Special - Daehanmindecline

Special
Clausmas
issue #6
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Letters to the Editor
Broke in Korea
Issue 8
This zine is published
whenever the hell I feel
like it. Don’t like it? Start
your own damn zine.
Editor
Jon Twitch
Contributors
Cain Barriskill
Summer Walker
Verv
Tel Tele-terrance
Telleyrude
Nevin Domer
Jungy Rotten
Gary Norris
Jeremy Toombs
accidentalcharm
sepuku
jules
Trash & Jeff
Kim Hyun-hee
and all the bands that
bothered getting back
to me
Photos
Jon Twitch
Summer Walker
Layout
Jon Twitch
Contact
jon_dunbar@hotmail.
com
Message Board
http://brokeinkorea.tk
Previous issues avalable
for download at
daehanmindecline.com
Contributors are
always welcome
This zine was designed
using a pirated copy of
Adobe IndDesign CS.
What are you gonna do
about it? Huh? Huh?
NAME: Kim Hyun-Hee
LOCATION: Pyongyang
SEXUALITY: Bi
We don’t get a lot of mail here at
the Broke in Korea offices, so instead, here are some messages I
got on MySpace from random people
who thought they were talking to
a North Korean girl who lists her
sexuality as bi.
wow ,a real north korean! About
as rare as the abominable snowman,
cool to see you here on myspace. I
promise I don’t have vampire fangs
and I’m not an imperialist.
anyways, I’d love to get to know
you and hear your opinions on
things. How do you have access to
a computer? THat must be a pretty
rare thing!
Hope to hear from you
andy
haha, sorry, im an american and
you prolly hate me or something
but yea, i dig the asians. haha. Very
party oriented i see, well, i personally wouldn’t like to meet Mr, Kim Il
but i would like to search asian. Hey
would i get killed if i wanted to tour
N. Korea.
unsigned
Hi,
how are you and your work?hope
everything is fine ireally admire your
pics,when i went through your profile, i could see you have what it take
to be my lover.
bonny
Kim,
You are NOT in North Korea!
North Koreans are forbidden from
having free contact with outsiders.
They are also not allowed to date,
much less marry, foreigners. Your
very pretty and put up an elaborate
hoax, but you don’t fool me.
Jeff
how are you. im lookin in the
browse section for a girl. one that’ll
treat me write n be there for me. i
am a huge partier. i smoke neports.
n i love sex. sex is like my problem. the more times i have sex the
more times i fall for the person. u
should give me a chance, with eather
friends with benefits or a relationship. write back when u can.
unsigned
Hi I is Tanya. I is from Tomsk in
Russia. I see profile and is cool. You
be my in friend box OK? I like Kim
Jong Il. I watch him in puppet movie
with big shark. So funny!!!
Tanya
Hi, you are the first person I have
contacted that I did not already know.
I am looking for someone to talk to
and who might find me interesting.
I will tell you about me and let you
decide if you want to write me back.
I am divorced and have a 16 year old
son who I am very proud of. He does
very good in school. I am 37 almost
38 I used to be a Deputy Sheriff, but
I had to quit because I have several
heart problems. I have had heart
problems since I was 21 but I never
let that stop me until now.
I don’t know why I picked you but
you have such honest eyes and that
small things like that mean so much
to me after dealing with criminals for
over 7 years.
I saw your pictures of you in uniform, you served your country, so
did I. I was in the Navy. But I don’t
remember ever seeing anyone in the
Navy look as pretty as you.
Well I hope we can talk and maybe
become friends. Oh by the way my
full name is Shane Murphy, its Irish. I
have to post a different name so the
ex-criminals don’t find out where I
live. Plus I love Zombie movies.
Domo
Shane
Your very attractive.
Recently your country has got
some news about its quest for nuclear power. I hope your country
has many professionals since that is
very dangerous.
You are a very attractive North Korean women. Are you allowed to be in
a relationship on the internet with a
man like me from the United States of
America. I don’t want you to get into
any trouble with your supervisors.
I would enjoy receiving notes and
messages from an attractive women
like you. I think Korean and Japanese women are very attractive.
Andrew
I am a workaholic too..i had a bi
experience
unsigned
Check out my pics area and blog
spot for creative art board design
and analysis of cinematic film, Die
Another Day. I do not think that it
reflects your society acurrately.
Best Wishes,
Andrew
hi,
I cant believe in my mind that there
is a beautiful like this, after reading ur
profile and saw ur pics , i realy love it,
i like the structure of ur profile !!
u are so beautiful, to tell u the fact
u are one of beautiful angel in world,
i will like to know u , even to have a
good relationship with u?
peter
I am not average american I dislike
my governments actions a lot--i did
some bi things once
unsigned
My former co-worker from Sony
Electronics Corporation deals in decoders for FCC and military regulated
telecommunitcations frequencies.
