People crowd outside a former live music venue in eastern Seoul, June 3, 2023. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

This is the first part in a three-part series intended to raise awareness of Korea's elusive live music scene and help more people find it.

It seems like more people are asking online how to find shows in Korea this year. Notorious for mega-pop acts, the country does a good job of keeping its live music scene hidden underground.

It has become harder in recent years to find upcoming shows. Gone are the days when resources like Korea Gig Guide or DoIndie or the Korean Punk and Hardcore page on Facebook or MySpace would release exhaustive lists of upcoming shows. Even Platform Magazine gave up on weekly show listings years ago.

Nowadays, in order to find upcoming shows, you have to be on Instagram, where you'll need to follow every band you like, every venue they might play at and every relevant promoter. And then you have to trust the algorithm to show you what you want to see — and you might forget later which account you saw share it, so you'll have to remember all the bands on the lineup, the venue and possibly the promoter, in order to find it again.

In order to help anyone start their search, I asked an online community of scenesters for their favorite music venues. We came up with a list of 10 recommendations for anyone looking for live music in the capital in early 2024.

There are certainly more venues out there, but the community members chose these. As per usual, this list might not age well, due to the fast turnover rate as old venues close, new venues close and even newer venues open.

These are not ranked in any particular order.

A band performs in SoundDog Jazz in central Seoul's Huam Market, May 18, 2022. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

10. SoundDog Jazz

If you're looking for live jazz, one of the most unique places in the city for that is SoundDog, a small pub right inside central Seoul's Huam Market. They have live music almost every night of the week, every week. When I first started attending years ago, before the pandemic, a lot of the acts were younger jazz students, enthusiastic but inexperienced — but on returning more recently, I discovered that many of the same kids still play here, and they've since honed their craft. Shows are usually about two hours long with an intermission. One cool feature I noticed is they placed a mirror over the piano, so you can appreciate it being played from an interesting perspective. The performers used to set up outside the venue in the market corridor, infusing the whole structure (and surrounding neighborhood) with live jazz, but regrettably they no longer do that.

There are full proper public bathrooms next door, and they're modern but sometimes can get a little messy.

Follow @sounddog_jazz on Instagram.

Leenalchi performs to a packed house at Pet Sounds, Oct. 7, 2023, during Block Party. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

9. Pet Sounds

A landmark of Itaewon's Gyeongnidan neighborhood, Pet Sounds is sometimes a live music venue, and on nights when there's not a band setting up, there's usually a DJ spinning classic rock, indie or juggalo music. It's kind of a funny space because it's long and thin, so when you enter, the band's at the far side of the room, and you might have to push through a lot of people to get there.

From what I understand, the place has a lovely women's room, but the men's room is "built for half a person."

Follow @petsoundsmusicpub on Instagram.

Tommy from Gorymurgy performs at Youkillbong, the interior of which looks like someone's living room, Jan. 1. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

8. Youkillbong

Enter an innocuous building on a street in downtown Seoul's Euljiro, take the stairs up and keep going up, and you'll step through a door into...what seems like somebody's living room? The surprisingly homely environment in the middle of such a bleak industrial area makes it feel extra special. You can even go up onto the rooftop, where they used to hold shows. Unfortunately, last year the police showed up to shut down a performance by electronic duo Kang New and Fat Hamster, so as a result it's unlikely they'll have as much freedom to be loud in as many parts of the venue as before. But keep an eye on it, because you never know what it might host.

The washroom is one floor down in the building, sort of shattering the illusion that this is a cozy residential space.

Visit @youkillbong on Instagram.

Burn Burn Burn performs at Channel1969 in western Seoul's Yeonnam-dong, Sept. 17, 2017. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

7. Channel1969

This basement venue has been pretty consistent despite having been located in three different spaces by my count. It started in the northwestern tip of Hapjeong-dong, and now resides in a quiet alley of Yeonnam-dong. I've seen some amazing shows here, although the venue has a wide variety of programming and won't be consistent from one weekend to the next. That just means you have to do your homework.

Oh, and I hear the bathroom is up a few flights of stairs, so don't wait until the last minute.

Follow @channel1969.seoul on Instagram.

