This past week has been a momentous one in terms of musical, or shall we say: cultural, highlights.
This week, I had the opportunity to attend the farewell do for a colleague who shall remain unnamed. After f They are also tales of the more often than not uncomfortable mixing of Pop with Politics which on the other hand is not all that far-fetched as “Pop” is just the abbreviation for “popular”.
Where to begin.
Well, let's look east first – after all, that’s where the sun rises and the sky is red. Far East actually, all the way to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Just plain North Korea to the rest of the world. This geographically remote, politically dysfunctional, economically bankrupt, and voluntarily isolated country – some call it The Hermit Kingdom – saw its seventh Workers’ Party Congress, the first one in 36 years would you believe it, held of course in its metropolitan capital city of Pyongyang. Now if that’s not an occasion to roll out and share with all of us the Nation’s Finest, nothing will be. Ever the gracious host, at the end of the otherwise rather drab four-day affair, predictable in its faultless choreography and political outcomes, despotic ruler Kim Jong-un, who goes by the self-effacing title of Supreme Leader, presented for the world to witness, admire, and envy, his most prized treasure – pop girls bands. And Man, did they rock the Congress with toe-tappers like “Our Dear Leader” and “Let’s Support Our Supreme Commander with Arms”! The 3,467 voting delegates especially dug Moranbong Band’s timeless rendition of “Sea of Apples at Foot of Chol Pass”.
Allegedly a fan of Eric Clapton, we have it on good authority that Kim has “hand-picked” the members of each of these combos. What this process actually, physically entails, I leave to your imagination, but it seems clear he takes more than just a passing interest in the ladies who have the privilege of forming the vanguard of contemporary entertainment in a society that otherwise is somewhat behind the times. If critical, you might associate it with the Stone Age.
Now one of only two remnants of the Cold War and surviving bulwark of Communism – and the planet is getting an ever lonelier place, since before our eyes Cuba is threatening to succumb to the decadence of Capitalism, forever to be lost to the cause of World Revolution, while late-comer comrades-in-arms Venezuela is on the verge of self-imploding – over time North Korea, separated by a heavily armed military demarcation line along the 38th parallel dating back all the way to 1948 from its brethren in the Republic of Korea to its South, and no peace treaty has ever been signed, a while ago began distancing itself from what you might call the mainstream world Communist movement.
Juche, an ideology of national self-reliance, was introduced into the constitution as a "creative application of Marxism–Leninism" in 1972 – a contradiction in terms, I would contend. Anyhow, the means of production are of course still owned by the state through nationalised enterprises and collectivised farms. Most services such as healthcare, education, housing, and food production are subsidized or state-funded. From 1994 to 1998, North Korea suffered from a famine that resulted in the deaths of between 0.24 and 3.5 million people, and the country to this day struggles with food production.
North Korea follows Songun, or a "military-first" policy. It is the country with the highest number of citizens under arms, with a total of 9,495,000 active and reserve military, and paramilitary personnel, out of a total population of some 25 million. Its active duty army of 1.21 million is the fourth largest in the world, after China (population 1.37 billion), the U.S. (321 million), and India (1.25 billion). You do the math. Much to the chagrin of everybody else, it also possesses nuclear weapons, and while its threats to “take out” Washington DC are scarcely believable, the capital city of South Korea, Seoul (a very nice place, if very hot and humid in summer and bitterly cold in winter – do visit) with its population of 10 million is only, literally, “just south of the border” and within easy reach of even the most basic nuclear missiles.
By the way, if you ever search for up-to-date information on any country, I encourage you to use the CIA World Factbook (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/). All the figures I have just quoted are dated July 2015 – pretty impressive.
North Korea also “boasts” a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that places it at number 113 in the world; a GDP per capita that puts it in 210th place, and a Gross National Saving that, in the words of the CIA Factbook, is “NA” (not applicable).
On Transparency International’s “Corruption Perceptions Index 2015” – a ranking, first introduced in 1995 that has been widely credited with putting the issue of corruption on the international policy agenda – North Korea is rock-bottom at Number 167, ex-aequo with Somalia but without the excuse of being ravaged by bloody military conflict.
And, last but not least, on Reporters Without Borders’ “World Press Freedom Index 2016”, Kim’s haven for “creative Marxism-Leninism” comes in at Number 179, only narrowly, but nonetheless gloriously pipping Eritrea for last place.
So far so bad. But they do have their girls’ bands, not least in response to South Korea’s thriving pop music industry – remember “Gangnam Style”?
But otherwise, as per the above, things are pretty drab in Kim’s Kingdom. And did I mention it’s very much a family business, the current dictator the son of Kim Jong-il (1942 – 2011) who boasted the names “Guiding Sun Ray” and “Glorious General Who Descended from Heaven”; and grandson of the state’s founder, Kim Il-sung (1912 – 1994) who is also the origin of the rather penetrant personality cult the dynasty indulges in, which eclipses anything ever related to bona fide dictators like Joseph Stalin (1878 – 1953) or Mao Zedong (1893 – 1976). Starting with the comparatively modest “Great Leader”, he eventually graduated to unknown heights marked by titles of esteem such as "Sun", "Great Chairman", "Heavenly Leader" and others, as well as receiving awards like the "Double Hero Gold Medal".