Would you like to make a buy for
satellite decoders of FCC or military
frequecy applications??
Please let me know and I can set
the price.
Thank You...
Andrew
am I too old and too far away for you?
My name is gary
hi gary~~~
my is the hyunee^^
i want you visit the pyongyang!
hello...and thanks for your reply.
I would like to visit you too
Are you really ‘bi’? That excites me
Gary
hi~~~
you’re welcome for your reply :P
what is “bi”?
Hyunhee~~**~~*
‘bi’ is how you listed your sexual
orientation, meaning you are bisexual...is that true or no?
if you do not like sex with other
females and prefer sex only with
males, have you ever had several
men at the same time?
Gary
I am looking for a few good women. Not the kind that would betray
their own country, or manipulate
their own ethnic gender and cultural
heritage. I am a serious man looking
to maintain global political and economical peace. Also bridging cultural
and ethnic gaps when necessary for
prevention of political distress that
could lead to economic instability
due to poor foreign policy management with these hidden agendas.
If you are capable of acting as a
liason for counter intelligence with
North Korea, since you are a cute
Korean girl I am willing to work with
you directly.
Please contact the following branch
of the US Department of Defense to
notify them you must have me, and
only me to work with as a counter
intelligence liason. If not, only God
knows who you will get. As you
can tell from my photograph I am a
handsome American guy.
Please send me a copy of this letter, if you want me. Then in an act of
good faith I will open a small credit
card account with a $5,000 dollar
limit in the United States of America
by a bank of my choice and add your
contact information to the registered
account. This will then be reported
to the Office of Foreign Assests and
Control of the US Treasury Department as you being my direct and
trusted contact. My legal proff is the
document that you send to the US
Army Intelligence group mentioned
above. Please keep the contact and
personal information the same so
that the US Army and US Department of the Treasury maintain precise records.
Thank You,
Handsome American guy, Andrew
yes you are a Cutie Pie!!! but I think
you are wrong agout your Leader!!!
have a nice weekend
unsigned
I recently had a legal dispute with
local university from Pennsylvania
involving Carnegie Mellon University
(CMU). They tried to make a criminal charge against me for reporting
political flyers on their campus.
Somehow,
your
name
from
Myspace.com came into the conversation of legal documents. I can
not beleive that they are worse than
what the United States of America
calls the North Korean government.
I received you e-mail from MSN
hotmail.com and had to use it as
legal evidence in my defense. I am
currently reporting my evidence to
the Pennsylvania Office of Attorney
General Civil Rights Enforcement.
I feel like the campus police can do
whatever they what with their authority,
they are so powerfull. I will keep you
informed if they ask more questions
about North Korea, or The Peoples Republic of China. I hope you understand
that I am defenseless in this situation in
defending your photo on Myspace.com
from becoming legal evidence. Blame
the CMU university police.
Best Wishes,
Andrew
so you don’t say hi? What are you
one of those communists that don’t
like anarchists and other free thinking people? Well, take care.
With soggy seattle greetings
Sam
are you really in north korea!?
that’s amazing! i’m teaching near
seoul. i’m friends with grant and jay
- they’re on your page, too.
nice to meet you!
unity
you BLOW but this really is funny
as hell...damn i feel like an idiot in a
PC bang now!
unity
Mr. Kim is not a great leader, he is
a little man who wears funny looking platform shoes, and has a bad
haircut.
Have a nice day!
unsigned
THANKS FOR THE MAIL I REALLY LOVE UR WORS I LOVE U.THIS
IS FOR U.
My love,
Are you still mine?
‘Cause there are many...
Fantasy thoughts going through
my head,
As all I do is think of you...
As I’ve hungered,
For your loving burning touch,
As I need your love so badly,
Now till the end of time,
I am waiting for you with open arms
To embrace you with wings of love,
To hold you deep within my soul,
To kiss you without control.
Just being near you,
And be able to behold your touch,
Takes me to another dimension,
But, time just moving so slowly,
To feel the heat of your passions.
I do want you to know...
I will always love you,
That you are all I have ever long for,
And crave, and yearn...
That you are the man of my dreams,
The one I have searched all my life,
That every day, more and more,
I’m falling deeply in love with you!
I LOVE U
PAUL
iraq done
iran tomorrow
korea soon
axis of evil
unsigned
ABSTRACT LOVE.
I HAVE NOT MEET U BE 4
YET YOU HAVE WON ME OVER
I THINK OF U EVERY MOMENT
YET I DON;T KNOW WHAT U
LOOK LIKE
I MAGINE UR GRACEFUL STRIDE TOWARD MY HEART, BODY AND SOUL.
AND UR KING SIZED HUGS.
