The Iceberg

The rock band Muse is paying a second visit to Korea this summer for the Pentaport 2007 festival. A few of the other performers thus far slated to appear are The Chemical Brothers, Damien Rice, and guitarist Stevie Salas, though it’s still early and there will likely be more bands added later. Last year’s festival featured Franz Ferdinand, the Black Eyed Peas, Placebo, the Strokes, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Snow Patrol, and more. The festival runs from July 27-29. You can find out more information here.

One of my two favorite CDs* from 2006 is Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ “Show Your Bones“, which was released last March. In my opinion, there isn’t a bad song on the album. The band’s musical style is described as “art rock”, whatever the hell that means. All I know is that the three-member band from New York City’s music is varied and possesses the right mix of guitars and drums to suit my tastes. But what really does it for me is the uniquely energetic voice of singer Karen O (Karen Lee Orzolek). Born in Korea to a Polish father and Korean mother, O manages to sound tough, girlish, and sexy all at the same time. I’m not normally a fan of female rock singers, but she’s got it going on. I’m surprised the Korean media hasn’t given her more play. Perhaps it’s because of her somewhat outlandish stage presence, but regardless I think it’s just a matter of time before she becomes one of Korea’s new darlings. Here is an excerpt from a piece written by Minnie Chi in 2003 at the Asia Pacific Arts Online Magazine:

Her ethnic background is not so obvious as her dynamic rock persona, however. Karen, who was born in Korea, says that her whole ethnic experience has been quite “strange.” Her mother is full Korean and her father is Caucasian but they decided not to enforce the culture onto her and her younger brother out of a desire for them to fit in while they were growing up on the East Coast. “My mom is definitely Asian looking but I didn’t even realize that she was Korean until I was 7 or 8. I was sort of half-Caucasian to the world as I was growing up,” Karen recalls. “When I hit 7th or 8th grade, you become really really self-conscious about fitting in, and that’s when I was sort of ashamed that I was half Asian. I didn’t realize how much of an asset that is until I went to college and I had this real desire to explore that side of me that I’ve been neglecting for so long. Now it’s like I’d rather much be half-breed than all white. Now days I have a much easier time with it.”

The fashionable singer has visited her family in Korea several times and has grown an affinity with the culture and the community. She is well aware that there is an unfortunate lack of underground scenes in her homeland, so she doesn’t want to take her status as a rock icon in vain. “That’s why it’s important to me to sort of represent to Korean Americans and the Korean community that I am a personality who’s part Korean. I’d be thrilled if I was younger and there was someone who has a Korean heritage that’s standing against the grain. I definitely feel like there’s a sort of satisfaction out of touching people’s lives being of Korean heritage more than if I was just white.”

(You can read the whole article here.)

In case you’ve never heard their music, I’ve uploaded a couple songs for you to check out. As I mentioned earlier, there isn’t a weak effort on the entire album, so choosing which ones to upload was tough. I finally settled on “Way Out“ and “Warrior“ because I felt these two songs capture the essence of Karen O’s voice as well as any.

(*My other favorite is Muse’s “Black Holes and Revelations”.)

Well, a week has passed and I’ve had time to settle back into my suck-ass routine, so I guess it’s time to report on my experience at the Pentaport Rock Festival.

Last Thursday (July 27th) I hopped on a bus at 10:40 pm for the approximately five-hour journey from Yeosu to Seoul. There wasn’t much rain or traffic until the bus reached Daejeon, so I arrived in Seoul ahead of schedule (around 3:30 am). I took a taxi to Haebangchon and called my friend. The plan was to crash at his place and then head out early to Incheon - more specifically, Song-do - for the Pentaport Rock Festival. As it turned out, we were both psyched about the festival and decided to start the celebration early. We ended up having some vodka and cokes while listening to the new Muse cd (which, by the way, is quite good…check it out when you have a chance). The result being that we didn’t wake up until around 10 am (or was it 11? I can’t remember). Beavis and Butthead rock Korea!