If you really want to know what life is like in this Soldiers’ State and Peasants’ Paradise, please read the novel The Orphan Master’s Son (2012) by Adam Johnson that won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2013, and deservedly so. To quote just one reviewer:
“As well as a heartbreaking insight into the unreality of life north of the 38th parallel, Adam Johnson has produced a brilliant exploration of the act of fiction-making and the importance of narratives, both public and private. Employing a range of registers from the intimate first person to the disembodied bullshit that blares constantly from Kim’s loudspeakers, he seems to question the very act of storytelling, intimating that the inventions of the novelist might be in some way analogous to the falsehoods of the Dear Leader. On this last point he can rest assured: his brilliant novel singularly confounds any such suggestions.” David Annand, The Telegraph (16 April 2013)
So, we owe Comrade Kim Jong-un for last week’s rare glimpse into the boundless, bottomless, and breathless (just stopping short of topless, at least in their public appearances) creativity of the North Korean pop music industry. Just to see the girls meant to fall in love. Honestly, what’s not to like?
Thank you, Great Leader!
I can't resist, however, to throw one quote from another highly recommended novel I have just finished reading, this one dealing with the impact of the Vietnam War, at Comrade Kim: “Slogans are empty suits draped on the corpse of an idea.” Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer (2015)
The corpse in question is, of course, Marxism-Leninism. You can find it on the dust heap of History, right next to National Socialism.
So, North Korea set the bar rather high when it came to pop music and female singers last week. Could this be topped, you ask yourselves breathlessly no doubt?
Well, it could, and yet again, we venture from the firm footing of mere fun into the treacherous territory of possibly political provocation (to avoid the term propaganda). But please judge for yourselves.
As announced in one of my previous blogs, Saturday 14 May was the day of the 2016 final of the Eurovision Song Contest, the competition formerly known as Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson.
Those were the days when the French language still ruled supreme in all matters cultural and diplomatic – although the latter, realistically, probably ended with the Congress (yes, another one) of Vienna in 1814/15 where the four great European powers Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, restored as best they could the continental order that had been unsettled for 25 years of almost continuous war resulting from the French Revolution of 1789 and the challenge posed by Napoleon.
The Congress' "Final Act" – somewhat prematurely I would contend as General Buonaparte was still at large and at it again, having gone AWOL (Absent Without Leave) from his original exile on the Mediterranean island of Elba – was signed nine days before his final defeat at Waterloo on 18 June 1815. And yes, it was the Duke of Wellington who got all the laurels, but if the Prussians lead by General Blücher had not turned up just in time before it grew too dark to continue fighting, things would in all likelihood have ended differently. “I wish it was night, or the Prussians came.” History in the subjunctive. “What if?”
Waterloo – hold the thought, please.
Anyhow, coming back to last Saturday evening, those lucky enough to watch the live broadcast of the event witnessed not just a remarkable musical competition with a surprising outcome, but also a result that has since widely been commented on, primarily in political terms.
How so, you may ask.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am not taking sides in this controversy. I do, however, as a matter of principle reject the notion of mass deportation of ethnic groups and dislike the practice of military annexation of territory that has never really been yours to begin with.
But, again, in my blog I do not do politics.
Well, that said, I realize one day I will have to write about Donald “The Donald” Trump and Hillary “It’s my turn” Clinton, their face-off something to look forward to as little will be off-limits. But we are not quite there yet.
So, the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), in its 61st edition this year, was held in Stockholm as Sweden had won last year’s competition. The victorious contestant in 2015 was Mans Zelmerlöw; his song entitled “Heroes”. And I do confess having just had to look this up, such is the transitory nature of glory in our fast-moving, disrespectful, and undeserving world. Our friend Mans got to co-host the event, so that was kind of cool by way of a compensation for having been forgotten in the meantime I guess.
Since the sequential self-implosion of both the former Soviet Union and former Yugoslavia, in that chronological order, and the subsequent creation of a large number of new states that now form part of the Eurovision network – and of course they are all hugely welcome – we have had to endure qualifying rounds called “Semi-Finals” in the week leading up to the Grand Finale, and in the course of these preliminary rounds something remarkable and quite unheard-of happened.
Ireland, record seven-time winner, were knocked out of the competition before reaching the final. Ireland, the home of never-to-be forgotten bards like Johnny Logan – well, truth be told, he was born in Australia, but that’s detail really – who triumphed not just once, not just twice, but actually three times. He won as a performer with the song “What’s Another Year” in 1980; again as a singer with “Hold Me Now” in 1987; and, little known except to true aficionados, he was the composer of Linda Martin’s winning entry, “Why Me?” in 1992. And I honestly have no answer to that question.
By sheer coincidence, I saw Logan (left) perform live on Sunday on a rather staid German TV program mostly aimed at pensioners, and while almost feeling sorry for him, I did notice an uncanny resemblance with the Eagles’ Don Henley (right), seven years Johnny’s senior and arguably the greater singer and songwriter of the two. “Hotel California”, anyone? – RIP, Glen Frey. And “Take It Easy”, Man. See you on that “corner in Winslow, Arizona”.
So, meanwhile back in Stockholm, other countries had also been knocked out in the preliminary stage, including Slovenia. I shared my disappointment with a good friend of mine in Ljubljana – where I get to spend a lot of time nowadays, and you really must visit: it’s truly a charming town of 300,000 people with a river, a castle, and a University, a beautifully restored centre accessible only to pedestrians, and many nice pubs and restaurants serving excellent local craft beers – pulling his leg by referring to it as a national shame. In his own, very dry and understated way, he replied: “If this is our only shame, we are a happy country.” And they are, by and large.
But they do maybe lack the seriousness of the Olympic spirit of competition when it comes to this musical contest – an approach that many, if not most of the entrants in Stockholm embraced and embodied. First and foremost those who may have something to prove to the rest of the world, or specific parts of it, linked to issues in other areas of life.