I HAVE NOT SEEN UR SIMLE
YET, I MAGINE IT’S SPARKLE
I HAVE NOT SLEPT BY UR SIDE,
YET U CUDDLE ME SLEEP
IMAGINE US DOING THING TO EACH
OTHER, PROMISING NEVER LET GO.
AND TO REMAIN AS ONE AT ALL TIME.
I HAVE NOT SEEN U PHYSICALLY
BUT U APPEAR TO ME LIKE AN ANGEL, IN MY DREAM U ARE THE PRINCESS THAT CONQUERED MY WORLD
AND I,M UR SLAVE IN LOVE.
YET I HAVE NOT MET YOU OH
WHAT AN ABSTRACT LOVE BABEyou can drop me a mail via my
yahoo mail address or my hotmail...
unsigned
hello baby, how happy to have
aglance at ur beautiful image. its a
great pleasure to meet beautiful and
great women of virtue like u. Hope
my coming across you will never be
an embarracement but upliftment of
love and happiness in our spaced life
time and hopefully the meeting will
yield flamboyant suculent fruits.remain blessed as i hopefuly wait for
ur open minded and caring reply
unsigned
Table of Incontinence
1. Cover
2. Letters to the Editor
3. Table of Incontinence
3. Santa Goes to Hell
4. Enter Pornotarium
5. BB Lucky Town
6. Chadburger Tour Report
7. Facts About Tel
8. Battle of the Bands
9. The Tear Jerks
10. Don’t Quit Your Day Job
12. Shitty New Countercultures
14. Top Ten Photogenic Punks
16. Christmas Gift Ideas
18. Verv’s Sex Page
19. Verv’s Taliban Page
19. Riddles
20. Self Mutilation
21. Outlanders Zine Review
21. Say What?
21. Reggae Bar Reviews
22. Broke Crossword
22. Bimonthly Bootfuck
22. Hideously Shitty Band Names
22. Saint John the Gambler CD
23. More CD Reviews
24. Legends of Kamelot
27. Top Ten Harmful Religions
28. Nabiya Cat Shelter
Santa Goes to Hell
Jon Twitch
24 December 2008
Revellers and well-wishers on Christmas Eve were
surprised when Old Saint Nick
himself appeared at the alley
entrance of Skunk Hell.
“Ho ho ho, what have we
here?” bellowed Santa. “A punk
rock show in Korea?”
Santa quickly explained that
he was in country for his annual
delivery run, but finished early
and had a break. “All these
boys and girls only ask Santa
for pencil cases. It makes my
job easy.”
As night spreads across the
time zones, Santa follows, delivering presents in an eastto-west fashion. “I started with
Australia, then I flew up through
the Philippines, and right up
to Korea. The south one, of
course. Now I have a few hours
to kill because it’s all heathens
between here and Europe.”
He came inside in time for
Pornotarium, but had to leave
after a couple songs because
of the noise. “Nothing against
them at all,” he said quickly,
“but their style of thrashy
grindcore is hard on poor old
Santa’s ears. They do sound
great, and their bass player
bought me milk and cookies
earlier.”
Santa recalls running into
Verv when he first arrived,
and says he will never forget
the experience. “He introduced himself by telling me
he’s a national socialist, and
then gave me a tearful speech
about how girls in North Korea
are forced into prostitution,”
he recounts, and as he laughs
his belly shakes like a bowl full
of jelly. “Ho ho ho, I still remember the first time I met him
when he was only four years
old. He got up to use the bathroom or something and caught
me putting presents under the
tree. Santa was feeling kind of
naughty that night, so I told h
im, ‘Beat it, kid—I’m just here
to bang your mom.’ And the
best part is he totally doesn’t
remember!”
I asked him if he remembered
all of us, at which point his
face darkened. If you’ve ever
seen an angry Santa, it’s more
frightening than you could
imagine.
“1989,” he said tersely. “In
front of Sears in West Edmonton Mall. A certain ten-year-
old Jon Twitch sits in my lap,
says ‘You’re not Santa!’ and
tugs off my bears. Yeah, that
was me. I was getting chemo.
Not cool. Seriously, not cool. I
needed that job.”
As we had to move aside
to let a car down the alley, I
switched topics by asking Santa for his thoughts on the commercialisation of Christmas.
“Ho ho ho, it’s no worry,” he
said. “You know, this is how I
wanted it all along. You know
all those Jesus freaks see a
problem with the decorated
trees and the riots at Walmart.
Well, that guy really should
get his own holiday. He wasn’t
even born this time of year.
December 25 is whose birthday? That’s right—it’s Santa’s
birthday. If there was any justice, this day would be called
Clausmas Eve.”
