You have probably read of the North Koreans shamelessly ripping off a suite of Disney characters in one of their infamous stage shows.
Why all the pageantry? OK, it’s North Korea, silly question. But why now? Well, it may have something to do with the young leader Kim Jong-un being freed from Dad’s shackles and finally being able to get his leg over recently married (not to Fatty Kim, as the Chinese call him) new mother and former popstar, Hyon Son-wol.
But she’s an interesting one, is Madame Comrade Hyon. An accomplished musician in her own right, she has a string of hits as long as your bayonette, such as Footsteps of Soldiers, I Love Pyongyang, She Is A Discharged Soldier, and We Are The Troops Of The Party. Real toe-tapping stuff. However, her star rose highest when she embraced her fans in the countryside with the 2005 chart-topper Excellent Horse-Like Lady.
Something lost in translation, or a manifestation of the severe shortage of tractors?
Update: by popular demand, Youtube clips provided. No translations, sorry. And I am unable to verify whether the clips match the actual songs, not being versed in Korean.
Further update: call that pop music?? This is pop music. (And no I don’t expect you to sit through that atrocious K-Pop; just trying to make a point…) That being said, it is worth noting how freaking massive K-Pop is throughout Asia, a market of 2 billion+.
Comparing the vigour of South Korean K-pop with its nothern counterpart as churned out by the likes of Kim Jong-un’s latest squeeze reminds me of this well-known photo. God bless capitalism!
Too bad you couldn’t give us links to those tunes. I’d like to give them a listen!
Hmmm …. Excellent Horse-Like Lady … maybe they are big fans of Sarah Jessica Parker, too?
Link here. It’s sort of catchy.
hmm Sounds like that Lilly Allen song about her brother
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sr2Grfi3lFg
Nice beat and tune but I have to say “neigh” to the lyrics.
Sheesh! lady Gaga eat your heart out.
Um, it sounds rather Munich Beerhall circa 1933 to me.
It is sort of catchy, and she’s not a bad singer.
And without having access to a translation of the lyrics, based on the video I suspect that “horse-like” is a rather poor translation of “works like horse”, and not a description of her looks.
Hmm – I couldn’t help but think of “My Lovely Horse” from the “Eurosong” episode of “Father Ted” :-).
Still, at least Mr Kim now has rather more pleasant things to think about, than producing sufficient fissile material to drop a critical mass of, on the “imperialist aggressor” (as his old man used to call us)…
Vintage comedy, that episode of Father Ted.
Regarding your second point, I suspect the elder Kim had his pick of beauties, yet this did not stop him from dropping Hans Blix into a tank full of sharks.
Thanks for the links. Interesting, and not too terrible, either. Since this is from NK I presume that there are no western copyright restrictions on that music, right? So I could copy the tunes and arrangements . . . .
Nah. Anyway, they’ll never replace Tschenghis Kahn in my heart.
Excellent Horse-Like Lady? She’ll never top Groucho’s version in A Day At The Races.
The Republic of Korea (South Korea) is not the young soceity that its pop music presents.
The fertility rate is low – so the population is ageing.
It is much the same in most of the West.
Although perhaps technology will solve the problem.
Come on Rogue Trooper – climb out of your vat and prepare to fight back the Norts.