They are a quartet of girls, whose act includes painting themselves black, donning afros, sticking their lips out in caricature and dancing in pajamas. With stage names Nanda, Bluesy, Spicy and Sleepy the four talented Korean singers - Seo Sung-hee, Kim Soo-youn, Kim Yong-ji and Kang Hyun-jong - have become a pop sensation in Korea.

The quartet of singers have also plunged Korea, which is competing with Vancouver to host the 2010 Winter Olympics, into a race relations nightmare.

Their act which is blatantly racist has triggered a firestorm of protest around the world with critics demanding the Korean government ban the show which demeans those of African origin.

"Besides the blatant mockery of African people by this group, what I find really troublesome is that the group, the media, nor the governmental censorship board has a problem with what the Bubble Sisters are doing," wrote Olalekan Waheed Temidire, a Nigerian-Canadian who is teaching English in Seoul.

Olalekan is using the Internet to get artists such as Nas, Jay-Z, Eminem, 50 Cent, Mary J. Blige, and others to have their representatives in South Korea insist that they do not want their videos or music to be played on the same programs or stations as those airing the Bubble Sisters.

"Eminem used up just about every trick in the book to court controversy. Homophobia, hockey masks and chainsaws - but he never smeared black greasepaint on his face. For that matter, he never smeared yellow greasepaint on either. If he did, he probably would have been shot." Olalekan fumed.

The censorship board in Korea, which is notorious for being extremely conservative and has been known to ban songs citing sexually charged lyrics, has been silent on the Bubble Girls.

Whether it is or is not a direct result of the misguided marketing ploy, the group has managed to sell more records than its competition.

Their first album, integrating funk, R&B and soul, was released last month and has already sold 7,000 copies.

"That's typical for a new face," said Lee Yoo-sun, speaking on behalf of distributors Universal Music Korea (UMK). "But it is true that Bubble Sisters are getting more popular on air and sales."

In a recent Korean newspaper interview, lead singer Nanda says all the extra attention was an unintentional by-product of the "blackface" gimmick.

"We really love black music," she explained, drawing a distinction between the artists whom the band is parodying and those whom it respects.

"We want to undermine the typical Korean band, who are pretty but don't have any talent, and open the doors to musically-talented people who, if they don't fit into this compartment, are usually forced underground."

The music video however tells another story. Nanda and the girls jump around, pulling faces and wearing grotesquely distorted "rubber-lips" makeup and bring up unsavory issues like slavery, exploitation, racism - issues the West has spent a century trying to bury.

To make matters worse, the girls sing about being ugly and not satisfying their true love, creating an unfortunate juxtaposition, wrote a pop critic. "We just thought it was fun to play around with the image, we didn't mean to link ugliness to being black," retorted Nanda.

After the 'blackface' act triggered headlines in Korea and created an unanticipated splurge of protest, hate mail and petitions, the band's marketing company WinWin decided to pull the plug.

Marketing Director Rob Seo even offered an apology, "To the 1 percent of people who were offended by this, we're really sorry."

The protests were not only coming from around the globe. Korea's half-black queen of hip-hop Tasha, aka T, aka Natasha Shanta Reid contacted her manager, Jeon Hong-jun, explained that this was going to be a very big problem and refused to participate in any shows linked to the girls.

"This problem is simply a culture gap, we didn't know it was racist," said Jeon. "Nobody considered (the band) are trying to degrade black people. We don't see it in that way," said MTV Korea rep Kay Park. The station plans to continue airing the video while others are itching to distance themselves.

UMK, some of whose biggest-selling artists are black, such as Tupac Shakur and Jay-Z has asked the band's agent WinWin to be more politically sensitive in future. - APNS