And this leads me straight to the surprise winner of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest, female singer Susana Jamaladinova, who goes by the stage name Jamala, from the Ukraine. Of Crimean Tatar origin, she performed the song “1944” which describes the plight of the Tatar minority deported from their Crimean homeland under Joseph Stalin (see above). Many of the deportees, Ms Jamaladinova’s grandmother included, did not survive to make it back to the Crimea after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
As it was cloaked as a personal anthem to her grandmother, the song was allowed to compete, thereby ducking one of the contest’s ground rules stipulating that political content is forbidden. Even before the first note was sung, Russia had protested against this, claiming it was nothing but a thinly veiled oblique comment on Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, not to speak of giving voice to most Ukrainians’ and Tatars’ general distaste for everything even remotely Russian.
The opening verse of the song is: “When strangers are coming, they come to your house, they kill you all and say we are not guilty, not guilty.” Following above-mentioned annexation, one of the first measures of the new Russian rulers was to shut down the Tatars’ independent legislature, a step widely viewed as a renewed discrimination of this minority – déjà-vu all over again, to quote our favourite sage, Yogi Berra. Please judge for yourself, Constant Reader.
The Russians were, unsurprisingly, scandalised and more than just a little upset – not least because they had been fancying the chances of their own entry, Sergey Lazarev performing “You Are The Only One”, before the event actually the favourite to win. So less than two weeks on, all those bookies just slowly recovering from the Leicester City pay-outs took a hit yet again – the end of an industry I wonder?
For Russia, given the current general geo-political climate, winning the ESC in Stockholm (into the harbour of which, allegedly, they enjoy sending their submarines on scouting missions, all in the spirit of good fun and Olympic competition of course) would have been a major PR coup, not least because it would have meant hosting next year’s event in Moscow. Accordingly, they fulminated about “Russophobia”, blaming politics and the United States for this top-level international scandal. In the good old days of conventional, pre-nuclear times diplomacy, I believe it would have been ranked as “an unfriendly act” which invariably lead to a declaration of war – boy, has humanity progressed since.
What, pray, do the U.S. of A. have to do with any of this, you may well ask. Well, purely by coincidence, this was the first ESC ever that was actually broadcast States-side, and this in and of itself was sufficient for Russian conspiracy theories of an “information war” being waged against the Motherland. To quote Yelena Drapeko, an actress turns lawmaker speaking to the Tass news agency: “We are talking about the general demonization of Russia, about how everything with us is bad, about how our athletes are all doping, our planes are violating airspace, all of this.” A seriously unhappy lady, Yelena is.
Since the event next year will now take place in Kiev, Russia’s political establishment is already gearing up for revenge. Maria V. Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry, wrote on her Facebook account Russia in 2017 would enter a song about the President of Syria that would surely win: “Assad bloody, Assad the worst. Give me prize so we can host.” Others suggested Russia’s contestants next year should travel to the Ukraine on the back of tanks. Oh dear.
The situation was further acerbated by the fact that for the first time the ESC had a new voting system, combining the popular vote of the TV audiences country-by-country with an expert vote, five important people per Eurovision Member State. And guess what, after the popular vote our friend Sergey was in the lead, only to be toppled by Jamala and ending up in third place at the very end of the competition, once the expert juries’ decisions had been factored in.
The day following the alleged scandal, on his weekly Sunday night news program, Dmitry K. Kiselyov, a reliable apologist of anything emanating from the Kremlin, was fuming: “I don’t exclude the fact that Americans having bought broadcasting rights has changed the voting system. Money talks, as they say, in this case in political interests.”
I have many Russian friends, and while very different in personalities, they have at least one trait in common – a wonderful, self-deprecating, and ironic sense of humour. I hope Russian national character, always assuming there is such a thing, will survive this petty storm in a teapot.
In closing, the question should be addressed why girls groups and even female solo singers have such an emotional impact on so many people – much more, for argument’s sake, than their male counterparts.
Remember Waterloo, or rather – “Waterloo”?
This was the title of the winning song at the Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson back in 1974, staged in Brighton, UK, and performed by the Swedish group ABBA that was composed of two men and two women – Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad.
Here’s a Fun Fact for your next pub quiz night: Only three of them are actually Swedes. Anni-Frid hails from Norway.
Fun Fact Number Two: During the band's active years, Fältskog and Ulvaeus, and Lyngstad and Andersson were married. At the height of their popularity, both relationships were suffering strain which ultimately resulted in the collapse of the Ulvaeus–Fältskog marriage in 1979 and the Andersson–Lyngstad marriage in 1981. These relationship changes, experts will tell you, were reflected in the group's music, with later compositions including more introspective, brooding, dark lyrics. The group eventually broke up in the mid-eighties.
Fun Fact Number Three: ABBA are the only music act whose name was an palindrome and that had a song out whose title was also an palindrome – “S.O.S.” (ABBA, 1975).
On the back of that ESC victory, ABBA became one of the most commercially successful acts in the history of popular music, topping the charts worldwide from 1974 to 1982. And the only Eurovision winners ever really to become world stars. ABBA were honoured at the 50th anniversary celebration of the Eurovision Song Contest in 2005, when their hit "Waterloo" was chosen as the best song in the competition's history. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 15 March 2010.
While Björn and Benny were the composers and driving forces behind the success of this foursome – subsequently raking in on the obscene global commercial success of the musical “Mamma Mia!”, with its thin plot written around their songs, and its film version of 2008 (one of my three worst-ever movies, but that’s another story) – as far as the vocals and ABBA’s stage show were concerned, it was the two girls who carried the act.
So for the purpose of these ramblings, they might as well have been a girls’ group. My top three in this particular category?
Number Three: The Corrs
Number Two: Wilson Phillips
Number One: The Dixie Chicks
And with the last band, I come to a third story of Pop, Power, and Politics getting too close for comfort, and on a much grander scale than our Korean girls and Ms Jamaladinova.