The last I saw of Santa, he
was pumping his fist in the air
to Samchung and riding Never
Daniel’s back as if he was a
reindeer. Then he disappeared
up the chimney to get on with
his deliveries (I bet you didn’t
even know Skunk had a chimney). Merry Clausmas everybody!
Korean punk photography by Jon Dunbar
www.daehanmindecline.com
Enter Pornotarium
Jon Twitch
Recently, Seoul’s underground
scene got donkey-punched by the
formation of a strange new band
known as Pornotarium. I think every second person and their uncle
knows who Verv is, so there’s been
a lot of excitement to see him on
stage, playing bass for Pornotarium.
Musically they’re sort of a combination of grindcore and thrash, and
the members come from far-flung
locations like Poland, China, North
Dakota, and Korean-America. Verv
is out in the field and while he took
the time out of his schedule to answer my questions, four spies and
a commando team snuck over the
border.
all from? What countries do you
have to give a shout out to?
Verv: We really have to first give
a shout out to Poland—we had probably 12-13 Poles there due to Bialy.
But in addition to that they are all
well networked and my cousins
Aliona and Walony brought people,
too. I can tell you we had 12-13
Poles, 4 Bulgarians, 2 Ukrainians,
1 Belarussian, 1 Russian and 1 Kazakh. We speculated that 70-80% of
all Polish people in Seoul that night
were there. I can only think of two
Poles who did not make it (but will
probably be there in the future).
It’s also notable that there were
probably around 10 Chinese present
due to Zhang Sheng and a hodgepodge of others from Jason.
Bialy: As you can see the Eastern European bloc is still stong and
more than solid.
Jason: I guess Europe likes us,
and you should too. Oh, but big
shout out to Poland cuz Polska puka
nolshna is zayabista.
Broke: What in the living fuck is
a pornotarium?
Bialy: As far as I remember that’s
how Mrs Verville used to call Verv’s
room.
Jason: You know how if you
wanted to see a bunch of fish and
shit, you’d go to the aquarium?
And how if you wanted to see stars
you’d go to a planetarium?...Or outside I guess... Well yeah, you get
the idea.
Verv: Well, it is a cultural location for pornography... you go to
the aquarium to learn about the fish;
to a planetarium to learn about the
majesty of space. And to learn the
majesty of pornography there is no
other place to go to than a Pornotarium.
Broke: How is your performance
like a porn film?
Verv: We have not yet fully incorporated porno as much as we like,
but I can tell you: we hope our performance can at least arouse your
music senses—get it stiff and hard
or wet and inviting.
Bialy: I wish we had a bit
more pornography during our
shows but the problem is that
it’s fuckin hard for me to get a
boner in public.
Broke: Do you guys ever watch
porn together?
Verv: I did receive a porno from
the Pornotarium members on my
birthday and we do intend to watch
this one together. We have also
given Jason pornography for his
birthday and Bialy a dildo on top of
a Bacardi 151 bottle. By the end of
the night I think nearly every member at some point put the dildo in
their to drink some liquor—we used
a chop stick to pierce a hole in the
center so... it was interesting.
Jason: I don’t think this has anything to do with us being in a band
or being in a band called Pornotarium at that, but I was given some
porn for my birthday by our bassist
and like a couple months later, the
guitarist and I went out and bought
some Korean soft-core porn for our
bassist’s birthday. so I guess what
I’m trying to say is that, even if
we weren’t in a band called Pornotarium, that would’ve happened
anyways.
Broke: What was the idea behind
starting a band? Did it take a lot of
“Yeah man, we should totally start
a band” or did it come together
quickly?
Verv: It is interesting how we
started—I had meant to start a
band with a Polish student in Korea
named Mark but sadly he was leaving Korea in August. However, he
did tell me “Dude, I know a great
guitarist that is coming and he will
be in your band.” At a show at
Skunk, where I met both Jason Han
(singer) and Bialy, I was introduced
to Bialy as the ‘new guitarist of my
band.’ It was rather shocking. We
exchanged emails because Bialy the
bum had no fucking phone—and
from there we had a jam session. I
invited Jason to come and sing and
it was a total success. Oddly, having no drummer, we used a friend
Christina who was not a drummer
and just played a little beat for us.
It was nice.
Bialy: Maybe just Verv wanted
to atract some chicks, i dont know
for sure..
Jason: Our coming together
had no planning behind it and was
pretty random. I went to Skunk
Hell to check out a show with my
friend from the States (Justin, we
miss you) and while we were outside waiting for the next band to
play, Verv walks up and we get to
chatting. he says he loves gyopos
and he would love to hang out
sometime so I give him my number.
Not one week later, he calls up and
says that he’s going to jam for the
first time together just for fun and
I should stop by to check it out and
maybe grab a beer afterwards. So I
get there and they’re jamming for a
while and Verv suggests that I jump
on the mic. So... yeah.
