Gopchang Jeongol is a Hongdae LP bar for Korean oldies, not a polite audiophile lounge. It has been part of Seoul’s music-bar map since the late 1990s, moving around Sinchon and Hongdae before settling into its current basement address on Wausan-ro 29ra-gil.
The room is built from familiar LP-bar materials: vintage lighting, wooden tables, shelves of records, old posters, and Korean pop history pressed into the walls. The music reaches back through folk, rock, pop, and Korean versions of overseas classics from the 1960s onward. Requests are part of the culture, and the night can move quickly from nostalgic listening to people singing along.
On quieter nights it works as a memory-heavy listening room. On weekends it can become one of Seoul’s rowdier retro music bars, with different generations meeting over songs they know by heart.
Go for Korean records, a basement room with history, and a night that may start with a drink at the table and end closer to a singalong than a seated hi-fi session.