The Dixie Chicks are an American country music band which has also crossed over into other genres, including pop. The group, composed of founding members (and sisters) Martie Erwin Maguire and Emily Erwin Robison, and lead singer Natalie Maines, first hit the big time in the late Nineties and went on to selling a lot of records, topping the charts regularly, and collecting Grammy Awards in the process.
And then, this happened:
During the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, on 10 March 2003, Dixie Chicks performed live at the Shepherd's Bush Empire theatre in London. This concert kicked off their “Top of the World Tour”. During the introduction to their song "Travelin' Soldier", Natalie Maines, who along with Robison and Maguire is also a native of Texas, said:
"Just so you know, we're on the good side with y'all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas." Not just from Texas – George W. Bush had been Governor of that proud State from 1995 to 2000, before being elected to the Presidency.
Bang. It was out there, avidly reported in The Guardian's review of the concert. Shortly thereafter, the U.S. media picked up the story, and all hell broke loose.
Maines' remark sparked intense criticism; American commentators claimed she should not have criticised the President on foreign soil. She simply responded, "I said it there 'cause that's where I was."
To claim this was not a career-enhancing thing to do would be the understatement of the decade. In response to the uproar and the start of a wide boycott of Dixie Chicks' music, Maines subsequently tried to make amends in an attempt to clarify matters: “"I feel the President is ignoring the opinions of many in the U.S. and alienating the rest of the world." She even went one step further, issuing the following apology: “"As a concerned American citizen, I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I feel that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect. We are currently in Europe and witnessing a huge anti-American sentiment as a result of the perceived rush to war. While war may remain a viable option, as a mother, I just want to see every possible alternative exhausted before children and American soldiers' lives are lost. I love my country. I am a proud American."
But it was a classic case of too little too late. Or, from another perspective, of the old adage that applies to media interviews, but also to life at large: “When you’re in a hole, stop digging.”
While many artists came to the Dixie Chicks’ support, the general wave of condemnation was impossible to halt, in spite of President Bush’s very measured response: “The Dixie Chicks are free to speak their mind. They can say what they want to say ... they shouldn't have their feelings hurt just because some people don't want to buy their records when they speak out ... Freedom is a two-way street ... I don't really care what the Dixie Chicks said. I want to do what I think is right for the American people, and if some singers or Hollywood stars feel like speaking out, that's fine. That's the great thing about America.”
The degree of hatred directed toward the Chicks included a specific death threat against Maines in Dallas that led to a police escort to the July 6 show and from the arena directly to the airport.
For the following years, apart from sporadic appearances, there was little evidence of any meaningful continuation of their career until their brave, defiant, and triumphant return on 16 March 2006, when they released the single “Not Ready to Make Nice” in advance of their new album, Taking the Long Way. The lyrics directly addressed the political controversy that had surrounded the group for the previous three years:
I'm not ready to make nice
I'm not ready to back down
I'm still mad as hell and I don't have time to go 'round and 'round and 'round
It's too late to make it right
I probably wouldn't if I could
'Cause I'm mad as hell
Can't bring myself to do what it is you think I should
And, in reaction to the death threat Maines had received, as well as a response to a protesting woman telling her small child to say "screw 'em", they go on:
I made my bed and I sleep like a baby
With no regrets and I don't mind sayin'
It's a sad sad story when a mother will teach her
Daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger
And how in the world can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they'd write me a letter Sayin' that I better
Shut up and sing or my life will be over
Robison said, "The stakes were definitely higher on that song. We knew it was special because it was so autobiographical, and we had to get it right. And once we had that song done, it freed us up to do the rest of the album without that burden." She said writing the song had become their "therapy", since they had had to hold in so many stored emotions for so long. The band considered the album not so much political as very personal.
In 2006, Taking the Long Way was the ninth best-selling album in the United States. At the 49th Grammy Awards Show on 11 February 2007, the group won all five categories for which they were nominated, including the top awards of Song of the Year and Record of the Year, both for "Not Ready to Make Nice", and Album of the Year, for Taking the Long Way. Maines interpreted the wins as being a show of public support for their advocacy of free speech. It had been 14 years since an artist had swept those three awards.
Finally, at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing premiered. The documentary follows the Chicks over the three years since the 2003 London concert remark and covers aspects of their musical and personal lives in addition to the controversy. Check it out.
And if you are now interested in seeing them perform live this side of the Atlantic, I’m afraid you have just missed them as they have completed the European part of their DCX MMXVI World Tour. However, there is hope, provided you are willing to cross the Big Pond: The American part starts in Cincinnati on 1 June and ends at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on 10 October 2016. For our U.S. based friends, a real treat.
The Daily Telegraph's Sarah Carson stated: "The triumphant trio proved the power lies in their musicianship, not notoriety, and their talents remain as rich and fierce as ever." ("Dixie Chicks make a headlining UK return after 13 years – review"; The Daily Telegraph, 30 April 2016)
So, we have come full circle in our musings. In ABBA’s own words:
Thank you for the music, the songs I'm singing
Thanks for all the joy they're bringing
Who can live without it, I ask in all honesty
What would life be?
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music, for giving it to me
“Thank You for the Music” (ABBA: The Album, 1977)
Politics, Power, and Pop: The Gift of Music, a Trojan horse? Discuss.
As for the talented young ladies who make up Moranbong Band back in Pyongyang, maybe they should rebrand as Kim’s Babes and enrich their repertoire by, in a first step, recording cover versions of ABBA, The Corrs (“Breathless”), Wilson Phillips (“Hold On”), and the Dixie Chicks (anything).
The sky, red of course, is the limit.
Where to begin.