Broke: At the Stompers Battle
of the Bands, you guys had a huge
Eastern European following. What’s
the deal with that? Where are they
Broke: This is probably the most
multi-ethnic band Korea has seen.
How do you feel about that?
Verv: I love it! I think that all
of us bring a lot to the band from
that perspective—not necessarily musically, but socially we have
been able to draw in a lot of people
who are now more interested in the
scene in Korea. I’ve made some of
the best friends of my life through
these guys.
My largest hope is that they can
become more active in the scene and
we can make the scene not so much
just English teachers and Koreans,
but also all of these foreign students
who come here to learn Korean.
I also have to say... it is funny and
almost embarrassing. It totally was
not planned this way. It is not a gimmick or anything.
I think it shows in a good way
that people of all cultures and societies can come together and do
something great, united in what
should unite all people: music.
Bialy: It is pretty cool and kind
of unique, but it wasn’t our goeal
while forming this band. We met
in the same time in the same place,
and made a really cool multi-ethnic
line-up in the process.
Broke: What do you want Santa
to bring you for Christmas this
year?
Verv: Monbu Ran and a lot of pig
masks for my friends. I think we
could make a nice film! It would
be a good limited edition DVD for
Pornotarium fans.
Bialy: Unlimited credit card to
use at Cheongryangni district.
Jason: Pants?
Join BrokeInKorea.tk
Feeling Lucky?
Jon Twitch
BB Lucky Town has been around
forever, but did you know they’ve
never released a full-length album?
That came as a bit of a surprise to me.
I wanted to know more about these
guys, so I asked their bassist Trash
every question I could think of, except for the obvious one: what’s up
with her nickname.
주실 근처 그의 bar “human being”에 가서 맥주도 마시고 이야
기도 나누곤 한다.
그리고 요즘의 mr.park는 이전
밴드인 배다른형제와 함께 다시
reunion을 이야기 하는 것 같다.
bless him, anyway!
Broke: You guys have been around
for over six years. What has been the
highest point of your band’s history?
Trash: Highest point...hmm...we’ve
been playing in this band casually, so
there’s no highest point. Now we’re
still together so we’re still expecting
our highest point coming. So excited.
Broke: What is going on with your
drummer? He had surgery? Will he
be back?
Trash: He has a disc so he had to
leave his music life behind for surgery. At that time, he was so sick he
couldn’t move so he had to take an
ambulance to the hospital. Now he’s
getting better. We couldn’t just wait
until he comes back so we started
looking for a session drummer. I want
to thank all the gus who contacted
us for being a session drummer. You
guys rock!
We got a call from this guy recently and we met him and played for
an hour. It seems too much for him
to play upbeat because he could play
barely for an hour. We are still looking for a drummer, and I don’t think
we will play together with Mr Park
anymore. We want him but his back
doesn’t want our music. Still we are
good friends and Lee Jaehyuk from
Propeller21 is going to play with us
at Spot on Christmas Eve. After we
practice together, we always go to his
bar Human Being near our studio for
beer and talking. Mr Park is talking
about a reunion with Half Brothers.
Bless him anyway!
Broke: What are you doing in the
meantime? Is there a new drummer,
or will BBLT take a break?
Trash: We spend a lot of time practicing for the Spot show on Christmas
Eve. Lee Jaehyuk from Propeller 21
is one of the most considerate and
wise people. Also reasonable. After
that, we will get together with another session drummer. I expect a new
drummer will add a new colour to our
music. Hopefully he will be our new
drummer as long as possible. As you
may know, BBLT went through horribly many changes.
Broke: Is BBLT a skatepunk band?
Do all of the members of BBLT know
how to skateboard? Is skateboarding
important to your music?
Trash: Although we were called a
skatepunk band on the 2002 album
“Save Your Mind,” and you can see
our song “Scars on My Body” as a
skatepunk song, I don’t think we’re
a skatepunk band. There are many
kinds of music in this world, and
however you make sound, it becomes
music. Definitely our band members
like skateboarding and a lot of skateboarders happen to like the bands we
listen to. We just play the music we
like. Anyway, skateboarding is effin’
cool...like me!
Broke: What does the name BB
Lucky Town mean?
Trash: Nothing. It used to be Better
Bliss Lucky Town, then Beer, BBQ,
Lucky Town. Recently our band
members seriously discussed changing the band name.
Broke: What do you think about
the Korean punk scene right now?
Trash: The Hongdae music scene
seems to be changing and becoming more trendy. Not that new music
trends are bad, but it became more
difficult to see any shocking music in
Hongdae. Moreover, the current Korean punk scene is more of a clique.
Look at recent shows, similar types of
punk bands play together. It used to
be that more diverse kinds of people
played together no matter what genre
they belonged to. I miss those days.
