South Korean pop music sensation Psy admitted yesterday he sometimes gets sick of his massive hit Gangnam Style but will continue performing the number that made him world-famous.
Speaking at a news conference in Singapore ahead of a free performance for fans, the 34-year-old – clad in a black suit and his trademark sunglasses – was modest about his fame and said he was just another person doing his job.
“Sometimes, honestly, yes I get tired or I get sick of it because I got so many requests to teach it, you know, like average let me say 50 requests per city, per country,” said Psy, whose full name is Park Jae-Sang.
“I already taught the dance to so many people, so many times but still the dance makes me here, to make a press conference in Singapore, so of course sometimes I’m tired about it, but I got to do it, it’s my job,” he added.
He later performed the dance in front of cheering fans outside a Singapore landmark, the high-rise Marina Bay Sands casino complex. But Psy said that despite the many times he has performed the number, “I really like the dance still.”
The chubby K-pop veteran made his debut in South Korea in 2001 but it was only 11 years later that he shot to global fame with Gangnam Style, which a week ago made history by becoming the most watched video on You Tube.
The video has so far notched up more than 860 million views, overtaking Baby by Canadian teen heart-throb Justin Bieber, on more than 807 million.
Gangnam Style, which parodies the extravagant lifestyles of residents of an upmarket Seoul neighbourhood, has inspired thousands of online imitations, and flash mobs of tens of thousands in Paris, Rome and Milan.
The song has also earned Psy a nomination in the People’s Choice category of Time magazine’s Person of the Year 2012 contest together with other newsmakers such as US President Barack Obama, China’s Communist Party head Xi Jinping and North Korean leader Kim Jong-Un.
But Psy played down his chances of topping that chart. “I feel really strange and weird why I’m there,” he said. “It’s not going to happen, I think, and I don’t deserve that much.”