Well, let's look east first – after all, that’s where the sun rises and the sky is red. Far East actually, all the way to the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (DPRK). Just plain North Korea to the rest of the world. This geographically remote, politically dysfunctional, economically bankrupt, and voluntarily isolated country – some call it The Hermit Kingdom – saw its seventh Workers’ Party Congress, the first one in 36 years would you believe it, held of course in its metropolitan capital city of Pyongyang. Now if that’s not an occasion to roll out and share with all of us the Nation’s Finest, nothing will be. Ever the gracious host, at the end of the otherwise rather drab four-day affair, predictable in its faultless choreography and political outcomes, despotic ruler Kim Jong-un, who goes by the self-effacing title of Supreme Leader, presented for the world to witness, admire, and envy, his most prized treasure – pop girls bands. And Man, did they rock the Congress with toe-tappers like “Our Dear Leader” and “Let’s Support Our Supreme Commander with Arms”! The 3,467 voting delegates especially dug Moranbong Band’s timeless rendition of “Sea of Apples at Foot of Chol Pass”.
Allegedly a fan of Eric Clapton, we have it on good authority that Kim has “hand-picked” the members of each of these combos. What this process actually, physically entails, I leave to your imagination, but it seems clear he takes more than just a passing interest in the ladies who have the privilege of forming the vanguard of contemporary entertainment in a society that otherwise is somewhat behind the times. If critical, you might associate it with the Stone Age.
Now one of only two remnants of the Cold War and surviving bulwark of Communism – and the planet is getting an ever lonelier place, since before our eyes Cuba is threatening to succumb to the decadence of Capitalism, forever to be lost to the cause of World Revolution, while late-comer comrades-in-arms Venezuela is on the verge of self-imploding – over time North Korea, separated by a heavily armed military demarcation line along the 38th parallel dating back all the way to 1948 from its brethren in the Republic of Korea to its South, and no peace treaty has ever been signed, a while ago began distancing itself from what you might call the mainstream world Communist movement.
Juche, an ideology of national self-reliance, was introduced into the constitution as a "creative application of Marxism–Leninism" in 1972 – a contradiction in terms, I would contend. Anyhow, the means of production are of course still owned by the state through nationalised enterprises and collectivised farms. Most services such as healthcare, education, housing, and food production are subsidized or state-funded. From 1994 to 1998, North Korea suffered from a famine that resulted in the deaths of between 0.24 and 3.5 million people, and the country to this day struggles with food production.
North Korea follows Songun, or a "military-first" policy. It is the country with the highest number of citizens under arms, with a total of 9,495,000 active and reserve military, and paramilitary personnel, out of a total population of some 25 million. Its active duty army of 1.21 million is the fourth largest in the world, after China (population 1.37 billion), the U.S. (321 million), and India (1.25 billion). You do the math. Much to the chagrin of everybody else, it also possesses nuclear weapons, and while its threats to “take out” Washington DC are scarcely believable, the capital city of South Korea, Seoul (a very nice place, if very hot and humid in summer and bitterly cold in winter – do visit) with its population of 10 million is only, literally, “just south of the border” and within easy reach of even the most basic nuclear missiles.
By the way, if you ever search for up-to-date information on any country, I encourage you to use the CIA World Factbook (https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/). All the figures I have just quoted are dated July 2015 – pretty impressive.
North Korea also “boasts” a Gross Domestic Product (GDP) that places it at number 113 in the world; a GDP per capita that puts it in 210th place, and a Gross National Saving that, in the words of the CIA Factbook, is “NA” (not applicable).
On Transparency International’s “Corruption Perceptions Index 2015” – a ranking, first introduced in 1995 that has been widely credited with putting the issue of corruption on the international policy agenda – North Korea is rock-bottom at Number 167, ex-aequo with Somalia but without the excuse of being ravaged by bloody military conflict.
And, last but not least, on Reporters Without Borders’ “World Press Freedom Index 2016”, Kim’s haven for “creative Marxism-Leninism” comes in at Number 179, only narrowly, but nonetheless gloriously pipping Eritrea for last place.
So far so bad. But they do have their girls’ bands, not least in response to South Korea’s thriving pop music industry – remember “Gangnam Style”?
But otherwise, as per the above, things are pretty drab in Kim’s Kingdom. And did I mention it’s very much a family business, the current dictator the son of Kim Jong-il (1942 – 2011) who boasted the names “Guiding Sun Ray” and “Glorious General Who Descended from Heaven”; and grandson of the state’s founder, Kim Il-sung (1912 – 1994) who is also the origin of the rather penetrant personality cult the dynasty indulges in, which eclipses anything ever related to bona fide dictators like Joseph Stalin (1878 – 1953) or Mao Zedong (1893 – 1976). Starting with the comparatively modest “Great Leader”, he eventually graduated to unknown heights marked by titles of esteem such as "Sun", "Great Chairman", "Heavenly Leader" and others, as well as receiving awards like the "Double Hero Gold Medal".
If you really want to know what life is like in this Soldiers’ State and Peasants’ Paradise, please read the novel The Orphan Master’s Son (2012) by Adam Johnson that won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 2013, and deservedly so. To quote just one reviewer:
“As well as a heartbreaking insight into the unreality of life north of the 38th parallel, Adam Johnson has produced a brilliant exploration of the act of fiction-making and the importance of narratives, both public and private. Employing a range of registers from the intimate first person to the disembodied bullshit that blares constantly from Kim’s loudspeakers, he seems to question the very act of storytelling, intimating that the inventions of the novelist might be in some way analogous to the falsehoods of the Dear Leader. On this last point he can rest assured: his brilliant novel singularly confounds any such suggestions.” David Annand, The Telegraph (16 April 2013)
So, we owe Comrade Kim Jong-un for last week’s rare glimpse into the boundless, bottomless, and breathless (just stopping short of topless, at least in their public appearances) creativity of the North Korean pop music industry. Just to see the girls meant to fall in love. Honestly, what’s not to like?