Broke: What are the future plans
for your band?
Trash: First plan is making a regular album. We concluded that it’s very
stupid not to have a regular album
after six years in a band. We are planning to release a full-length album
next year.
Broke: When are you getting married? I heard there will be a BBLT
show after.
Trash: Yeah. we hope u guys come
and congratulate to our wedding. We
are both Christians and hate mechanical weddings in wedding factories so
we are having our wedding in Sungrak Church in Seongsu.
After the wedding, we are going
to have a party at Spot with everyone Jeff and I have known (presented
by www.jeffandtrash.com). Besides
BBLT, RUX, Galaxy Express, Suck
Stuff, Kingston Rudieska, the Geeks,
Rock Tigers, Sweet Guerillaz, Vicious
Glare, and Today X Spot are going to
play as well. I hope everybody comes
and has fun. Probably you won’t see
this kind of lineup. We will have tons
of other events for the show, and the
show will continue until dawn. I hope
you who are reading this will come to
Spot on February 28. It’ll be the biggest gift for us if you enjoy the show
we prepared.
Broke: What do you want Santa to
bring you for Christmas this year?
Trash: Gibson Thunderbird IV
bass!!!
I think it will be OK tons of hot
chicks for them!! Ha ha!!
Broke: You guys have been
around for over six years. What
has been the highest point of
your band’s history?
Trash: Highest point...흠... 글
쎄요..지난 6년간 솔직한 말로, 가
볍게 밴드를 해왔기 때문에 아직
우리가 원하는 그런 큰 뭐가 가
장 최고
점 이었던 순간은 없었던 것 같
음. 지금 우리는 아직도 달리고 있
기 때문에 앞으로 다가올 우리의
highest point를 기대하고 있을뿐.
그걸 생각하면 너무 excited! (영
어쓰다 한글말쓰다 하는건. 정확
하게 표현할 방법이 영어랑 섞어
써야 전달될것만 같아서 잇힝~:요
건 해석하지 마요 ㅋㅋ)
Broke: What is going on with
your drummer? He had surgery? Will he be back?
Trash: 디스크라는 병이 생겨서
8월을 마지막으로 그는 모든 음악
생활을 잠시 뒤로 한채 수술을 받
게되었고(그당시 그는 너무 아파
움직일 수 조차 없었기때문에 응
급차를 타고 병원에 가야만 했다
고 한다.)
사실.. 지금 그는 현재 많이 나아
져가고 있다.
그리고 남은 bbie, bang,
trash는 그가 돌아올 때까지 함께
쉬면서 무작정 기다릴 수 없었고,
밴드를 계속 이어나가고 싶었기
때문에, 세션드러머를 구하게 되
었고. 몇몇의 드러머와 합주를 해
보기도 했다.
(이 자리를 빌어 세션드러머에
관심을 갖고 연락을 해주었던 친
구들에게 감사의 말을 전한다. u
guys rock!)
그 리고 그에게서 다시 드럼을
치겠다는 연락이 전해져 와서. 최
근 그와 한 시간 정도 합주를 해
봤지만, 현재 그는 전형적인 빠른
비트의 드럼을 치기엔 역시나 무
리가 있는 모양이다. because he
could play barely for a hour.
결국 우리는 계속 세션 드러머
를 구하고 있으며, 아마도 앞으로
는 mr.park과 함께 공연을 하기는
어려울 것같다.
we want him, but his back
dont want our music..
하 지만 우리는 여전히 좋은 친
구로 지내고 있으며, 오는 24일
christmas eve 스팟 공연을 위해
propella21의 드러머(이재혁)가
도와줄 예정인데, 우리는 그 날을
위한 합주가 끝날 때마다 항상 합
Broke: What are you doing in
the meantime? Is there a new
drummer, or will BBLT take a
break?
Trash: 앞에도 말했지만. 지금
우리는 12월 24일 스팟공연을 위
해서, 최대한 많은 시간 합주에 시
간을 할애하고 있다.
세 션드럼으로는 프로펠러21의
이재혁씨가 도와주기로 했다. (그
는 내가 아는 굉장히 사례깊고 현
명한 사람 중에 한 명이다. 또한 냉
철하기도 하다.) 그 후에는 아마
지금 연락하는 또 다른 세션드러
머와의 합주가 우리를 기다리고
있다. 새로운 드러머는 아마 우리
의 음악에 또다른 재미와 색을 입
혀줄 것이라고 생각한다. hopefully, 그가 우리의 드러머가 되
길 바란다. 가능한한 오래오래.(아
는 사람은 알겠지만 비비럭키타운
은 끔찍하리만큼 많은 변화가 있
어왔다.)