Before embarking on our rock extravaganza, we had a couple of tasks at hand. First was breakfast, or rather, lunch. We went to Gecko’s in Itaewon and ordered a couple burgers and beers. Then, since rain was in the forecast, I browsed a few shops for a water-proof jacket. Finally we were off to Kangnam to catch a bus to the festival.

By the time we arrived at our motel we hadn’t seen anything more than a few sprinkles. We even chose to believe that we noticed the sun peeking through the clouds at one point. We checked into our rooms and I had a quick shower. Alas, when we went back outside, it was raining buckets. My newly purchased water-proof windbreaker was not going to do the trick.

The festival grounds were a mess. In some places we stepped in mud halfway up to our knees. As a result, the crowd on Friday was sparse - but enthusiastic. Cowards (and lushes) that we are, my friend and I found refuge from the rain in a beer tent. We waited for a break in the storm to make our move to one of the shows. We ended up waiting for about two hours. Torrential rain fell from the sky in approximately ten-minute intervals. In between the downpours, Mother Nature teased us with one-minute showers. Each time, just as we were about to leave the tent, the rain picked up again. I kid you not - it was coming down so hard that when it hit the puddles on the ground, water bounced a good three inches up in the air.

Eventually we just said f**k it and went out. The beer might have had something to do with our new found bravery. On our way to the main stage we stopped at a store to buy a couple of plastic “coats” for (I think) 1500 won each. The people selling those things must have made a killing. The first band we saw was a Korean group called Uhn ni nae ee bal gwan (언니네이발관). They were alright. (Unfortunately we missed the Yeah Yeah Yeahs due to our late start.)

The highlight of the first day for me was the Snow Patrol set. Singer/guitarist Gary Lightbody didn’t seem put off by the small crowd and provided an energetic performance. It’s a shame the band had only sixty minutes on stage rather than the ninety minutes given to The Strokes. Not that The Strokes were bad. They just didn’t seem to have as much fun as Snow Patrol and it showed. At least to me. Here’s a short clip of Snow Patrol and The Strokes - mostly Snow Patrol.

I wanted to get more footage of these groups but my camcorder had some moisture problems (go figure) so I had to use my digital camera to shoot the above video.

After Snow Patrol, we decided to skip the Korean band NEXT and run out for dinner before The Strokes concert. I’ve never heard NEXT, but I suspect we didn’t miss much. Song-do was a pretty cool little area - plenty of bars and other entertainment venues, as well as about a hundred motels - but one thing it most definitely needs is more Western-style restaurants. The best we could find was a cheesy “restaurant/coffee shop/bar” style place where the menu featured such tasty items as hamburger steak, pork cutlet, and fish cutlet. I went with the fish cutlet. I can’t remember exactly how it tasted as I was pretty drunk at that point. In fact, I was just drunk enough to leave my cell phone at the restaurant. But fortunately not drunk enough to not remember later where I left it.

DAY TWO

One of the great things about love motels is the boarded up windows. One could sleep until three in the afternoon and wouldn’t know it because it is completely dark in the room. In fact, I woke up late in the morning but it was nice to have a sound night’s sleep after the bus ride/vodka-coke experience the night before.

I met a couple of friends outside the motel and we set off for breakfast. I mentioned earlier that the pickings were slim for western food. There were, however, an abundance of convenience stores around the area. We decided to have one of those pre-made sandwiches - you know them, the ham/tuna fish/shredded cabbage/corn/tomato delights - and a coffee. Unfortunately, it appeared other foreigners got an earlier start than us and had the same craving for breakfast, because we visited at least four different stores and all of them were out of the sandwiches. Who woulda guessed? So we settled for the coffee and went to a Korean restaurant for breakfast. I had galbi-tang while my friends ate seollung-tang. (SIDENOTE: Concerning the coffee - my friends had the “Starbucks in a bottle” variety, while I went for the Caffe Latte Mocha Mild. Two reasons for this: 1. It tastes pretty much the same and is much cheaper; and 2) I refuse to drink Starbucks since its owner - Howard Schultz - sold the Sonics to an out-of-town buyer. Damn you, Howard Schultz!!! Damn you to hell!!!)