I can't resist, however, to throw one quote from another highly recommended novel I have just finished reading, this one dealing with the impact of the Vietnam War, at Comrade Kim: “Slogans are empty suits draped on the corpse of an idea.” Viet Thanh Nguyen, The Sympathizer (2015)
The corpse in question is, of course, Marxism-Leninism. You can find it on the dust heap of History, right next to National Socialism.
So, North Korea set the bar rather high when it came to pop music and female singers last week. Could this be topped, you ask yourselves breathlessly no doubt?
Well, it could, and yet again, we venture from the firm footing of mere fun into the treacherous territory of possibly political provocation (to avoid the term propaganda). But please judge for yourselves.
As announced in one of my previous blogs, Saturday 14 May was the day of the 2016 final of the Eurovision Song Contest, the competition formerly known as Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson.
Those were the days when the French language still ruled supreme in all matters cultural and diplomatic – although the latter, realistically, probably ended with the Congress (yes, another one) of Vienna in 1814/15 where the four great European powers Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia, restored as best they could the continental order that had been unsettled for 25 years of almost continuous war resulting from the French Revolution of 1789 and the challenge posed by Napoleon.
The Congress' "Final Act" – somewhat prematurely I would contend as General Buonaparte was still at large and at it again, having gone AWOL (Absent Without Leave) from his original exile on the Mediterranean island of Elba – was signed nine days before his final defeat at Waterloo on 18 June 1815. And yes, it was the Duke of Wellington who got all the laurels, but if the Prussians lead by General Blücher had not turned up just in time before it grew too dark to continue fighting, things would in all likelihood have ended differently. “I wish it was night, or the Prussians came.” History in the subjunctive. “What if?”
Waterloo – hold the thought, please.
Anyhow, coming back to last Saturday evening, those lucky enough to watch the live broadcast of the event witnessed not just a remarkable musical competition with a surprising outcome, but also a result that has since widely been commented on, primarily in political terms.
How so, you may ask.
In the interest of full disclosure, I am not taking sides in this controversy. I do, however, as a matter of principle reject the notion of mass deportation of ethnic groups and dislike the practice of military annexation of territory that has never really been yours to begin with.
But, again, in my blog I do not do politics.
Well, that said, I realize one day I will have to write about Donald “The Donald” Trump and Hillary “It’s my turn” Clinton, their face-off something to look forward to as little will be off-limits. But we are not quite there yet.
So, the Eurovision Song Contest (ESC), in its 61st edition this year, was held in Stockholm as Sweden had won last year’s competition. The victorious contestant in 2015 was Mans Zelmerlöw; his song entitled “Heroes”. And I do confess having just had to look this up, such is the transitory nature of glory in our fast-moving, disrespectful, and undeserving world. Our friend Mans got to co-host the event, so that was kind of cool by way of a compensation for having been forgotten in the meantime I guess.
Since the sequential self-implosion of both the former Soviet Union and former Yugoslavia, in that chronological order, and the subsequent creation of a large number of new states that now form part of the Eurovision network – and of course they are all hugely welcome – we have had to endure qualifying rounds called “Semi-Finals” in the week leading up to the Grand Finale, and in the course of these preliminary rounds something remarkable and quite unheard-of happened.
Ireland, record seven-time winner, were knocked out of the competition before reaching the final. Ireland, the home of never-to-be forgotten bards like Johnny Logan – well, truth be told, he was born in Australia, but that’s detail really – who triumphed not just once, not just twice, but actually three times. He won as a performer with the song “What’s Another Year” in 1980; again as a singer with “Hold Me Now” in 1987; and, little known except to true aficionados, he was the composer of Linda Martin’s winning entry, “Why Me?” in 1992. And I honestly have no answer to that question.
By sheer coincidence, I saw Logan (left) perform live on Sunday on a rather staid German TV program mostly aimed at pensioners, and while almost feeling sorry for him, I did notice an uncanny resemblance with the Eagles’ Don Henley (right), seven years Johnny’s senior and arguably the greater singer and songwriter of the two. “Hotel California”, anyone? – RIP, Glen Frey. And “Take It Easy”, Man. See you on that “corner in Winslow, Arizona”.So, meanwhile back in Stockholm, other countries had also been knocked out in the preliminary stage, including Slovenia. I shared my disappointment with a good friend of mine in Ljubljana – where I get to spend a lot of time nowadays, and you really must visit: it’s truly a charming town of 300,000 people with a river, a castle, and a University, a beautifully restored centre accessible only to pedestrians, and many nice pubs and restaurants serving excellent local craft beers – pulling his leg by referring to it as a national shame. In his own, very dry and understated way, he replied: “If this is our only shame, we are a happy country.” And they are, by and large.
But they do maybe lack the seriousness of the Olympic spirit of competition when it comes to this musical contest – an approach that many, if not most of the entrants in Stockholm embraced and embodied. First and foremost those who may have something to prove to the rest of the world, or specific parts of it, linked to issues in other areas of life.
And this leads me straight to the surprise winner of this year’s Eurovision Song Contest, female singer Susana Jamaladinova, who goes by the stage name Jamala, from the Ukraine. Of Crimean Tatar origin, she performed the song “1944” which describes the plight of the Tatar minority deported from their Crimean homeland under Joseph Stalin (see above). Many of the deportees, Ms Jamaladinova’s grandmother included, did not survive to make it back to the Crimea after the collapse of the Soviet Union.
As it was cloaked as a personal anthem to her grandmother, the song was allowed to compete, thereby ducking one of the contest’s ground rules stipulating that political content is forbidden. Even before the first note was sung, Russia had protested against this, claiming it was nothing but a thinly veiled oblique comment on Russia’s annexation of Crimea in 2014, not to speak of giving voice to most Ukrainians’ and Tatars’ general distaste for everything even remotely Russian.