Broke: Is BBLT a skatepunk
band? Do all of the members
of BBLT know how to skateboard? Is skateboarding important to your music?
Trash: 2002년 배다른형제가
프로젝트하여 만든 앨범 “save
your mind”를 통해 스케잇펑크밴
드라고 불려지긴 했지만,또 우리
노래 중에도 scars on my body라
던가 전체적인 노래의 리듬이나
비트를 봤을 때 어떤 면에서는 스
케잇펑크와 같다고 말할 수 있겠
지만, 사실 이제와 보면 우리는 꼭
스케잇 펑크 밴드는 아니라고 생
각한다.
세상엔 여러가지 음악이 있고,
어떻게 만들어지던간에 소리를 만
들면 그것은 음악이 된다. 그 중에
스케잇 뮤직이 있고, 그 중에 우리
의 노래가 있을 뿐이다. 하지만 우
리밴드는 확실히 스케잇을 좋아하
고, 우리가 즐겨듣던 밴드들의 음
악을 세상의 많은 스케이터들이
듣고 있었을 뿐이다. 하지만 세상
의 많은 스케이터들이 꼭 우리가
하고 있는 노래만 듣고 있는게 아
니지 않나. 단지 우리는 우리가 좋
아하는 음악을 할 뿐이고, 그게 스
케잇과 잘 어울려서 하게 된거라
고 생각한다. 반대로 우리의 음악
과 sk8이 서로를 위해 달리고 있
는건 아닐까? 하하.anyway sk8 is
effin’ cool! ...like me! :p
Broke: What does the name
BB Lucky Town mean?
Trash: 없다.
처음엔 better bliss lucky
town이라고 했었고, 그 후엔 그냥
beer, bbq, lucky town. 이라고 불
렀고. 하하.
사실 최근엔 멤버들끼리 밴드
이름 바꾸자는 이야기도 심각하게
했던 적이 있다. 하하.
Broke: What do you think
about the Korean punk scene
right now?
Trash: 홍대의 음악들이 트렌디
하게 변하고 있다고 생각한다. 그
말은 새로운 음악적 시도들이 나
쁘다는 것이 아니라.
홍 대 씬의 옛날의 fever 그러
한 것들을 불러 일으킬 만한 음악
적 충격이 줄어들고 있다고 해야
할까? 새로운 음악에 대한 신선한
충격도 좋지만 말이다. 게다가 요
즘 한국펑크씬의 유니온이나 유니
티는 옛날의 “모두가 다 즐겁게”
라기보다 “크루끼리 즐겁게”가 더
많아진 것이 지금의 현상을 만든
것 같다고 생각한다. 최근의 공연
보라, 거의 비슷한 성향의 펑크밴
드들끼리 공연을 한다. 이젠 그것
이 당연하다고 생각하게 되었지
만. 예전의 공연에선 구분없이 다
같이 공연하며 더 다양한 사람들
이 모여들곤 했었다. 뭐.. 나쁘다
고 말하는 것보다 그립다는 말이
정확할꺼 같다.
Broke: What are the future
plans for your band?
Trash: First plan is making
a regular album. We concluded
that it’s very stupid not to have
a regular album after six years
in a band. We are planning to
release a full-length album
next year.
Trash: 일단 정규앨범을 만드
는 것이 우리의 가장 첫번째 계획
이다.
6년간 밴드를 하면서 정규앨범
한장 없다는 게 괴상하고 멍청한
일이라고 결론을 지었고, 지금은
현재 내년 안에 최선을 다해 fulllength 앨범을 낼 계획 세웠다
Broke: When are you getting
married? I heard there will be a
BBLT show after.
Trash: Yeah. we hope u guys
come and congratulate to our
wedding.
그리고 둘다 기독교인이기도 하
고, 마치 웨딩factory에서 하는 기
계적인 결혼식을 둘다 끔찍히(나
는 한국인임에도 불구하고,하하!!)
싫어해서 결혼식은 2호선 성수역
에 있는 “sungrak church”에서
할 예정이다.
결혼식이 끝나면 홍대 스팟으
로 가서 저녁에 홍대에서 Jeff and
trash 가 알아온 모든 이들과 함
께 할 수 있는 파티를 열 예정이
다.(presented by Jeffandtrash.
com 이라고 부른다.ㅋㅋ 실제로
웹사이트도 존재함.) 특히나 그날
공연엔 BBLT말고도 RUX, galaxy express, Suck stuff, kinston rudy ska, the geeks, rock
tigers, sweet guerillaz, vicious
glare, today X spot 등등 내가 좋
아하고 많은 추억을 만든 밴드들
이 함께 공연할 예정이다. 모두 와
서 공연을 즐겨줬으면 하고, 앞서
말했듯이 아마 이런 라인업의 공
연은 어쩌면 더이상 만들어지지
않을지도 모른다. (어쩌면 내가 다
시 결혼한다면 생길지도 모르겠지
만 ㅋㅋ)
그날 공연을 위한 이벤트들도
준비되어있고, 공연은 새벽까지
이어질 예정이다.