Stomachs full, it was time to head to the festival grounds. We purchased our beers (an absolute requirement at all times) and made our way to a tent near the main stage to listen to a Korean band called “Vassline” (their spelling, not mine). Having received a glowing recommendation from his co-worker, my friend considered this group one of the “must-see” shows of the festival. Note to self: take all recommendations from friends’ co-workers with a huge chunk of salt. In two words: Vassline sucked! If you’re a fan of Megadeth-ish thrash metal, then I apologize if this offends and you may in fact enjoy Vassline. Personally, I just can’t get into that kind of music. I was torn between fleeing the scene as quickly as possible and running up on stage to perform the Heimlich on the “singer”. In the end, I noted that I still had plenty of beer remaining and chose to concentrate on polishing it off. Fortunately, Vassline had only a 30-minute set.

Next up was another Korean band called “Crash”. We waited around to see if they’d be an improvement. While not quite as severe as Vassline, they weren’t much better. In the middle of their first “song” they ran into some technical problems and had to cut it short. This gave us our chance to escape. We darted for the second stage, where we listened to a pretty decent Korean band called “Beautiful Days” and a not-so-decent band called “Pils Day”. The second band’s singer was the walking definition of “느끼”. You can see a bit of both bands in the following video. Oh yeah! We also drank more beer.

The guy in black at the end of the previous video was a member of the festival stage construction crew. He’s from Australia, a happy-go-lucky sort of guy, and seemed to be living a enjoyable life traveling around with the bands. He’s also pretty compelling evidence that Michael Hutchence of INXS is alive and (mostly) well. We asked for his take on the bands performing that night (Black Eyed Peas and Placebo) and he told us that the Black Eyed Peas didn’t put on a very good live show. Turns out he was wrong. But it was good that he said that because I lowered my expectations of them going in. More on that later.

It was around this time that we discovered that there was some very tasty food being sold at the festival. Particularly the pizza, barbequed chicken, and barbequed sausages. This was an extremely valuable revelation as it meant we no longer had cause to leave the festival grounds. We ate and drank our fill and then took in a little of the Japanese band “Dragon Ash”. My friend wasn’t completely sold on them but I liked them. Except for the goofball dancers that were part of their show.

After Dragon Ash it was back to the food area for more pizza, chicken, and sausages. My memory is a little foggy, but I think it was also around this time that we started on the Jack and Cokes. We listened to the bulk of the Psy show while having dinner, but did manage to see the last five minutes or so. No doubt I’ll receive a lot of grief from Korean teen-agers (should they ever stumble across this blog) for what I’m about to say, but here goes: I had heard good things about Psy’s live performances. Something along the lines of, “Psy’s concert is one of the best in Korea.” If this is true, then I won’t be going to any Korean concerts soon. Compared to the headliners, Psy came across as very amateurish, in my humble opinion. One good thing though - at least he employed sexy female dancers. Take THAT Dragon Ash! (I didn’t get any video of them though. Sorry.)

At 7:30 it was time for the Black Eyed Peas. Though this was a rock festival, the Peas were easily the most recognizable name to Koreans and as a result attracted the largest crowd. I like their music and was eager to see them, though, as I mentioned earlier, I wasn’t expecting too much. But their show was good. Emphasis on show. I personally don’t think their music is well-suited to a live outdoor performance, but they had a lot of fun and knew exactly how to get the crowd fired up - incorporating “Korea” into songs and monologues, praising Korean women (”Korean girls are the prettiest Asian girls”), and of course, chanting the ubiquitous “Dae-han-min-guk”. They certainly knew their audience.

One more point to note about the Peas: That Fergie is a nimble little minx. Yeow!

As you likely have already gathered by now, I am not the steadiest of hand when shooting video. Particularily at this festival. I debated with myself (as I often do…I’m a master debater) whether to devote effort to capturing great video shots or to just have a great time (read: lots of alcohol comsumption). In the end, having a great time took precedence. This is just a blog, afterall. So I ask for your understanding. Also, please understand that the mic on my camera sucks and therefore much of the audio is distorted (especially on the videos to follow).

To be continued…