities, but also with their skill sets,” Kayla said. “A lot of K-pop artists are trained under one formula and they can seem a little similar to one another at times, but KATSEYE seem to be marketed as individuals rather than one group. They discuss a lot of issues that a lot of K-pop artists aren’t allowed to discuss, like sexual identity.”

Since their company regulates their behavior less than K-pop idols, KATSEYE members often express their own opinions, honing in on the latest trends and spreading awareness for topics such as feminism and dyslexia.

Sophomore Regina Zhang noted how the members of KATSEYE are also able to maintain more personal connections to their fanbase due to their unfiltered comments and interactions with other members on livestreams, making the group more relatable.

“Because they’re all Gen Z, they can relate to their audience on camera,” Regina said. “Their marketing appeals to younger audiences, and they can relate to their fans on a higher level. The members understand all the fans’ references, and they play off that really well.”

However, with HYBE sharing ownership of KATSEYE, the group has faced the strict Korean standards regarding their styling as well as dating, with many members receiving backlash for appearing intimate with men. Additionally, fans have criticized KATSEYE management for favoritism, by supposedly leaving Manon out of the “Gabriela” performance video” on purpose because of a sprained ankle.

This scrutiny has also brought welcome attention to KATSEYE, increasing their global recognition and allowing them to surpass 1 billion streams on Spotify. Additionally, their recent ad campaign with Gap went viral on social media and boosted streams of Kelis’ “Milkshake”, the song they danced to in the ad, by 179%.

Kayla attributes the rise of KATSEYE globally to marketing tactics that draw in fans of traditional K-pop while simultaneously pursuing mainstream exposure by performing at music festivals like Lollapalooza.

“The way they have been marketed is to have the stylistic elements of American culture but retain a lot of the fan worship of K-pop culture,” Kayla said. “They still sell albums the same way K-pop artists do with photocards and they perform at the same shows. The way they do these fan meetings and have a lot of performances is very similar to the way K-hop artists do, and that way they retain a lot of that same fan base while branching out into different stylistic elements.”