The opening verse of the song is: “When strangers are coming, they come to your house, they kill you all and say we are not guilty, not guilty.” Following above-mentioned annexation, one of the first measures of the new Russian rulers was to shut down the Tatars’ independent legislature, a step widely viewed as a renewed discrimination of this minority – déjà-vu all over again, to quote our favourite sage, Yogi Berra. Please judge for yourself, Constant Reader.
The Russians were, unsurprisingly, scandalised and more than just a little upset – not least because they had been fancying the chances of their own entry, Sergey Lazarev performing “You Are The Only One”, before the event actually the favourite to win. So less than two weeks on, all those bookies just slowly recovering from the Leicester City pay-outs took a hit yet again – the end of an industry I wonder?
For Russia, given the current general geo-political climate, winning the ESC in Stockholm (into the harbour of which, allegedly, they enjoy sending their submarines on scouting missions, all in the spirit of good fun and Olympic competition of course) would have been a major PR coup, not least because it would have meant hosting next year’s event in Moscow. Accordingly, they fulminated about “Russophobia”, blaming politics and the United States for this top-level international scandal. In the good old days of conventional, pre-nuclear times diplomacy, I believe it would have been ranked as “an unfriendly act” which invariably lead to a declaration of war – boy, has humanity progressed since.
What, pray, do the U.S. of A. have to do with any of this, you may well ask. Well, purely by coincidence, this was the first ESC ever that was actually broadcast States-side, and this in and of itself was sufficient for Russian conspiracy theories of an “information war” being waged against the Motherland. To quote Yelena Drapeko, an actress turns lawmaker speaking to the Tass news agency: “We are talking about the general demonization of Russia, about how everything with us is bad, about how our athletes are all doping, our planes are violating airspace, all of this.” A seriously unhappy lady, Yelena is.
Since the event next year will now take place in Kiev, Russia’s political establishment is already gearing up for revenge. Maria V. Zakharova, a spokeswoman for the Foreign Ministry, wrote on her Facebook account Russia in 2017 would enter a song about the President of Syria that would surely win: “Assad bloody, Assad the worst. Give me prize so we can host.” Others suggested Russia’s contestants next year should travel to the Ukraine on the back of tanks. Oh dear.
The situation was further acerbated by the fact that for the first time the ESC had a new voting system, combining the popular vote of the TV audiences country-by-country with an expert vote, five important people per Eurovision Member State. And guess what, after the popular vote our friend Sergey was in the lead, only to be toppled by Jamala and ending up in third place at the very end of the competition, once the expert juries’ decisions had been factored in.
The day following the alleged scandal, on his weekly Sunday night news program, Dmitry K. Kiselyov, a reliable apologist of anything emanating from the Kremlin, was fuming: “I don’t exclude the fact that Americans having bought broadcasting rights has changed the voting system. Money talks, as they say, in this case in political interests.”
I have many Russian friends, and while very different in personalities, they have at least one trait in common – a wonderful, self-deprecating, and ironic sense of humour. I hope Russian national character, always assuming there is such a thing, will survive this petty storm in a teapot.
In closing, the question should be addressed why girls groups and even female solo singers have such an emotional impact on so many people – much more, for argument’s sake, than their male counterparts.
Remember Waterloo, or rather – “Waterloo”?
This was the title of the winning song at the Grand Prix Eurovision de la Chanson back in 1974, staged in Brighton, UK, and performed by the Swedish group ABBA that was composed of two men and two women – Agnetha Fältskog, Björn Ulvaeus, Benny Andersson, and Anni-Frid Lyngstad.
Here’s a Fun Fact for your next pub quiz night: Only three of them are actually Swedes. Anni-Frid hails from Norway.
Fun Fact Number Two: During the band's active years, Fältskog and Ulvaeus, and Lyngstad and Andersson were married. At the height of their popularity, both relationships were suffering strain which ultimately resulted in the collapse of the Ulvaeus–Fältskog marriage in 1979 and the Andersson–Lyngstad marriage in 1981. These relationship changes, experts will tell you, were reflected in the group's music, with later compositions including more introspective, brooding, dark lyrics. The group eventually broke up in the mid-eighties.
Fun Fact Number Three: ABBA are the only music act whose name was an palindrome and that had a song out whose title was also an palindrome – “S.O.S.” (ABBA, 1975).
On the back of that ESC victory, ABBA became one of the most commercially successful acts in the history of popular music, topping the charts worldwide from 1974 to 1982. And the only Eurovision winners ever really to become world stars. ABBA were honoured at the 50th anniversary celebration of the Eurovision Song Contest in 2005, when their hit "Waterloo" was chosen as the best song in the competition's history. The group was inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame on 15 March 2010.
While Björn and Benny were the composers and driving forces behind the success of this foursome – subsequently raking in on the obscene global commercial success of the musical “Mamma Mia!”, with its thin plot written around their songs, and its film version of 2008 (one of my three worst-ever movies, but that’s another story) – as far as the vocals and ABBA’s stage show were concerned, it was the two girls who carried the act.
So for the purpose of these ramblings, they might as well have been a girls’ group. My top three in this particular category?
Number Three: The Corrs
Number Two: Wilson Phillips
Number One: The Dixie Chicks
And with the last band, I come to a third story of Pop, Power, and Politics getting too close for comfort, and on a much grander scale than our Korean girls and Ms Jamaladinova.
The Dixie Chicks are an American country music band which has also crossed over into other genres, including pop. The group, composed of founding members (and sisters) Martie Erwin Maguire and Emily Erwin Robison, and lead singer Natalie Maines, first hit the big time in the late Nineties and went on to selling a lot of records, topping the charts regularly, and collecting Grammy Awards in the process.
