(PPAP) Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen Meaning | Pop Culture by Dictionary.com

(PPAP) Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen was released in 2016 by Kazuhito Kosaka, a Japanese comedian better known by his stage names Daimaou Kosaka and persona Pikotaro.

Kosaka says he was inspired to write the song when he picked up a pen to write and thought about the apple trees in his native town while glancing at an open can of pineapple on the table. In the song, while dancing awkwardly to a goofy beat in tacky animal print clothing, Kosaka repeats that he has a pen and an apple, fitting the two words together (“Apple pen!”) and repeating it while miming a pen and pineapple (“Pineapple pen!”).

There’s not much more to the song than that—but that’s its infectious charm.

The deliberately absurdist (PPAP) Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen was produced for roughly just $1,000 in August, 2016. It was initially popular amongst Japanese students, but went viral after superstar Justin Beiber tweeted a link to the music video in September, 2016, stating it was his favorite video.

My favorite video on the internet 😂😂😂😂😂😂😂😂 https://t.co/oJOqMMyNvw

— Justin Bieber (@justinbieber) September 27, 2016

As of Jun, 2018, (PPAP) Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen had been viewed over 200-million times on YouTube, where there are countless lip-sync and parody versions. It even went #1 on the Japanese Billboard charts and was referenced in the 2017 Emoji Movie. (PPAP) Pen-Pineapple-Apple-Pen has been called the new “Gangnam Style,” referring to a music video by Korean rapper PSY that went massively viral in 2012.