Public Places For Karaoke

A karaoke bar, restaurant, club or lounge is a bar or restaurant that provides karaoke equipment so that people can sing publicly, sometimes on a small stage. This is the most common arrangement in North America and Europe. Many establishments offer karaoke on a weekly schedule, while some have shows every night. Such establishments commonly invest more in both equipment and song discs, and are often extremely popular, with an hour or more wait between a singer’s opportunities to take the stage (called the rotation). East Asian, North American and other Western karaoke arrangements are usually add-ons to an existing bar or social lounge. Most of these establishments allow patrons to sing for free, with the expectation that sufficient revenue will be made selling food and drink to the singers. Less commonly, the patron wishing to sing must pay a small fee for each song they sing.

In some traditional Chinese restaurants, there are so-called “mahjong-karaoke rooms” where the elderly can play mahjong and teenagers can enjoy karaoke. The result is fewer complaints about boredom but more noise.

With technological innovations and the development of family-use home karaoke sets, there was one problem – the noise: since most Japanese houses stand close to each other and are built of wood, with poor soundproofing, it would be very annoying of the neighbours to sing into a microphone at night. Seizing upon the opportunity created by this problem, entrepreneurs created the “Karaoke Box”, a roadside facility containing closed-door insulated rooms for singing. They were advertised as a place where you could sing to your heart’s content. The first karaoke box appeared in 1984 in a rice field in the countryside of Okayama Prefecture, just west of the Kansai area. It was built from a converted freight car. Since then, karaoke boxes have been built on unoccupied grounds all over Japan, and in urban areas, karaoke rooms, which consist of compartments made by partitioning and soundproofing rooms in a building, were introduced and set up one after another. As these facilities were established mainly to provide places to enjoy singing, they became widely popular among all sectors of the population – female office workers, housewives, college students, and even high school students.	A karaoke box that occupies a high-rise building in Shinjuku, Tokyo, this location was featured in the movie Lost In Translation.
In Asia, a Karaoke box is the most popular type of karaoke venue. A karaoke box is a small or medium-sized room containing karaoke equipment rented by the hour or half-hour, providing for a more intimate and less public atmosphere. Karaoke venues of this type are often dedicated businesses, some with multiple floors and a variety of amenities including food service, but hotels and business facilities provide karaoke boxes as well. The name varies across countries: In Japan and Hong Kong it is known as the Karaoke Box.	Entrance Hall of a K-TV in Taipei.

In Taiwan and mainland China, Karaoke Box establishments are often known as KTV. 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”. In the Philippines it is called Videoke. In South Korea, it is called Noraebang, meaning “song (norae) room (bang)”.

"Special KTV"

A group of gentlemen patronizing a KTV in China will typically have a group of young women brought into the room from which each man may choose his personal hostess. In Taiwan, these establishments are known as Special KTV. 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 in Taiwan 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 storefronts. They are alleged to have connections to triads. These Special KTVs are also prevalent in Mainland China, although they are usually just known as 'KTV' (whereas plain vanilla KTV without hostesses is usually called 'Karaoke'). Similar to Taiwan, these KTVs are illegal but are nevertheless commonplace.

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