North Korea

I’ve just been having too much fun in Mongolia. I’ve got to go somewhere where fun is prohibited. I need to get my serious on, seriously. Now, North Korea will be just the place for Ø freedom. Here’s some schmaltzy synth-pop, revolutionary rock, cheeky child rap, & a healthy dose of hagiography for Dear Dead Daddy  Kim Jong-il. This is the old NEW sound of North Korea. With a heady mix of Stalin opera, Tokyo karaoke, & brooding impressionism, the sound of 05 P'yŏngyang somehow comes out of the speakers as warped agit-pop or lost-in-time commie funk.

If you've ever wondered what goes on in North Korean music, this is your vehicle for exploration. Christiaan Virant visited this strange mysterious land. He assembled this amazing audio collage. Presented here are rare live recordings from various performances & mass games demonstrations, sounds lifted from People's Army television dramas, samples from hard-to-find CD releases obtained in the capital, & news reports from the real Radio P'yŏngyang, which continues to broadcast to this day , now under the new, strikingly anodyne moniker ‘The Voice of Korea’.

Various - Radio P'yongyang:Commie Funk & Agit Pop from the Hermit Kingdom, 

Sublime Frequencies SF023, 2005.

decryption code in comments

Tracklist -

Motherland Megamix

New Model Army

Numbers Game

Pride of the Nation

Start 'em Young

Arirang

Commie Funk

Motherland Redux – artists unknown

You are forbidden to Enjoy,

NØ

This is by way of special request from spiffy, who left a comment wanting more great DPRK music.

The new official North Korean tune posted online entitled something like “Let’s Defend General Kim Jong Un at the Cost of Our Lives” or “We Will Safeguard General Kim Jong Un With Our Very Lives,” depending on the translation.
It has everything we love from North Korean propaganda music video: shots of Mount Baekdu, images of the military, marching band instrumentation, & a Soviet-style chorus of shouting male tenors.

& here’s a little ditty called “Let’s Study” from The Moranbong Music Band, a pop music group of five North Korean women who were hand-selected by the country's communist leader, Kim Jong Un.