And then, this happened:
During the run-up to the invasion of Iraq, on 10 March 2003, Dixie Chicks performed live at the Shepherd's Bush Empire theatre in London. This concert kicked off their “Top of the World Tour”. During the introduction to their song "Travelin' Soldier", Natalie Maines, who along with Robison and Maguire is also a native of Texas, said:
"Just so you know, we're on the good side with y'all. We do not want this war, this violence, and we're ashamed that the President of the United States is from Texas." Not just from Texas – George W. Bush had been Governor of that proud State from 1995 to 2000, before being elected to the Presidency.
Bang. It was out there, avidly reported in The Guardian's review of the concert. Shortly thereafter, the U.S. media picked up the story, and all hell broke loose.
Maines' remark sparked intense criticism; American commentators claimed she should not have criticised the President on foreign soil. She simply responded, "I said it there 'cause that's where I was."
To claim this was not a career-enhancing thing to do would be the understatement of the decade. In response to the uproar and the start of a wide boycott of Dixie Chicks' music, Maines subsequently tried to make amends in an attempt to clarify matters: “"I feel the President is ignoring the opinions of many in the U.S. and alienating the rest of the world." She even went one step further, issuing the following apology: “"As a concerned American citizen, I apologize to President Bush because my remark was disrespectful. I feel that whoever holds that office should be treated with the utmost respect. We are currently in Europe and witnessing a huge anti-American sentiment as a result of the perceived rush to war. While war may remain a viable option, as a mother, I just want to see every possible alternative exhausted before children and American soldiers' lives are lost. I love my country. I am a proud American."
But it was a classic case of too little too late. Or, from another perspective, of the old adage that applies to media interviews, but also to life at large: “When you’re in a hole, stop digging.”
While many artists came to the Dixie Chicks’ support, the general wave of condemnation was impossible to halt, in spite of President Bush’s very measured response: “The Dixie Chicks are free to speak their mind. They can say what they want to say ... they shouldn't have their feelings hurt just because some people don't want to buy their records when they speak out ... Freedom is a two-way street ... I don't really care what the Dixie Chicks said. I want to do what I think is right for the American people, and if some singers or Hollywood stars feel like speaking out, that's fine. That's the great thing about America.”
The degree of hatred directed toward the Chicks included a specific death threat against Maines in Dallas that led to a police escort to the July 6 show and from the arena directly to the airport.
For the following years, apart from sporadic appearances, there was little evidence of any meaningful continuation of their career until their brave, defiant, and triumphant return on 16 March 2006, when they released the single “Not Ready to Make Nice” in advance of their new album, Taking the Long Way. The lyrics directly addressed the political controversy that had surrounded the group for the previous three years:
I'm not ready to make nice
I'm not ready to back down
I'm still mad as hell and I don't have time to go 'round and 'round and 'round
It's too late to make it right
I probably wouldn't if I could
'Cause I'm mad as hell
Can't bring myself to do what it is you think I should
And, in reaction to the death threat Maines had received, as well as a response to a protesting woman telling her small child to say "screw 'em", they go on:
I made my bed and I sleep like a baby
With no regrets and I don't mind sayin'
It's a sad sad story when a mother will teach her
Daughter that she ought to hate a perfect stranger
And how in the world can the words that I said
Send somebody so over the edge
That they'd write me a letter Sayin' that I better
Shut up and sing or my life will be over
Robison said, "The stakes were definitely higher on that song. We knew it was special because it was so autobiographical, and we had to get it right. And once we had that song done, it freed us up to do the rest of the album without that burden." She said writing the song had become their "therapy", since they had had to hold in so many stored emotions for so long. The band considered the album not so much political as very personal.
In 2006, Taking the Long Way was the ninth best-selling album in the United States. At the 49th Grammy Awards Show on 11 February 2007, the group won all five categories for which they were nominated, including the top awards of Song of the Year and Record of the Year, both for "Not Ready to Make Nice", and Album of the Year, for Taking the Long Way. Maines interpreted the wins as being a show of public support for their advocacy of free speech. It had been 14 years since an artist had swept those three awards.
Finally, at the 2006 Toronto International Film Festival, Dixie Chicks: Shut Up and Sing premiered. The documentary follows the Chicks over the three years since the 2003 London concert remark and covers aspects of their musical and personal lives in addition to the controversy. Check it out.
And if you are now interested in seeing them perform live this side of the Atlantic, I’m afraid you have just missed them as they have completed the European part of their DCX MMXVI World Tour. However, there is hope, provided you are willing to cross the Big Pond: The American part starts in Cincinnati on 1 June and ends at the Hollywood Bowl in Los Angeles on 10 October 2016. For our U.S. based friends, a real treat.
The Daily Telegraph's Sarah Carson stated: "The triumphant trio proved the power lies in their musicianship, not notoriety, and their talents remain as rich and fierce as ever." ("Dixie Chicks make a headlining UK return after 13 years – review"; The Daily Telegraph, 30 April 2016)
So, we have come full circle in our musings. In ABBA’s own words:
Thank you for the music, the songs I'm singing
Thanks for all the joy they're bringing
Who can live without it, I ask in all honesty
What would life be?
Without a song or a dance, what are we?
So I say thank you for the music, for giving it to me
“Thank You for the Music” (ABBA: The Album, 1977)
Politics, Power, and Pop: The Gift of Music, a Trojan horse? Discuss.
As for the talented young ladies who make up Moranbong Band back in Pyongyang, maybe they should rebrand as Kim’s Babes and enrich their repertoire by, in a first step, recording cover versions of ABBA, The Corrs (“Breathless”), Wilson Phillips (“Hold On”), and the Dixie Chicks (anything).
The sky, red of course, is the limit.