Walking After U performs at The Studio HBC in central Seoul's Haebangchon, June 9, 2023. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

6. The Studio HBC

As the name implies, this one's in central Seoul's Haebangchon neighborhood. It's owned by Ryan Goessl of Camarata Music, but earlier this year it made some changes and started collaborating with Wind & Flow Society as part of a drive to "Keep HBC Weird." They've been bringing in more-established acts, while also raising prices and having fewer opening bands, although sometimes there are still shows like before, when they would give a home for the night to a music act that couldn't afford to play anywhere else.

The place has a single unisex toilet that clogs easily, as warns a sign placed above.

Follow @thestudiohbc on Instagram.

Meejah performs at ACS in central Seoul, July 8, 2023. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

5. ACS

This one's an unfinished concrete basement decorated with spraypaint in the middle of an aging industrial section of downtown Seoul's Euljiro. In other words, cool. Go here and you might see electronic music, or a funk show, or hardcore punk.

I remember the bathroom here being a little primitive, but it's one of those buildings where if there's a mess or a lineup, you can often go up the stairs and find a completely unused bathroom one floor above.

Follow @acs.kr on Instagram.

The War Lovers play at Club Steel Face, Feb. 24. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

4. Club Steel Face

Occupying the top floors of a building along Hongdae's Jandari-ro (AKA "Hunting Street" for its nightclubs), Steel Face is sort of unique, in that it is aboveground. Run by Jo Su-min of the punk band Patients, it's mainly a punk venue, but its interior feels nicer and cleaner than others. And the roof is usually open, letting people go up to smoke and get a good view of the area from above. They seem to have given up on having rooftop shows, because you can't have live music disrupting the vibe in this street of nightclubs blasting mainstream canned music outside their doors to attract more customers. It doesn't seem to have shows often enough, but when it does they're always fun.

Be forewarned, while it's usually clean, there's one unisex toilet in the whole place, and that means sometimes a line can form.

Follow @clubsteelface on Instagram.

Club FF is a landmark of western Seoul's Hongdae area, May 13, 2015. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

3. Club FF

This Hongdae club, founded way back in 2004, doesn't appear on the top of everybody's list, but it always appear somewhere on it. It has a reputation for favoring bands that can bring in customers, rather than giving chances to new acts, so you're usually guaranteed to see a good show there. It's a little less niche than a lot of other clubs, so if you keep going back you're likely to see a lot of interesting bands, rather than the same acts over and over again. It's a great starting point for newcomers, for people who want to get a wider sample of what Korea's live music scene has to offer, and for people looking to socialize and make friends.

The men's and women's bathrooms are, unlike several other venues, separate. Full disclosure, I once was trapped in the men's room for five to 10 minutes when the inside doorknob fell off, but I'm glad to report that they have since changed doorknobs.

Follow @hongdaeff on Instagram.

A sign warns against causing too much noise outside Club SHARP in western Seoul's Mangwon-dong, June 18, 2022. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

2. Club SHARP

Opened in 2016, this venue belongs to Ryu Jin-suk, best known for the ska-punk band Skasucks. By the way, it's not Sharp the music symbol, but SHARP the movement, standing for Skinheads Against Racial Prejudice. SHARP has always been home to the punk, ska and hardcore scene — or, these days, I suppose, scenes — but since the closing of GBN Live House during the pandemic, it seems like it's become a little more of a home for the hardcore scene. It is located right outside the influence of the Hongdae area, in the considerably more local Mangwon-dong neighborhood.

Be warned, the bathrooms, located in a parking garage, are rustic: just a urinal for the boys and a squatter for the girls.

Follow @club_sharp on Instagram.

Punks hang out between bands in front of Hongdae's Club Victim, Dec. 30, 2023. Korea Times photo by Jon Dunbar

1. Club Victim

Newly opened just last year, Victim is run by the punk and hardcore label Victim Records. Its location near Sangsu Station on Line 6 makes it officially part of Hongdae, and it's good to feel at home in the area again, even if most of the musicians I see there seem to be in their 40s. I suspect its newness is the reason for its popularity, as people haven't gotten sick of it yet. I hope it stays like that for a long time.

Plus, probably as a result of being new, the bathroom is pretty clean.

Follow @club_victim on Instagram.

Honorable mentions to Hongdae's Strange Fruit, Sangsu-dong's Jebidabang and Euljiro's Seendosi — not sure why the surveyed people didn't think of them. And condolences to Skunk Sindang, which had to stop putting on shows after an older customer made a mess in the stairs, but still serves as a punk bar.

Next time we'll look at some of the best music venues outside of Seoul.