Karaoke Box

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Karaoke Box is a variant of karaoke that is popular in East Asia. It features a small to medium-sized private room containing karaoke equipment for a group of friends to rent in timed increments. A monitor in the room displays lyrics atop a themed music video. The music videos are often not the official videos, but are videos made especially for karaoke establishments. A typical Karaoke Box establishment contains 10-20 such rooms as well as a main "karaoke bar" area in the front. Karaoke Box centers can scale to hundreds of rooms and can be extremely opulent. Karaoke Box establishments often sell refreshments.

In Taiwan and China, Karaoke Box establishments are often known as KTV, and are a popular form of extertainment. Very successful KTV chains in Taiwan include Holiday KTV and Cashbox KTV. "KTV" is an abbreviation for karaoke television, derived as a reference to "MTV."

The name varies across countries:

KTV in Taiwan.
Videoke in the Philippines.
Karaoke Box in Hong Kong and Japan.
Noraebang (노래방) in South Korea. "Noraebang" literally means "song (norae) room (bang)".

It is also common to simply abbreviate it as "K".

1 Karaoke Music Videos
2 Special KTV
3 KTV outside of Asia
4 External link

[edit] Karaoke Music Videos

Screenshot of Karaoke MV

The word "KTV" can also mean a "karaoke music video", a music video with karaoke lyrics and MMO audio track. Some karaoke music videos were sold to KTV establishments under exclusivity contracts, causing some people to steal karaoke music videos and share them on the Internet. These are often found on the Internet in MPEG or VCD format with the string "(KTV)" appended to the filename.

[edit] Special KTV

Special KTV is a variant of KTV with the added feature of girls being available for hire as hosts in the KTV rooms. The term reflects the wider phenomenon of the word "special" in Taiwan being "hijacked" from English to imply something sexual. This "hosting" can range from polite conversation to sexual liaison, depending on the policies and niche of the particular "special KTV" lounge. Sexual recreation can take place in the KTV room itself or at a "love motel". Such practice is illegal in Taiwan, but enforcement is weak. Special KTVs are commonplace and can be incredibly expensive. Taichung, the third largest city on Taiwan, is a notable hub of special KTV lounges.

Special KTV are a popular form of corporate entertainment and many business deals are struck within the confines of special KTV lounges, a striking difference between Taiwanese and Western business practices. Special KTVs can often be distinguished by red, white, and blue twirling barbershop spindles on their storefront. They are alleged to have connections to triads.

KTV lounges are also found in other East Asian countries, such as Singapore and South Korea.

[edit] KTV outside of Asia

Karaoke itself is not as prevalent in the Western World as it is in much of Asia. Instead of KTV or Karaoke box, it tends to follow a more public format, which involves singing on stage in bars and clubs instead of in small, private, equipped rooms for rent. This format is arguably more daunting for an underconfident singer with the possibility of a sizable audience of strangers, as opposed to a small number of friends or family.

Most Americans have experienced karaoke only in the "karaoke bar" setting, although karaoke boxes also became popular in New York in the late 1990s. Asian subcommunities in the U.S. also have KTVs.