A bit dated, and you’ve probably already seen it, but in case not, here is South Korean boy-band Shinhwa delaying reunification by at least a decade with a performance in Pyongyang:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QM1avYwLC6I[/youtube]
You’d have thought a screening of 007’s “Die Another Day” would have gone over better.
(HT to reader)
13 Comments
I’d reckon about half the North Korean audience is looking at these creatures and thinking: “If this is South Korean manhood, then we can obviously take these guys”.
You gotta give props to Korean performers for giving their all no matter what. From the “Support Dr. Hwang” guy at Busan station to the Adjumma (washed-up) dancers on those Karaoke tv shows…
Koreans give 100% even if nobody’s listening.
Good job Shinwha for not crying that nobody in North Korea loved you…
By the way, I keep seeing this video around, but I seem to recall that other “Korean Wave” signers like BoA and Lee Hyori sand at this same event along with traditional N. Korean singers…?
Wow, if that doesn’t provoke (and deserve) an attack from the Norks, nothing will.
On the other hand, it may do wonders for American-NK solidarity . . . that audience reacted just the way I do to the wonder that is Shinwha.
I don’t think they didn’t like it, I think it was more like,
What is that?
All women like boybands. I bet the women liked it, except they were reluctant to show emotion.
So, did the North Korean men start howling when Hyori had her turn? Probably the same stone faced reaction.
Yeah, those women were eating it up. Pause the video with eleven seconds remaining to see a good summary of how much they liked it. That’s exactly the look that I have when I see these boy-bands.
One must consider that one driving tenet of North Korea’s cultural legitimacy is that the North considers itself the true cultural representation of what it is to be Korean, thus they are very reluctant to embrace any such South Korean music since it would considered tainted by Western influences, much the same way certain Party-sponsored students
stoogescriticized Christmas celebrations in China as being “non-Chinese”. Naturally, the on-line Chinese community largely rejected this party-sponsored stance as being unrealistic and no fun. “Iceberg” may have a good point since people like to have fun, no matter where they live.My commentary may not be completely correct but I would bet I’m fairly close to some thinking that one finds up north.
This is a wonderful video if only for the surreality of it all. As an aside, I wonder if Eric (the American) asked permission to go to Pyeongyang from the US government. If not, won’t the State Dept. have something to say about this. As I understand it, it’s illegal for Americans to go to NK without specific permission.
Amazing crowd reaction. It’s as if we sent Van Halen in a time machine back to the 1800s, ala Back To The Future. Next time, let’s ask Marilyn Manson to perform in Pyongyang.
All those years of accordion lessons and I never knew it was a traditional Korean instrument.
To be fair, it doesn’t surprise me all that much that an audience composed mainly of middle-aged men wasn’t rocking out in their seats, but the perturbed look on the girls’ faces does say a lot about Shinhwa’s market appeal up North. As for whether the Northerners didn’t like it because it was too far from “traditional” Korea, my opinion is that culture is still in the process of being created- and South Korea certainly has a unique pop sensibility. When I think of things in Korea that give me the warm fuzzies, one of them is the sound of upbeat K-pop at eardrum-shredding volume…I also think “YMCA” by the Village People would SLAY in the North.
Also, for the sake of transparency, I should mention that the moment I heard the Shinhwa song I recognized it, and remembered some of the lyrics.
Well, thank you very much Robert for posting that (the the reader who sent it). It’s new to me and I have to say, never have I imagined watching one of these boy bands would be so entertaining!
On a more disturbing note, no matter how much I hear South Koreans proclaiming those in the North to be their brothers, they obviously can’t market towards them very well at all, and I’m not just going off this video. In fact, I’m quite certain I could do a better job. They’ve been lieing to themselves about the North for too long.
This is just as bad as other foreign companies who failed to understand the South Korean market or hire a good Korean marketing consultant first, before coming here (Schlotzkeys comes to mind).
Yup, Schlotzkeys had the most delicious sandwitches, i dug them deeply at Jonggak-yeok when i worked downtown. But they had no clue how to sell to the K-bizman lunch crowd, and folded…
Considering the fact that two of Shinhwa members are Korean American, that their songs are a ridiculous mix of Korean and English, and that the audience are hard core KWP loyalists, I won’t be surprised if Shinhwa helped prove to the KWP that the US is ‘corrupting’ the ‘pure’ and ’sacred’ Korean culture.