North Korean Music from prog rock's viewpoint

Hi,

I'm not one for political stuff, but, honestly, I find this video insulting, and a propaganda film for their government. I guess you could call it a modern JPSouza done N. Korean style, but ... really ... some music doesn't deserve to be called music at all ... even though many of the players will get upset that they were not given credit for their abilities.

If I were PA I probably would remove the post completely, as we are about the music ... not politics, and this video is about the politics and the words even more so. 

Sorry ... I was born in a fascist country, and stuff like this is supposed to make the "people" believe that they are doing the right things ... and in the end, it's just propaganda ... using the western media style!

so why are you quoting me?  What have I done? 

My idea was to discuss the musical level, compositional level of North Korean propaganda music. I was also born in the USSR that was not that democratical. It's all about music. I think Ritchie Blackmore was a tyrannical figure, but he made some killer songs, played a few killer solos. 

Instrumentals in some of these North Korean propaganda songs tend to sound nice, as for me. 

There are prog elements in it in the sense that there are a lot of tempo and key changes throughout the piece. And some of the transitions do indeed make me think of some prog, but overall I think it sounds more like religious music. At times it's rather disco-like, and generally it appears very, very kitsch to my taste. Almost comical.

Lyrically, they are just replacing the word "God" with "Kim Jong-Il", no?

I absolutely hate Ritchie Blackmore and anyone of his kind. Treating colleagues like sh*t does not produce good fruits. Still, I listen to songs like Death Alley Rider with its fantastic solo(s). 

I do not listen to songs by Charles Manson, though. 

Then, here's a question of who those girls' art is closer to?.. The people who made those songs hardly worked part-time at the prisons torturing the innocent. Lyrics, if perceived as kitsch, as nonsense, sound melodic. I remember listening to Queen's albums in my teenage years, not knowing any words they sang. In "Fairy Feller's Master-Stroke" Freddie sang "He's a dilly-dally-o" - I heard "he's in italio". I thought "italio" might have had something to do with Italy, back then. 

I instantly remember the similar type of Soviet propaganda songs. There was, for example, a huge hit "And the battle goes on, again" about Lenin. Certainly, the 1970s' USSR was different from North Korea of any time. Most of the Soviet people in the 1970s did not really believe that much in Lenin or his ideas, they massively pretended they did, and they just lived the way it was possible for them to live. 

It was a song about serial killer Lenin. But considering all the theory behind him, he was also a decent thinker. So, I like this song, it's powerful and emotional: 

Nowadays, female string trio Silenzium (their frontwoman is a member of the Communist Party of Russia) have remade that song: 

I clearly understand that these cases are almost identical. Still, I like Soviet propaganda songs. I do not take their lyrics seriously - so did most of the Soviet people since at least the 1970s... But if it's nice and promotes something good (e.g., fighting for your freedom, for your rights), why not?.. 

After all, we used to listen to the songs of Judas, by Judas. Lenin was Judas, too. 

I kindly thank you for saving me and my thread, sir!  

I have heard two first mnutes of the video and realized the instrumentation resembled something a la progressive pop (progressive music hall, if you like?). Then I have listened to several more minutes and found nothing else than an average orchestrated pop. Then, again, licks of progressive music, appeared here and there. I draw one evident association in my mind - that with the album by David Tukhmanov's music. The album mentioned at GEPR. Called "Po Volne Moyey Pamyati" - (Al)on(g) The Wave Of My Memory, or so. 

In that album you also hear typical pop, unexpectedly experimental prog appears and disappears here and there. Tukhmanov's work is titled as progressive rock (GEPR approves). But if you listen to the first several minutes in the beginning or to the tunes from it like this one below, it is well-arranged, masterfully composed pure plain pop music: 

Awhole, a progressive rock masterpiece: 

So... you know, that's a complex problem. Again, David Tukhmanov's USSR of the 1970s, Brezhnev era USSR was not your poor Stalinist North Korea. Tukhmanov had no reasons to feel unsafe, nobody forced him to write songs about Brezhnev. Though, indeed, some state authority, responsible for the music, very likely told Mr. Tukhmanov afterwards that his experiments are acceptable and the vinyl would be released, but in the future it would be great of Mr. Tukhmanov to compose something... more easy to listen. In the 1970s' USSR nobody would have shot or imprisoned him if he continued writing in the same vein. But in the state-controlled industry he decided for better to create easier music... Because, well, we all have to earn money and feed the families... 

Anyway, there was prog here and there in his aforementioned masterpiece work. 

Hi,

Which is another reason why it should be removed!