체력이 허락한다면, 이 글을 읽
는 당신도 2월 28일 토요일 저녁
스팟으로 와서 함께 공연을 즐겼
으면 좋겠다.
우리의 결혼도 축복해주면 좋지
만, 그 무엇보다 우리가 준비한 공
연을 즐겨주면 우리에게 가장 큰
선물을 주는 것이다.
Broke: What do you want
Santa to bring you for Christmas this year?
Trash: Gibson Thunderbird
IV bass !!! (for trash)
I think it will be ok tons of hot
chick for them!! haha!!
Curl Up and Die with
Chadburger
Tour Diary
Tel
Before I even start... The
purpose of this article is not to
provide a review of the shows
we played. I don’t think it’s
particularly fair for somebody
to review a show that their own
band played. Rather, I want to
try and give some insight into
what it’s like going on tour in
a country where shows must,
by necessity, be at weekends;
a country where the scene is so
centralised, and where all local
scenes are almost entirely separate from, if not each other,
then certainly the Seoul scene
that is all most of us are familiar with. It’s also, perhaps, an
insight into the mind of somebody who is a new member in
their first band... Anyway, with
no further ado... read on.
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 1
DAEGU
w/ SINKLAIR, NACHOPUPA,
FIND THE SPOT, »çÇüÁýÇà´Ü,
ÀÚÆó, GOLDEN TICKET
I was told we needed to be in
Daegu for 4pm. I live in Cheonan; Daegu is just over an hour
away by KTX. Got to the station and texted (bassist) Aaron
to see how he was getting to
Daegu and if anyone was coming down with him. He told me
he was also on KTX, with our
friend Ryan, and would arrive
in Daegu at about 2:30; turned
out his train wasn’t stopping
at Cheonan-Asan, though, so
we’d have to meet in Daegu. In
Daegu we met up and called the
other guys; Daegu is (Find The
Spot vocalist) Changun’s hometown, so we figured he’d know
where we had to go. We were
given a subway station to head
for, and set off. Fun fact: Daegu’s subway doesn’t use paper
tickets like in Seoul or Busan,
it has little plastic coin-shaped
tokens, like you’d get on a pier
in an antiquated British seaside
resort town. And I’m still not
entirely sure how you’re supposed to use them; I ended up
hopping the gate on the way
out, since putting it into the
machine didn’t seem to work.
We went and found a cool little
park where we played poker
for a while (I won) as we waited for the other guys to arrive;
when they did, we got in a cab
and gave the driver a cellphone
so Changun could tell him to
drive us, basically, around the
corner. Met the rest of Chadburger and Find The Spot and
went to the club for soundcheck. At this point I started to
get nervous... The show turned
out pretty damn good, though. I
thought we played great. There
was an awesome turnout, comparable to a well-attended
Seoul show, and a few of them
even appeared to not hate us.
Some girl provided the most
surreal moment of the entire
tour when she got Aaron and
I to sign a copy of our demo.
After the show, the Nachopupa
guys had to return to Busan,
most of the rest of the bands
playing went to a local restaurant for some dwaejigalbi
- Daegu is, apparently, famous
for having the best dwaejigalbi
in Korea. I spent most of my
time in the restaurant chatting
with the vocalist from Sinklair
and a Daegu / Ballaz Crew dude
called Donghwi. He seems to
be the entire Daegu straightedge scene all by himself. After a few hours hanging out in
the restaurant, Donghwi took
the Seoul crew to a cheap hotel
where Donghyuk (‘Burger guitarist, Find The Spot bassist)
found The Simpsons on the TV.
Honggu and Changun proved
their maturity by spending most of the night running
around the hotel and listening
in at random doors to see if
they could hear anyone having sex, before running back to
our room and falling over each
other giggling like schoolgirls.
Eventually they fell into each
other’s arms and went to sleep.
Aaron, Ryan and I decided to
get the first KTX home, so we
left at about 5am and discovered Daegu’s taxi drivers to be
the most dickheaded I’ve ever
encountered; something like
15-20 empty cabs drove right
past instead of picking up the
three waegs. Eventually Donghwi got us a cab and we headed
home. I arrived home at about
8am and got about an hour of
sleep before having to wake up
again and move house.
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 8
BUSAN
w/ SINKLAIR, NACHOPUPA, GWAMEGI, SOUTH BAY,
PANIC DISORDER
We had practice at 10pm on
Friday night, so after finishing work at 7:15, I went home,
grabbed my weekend shit and
got on a KTX up to Seoul for
practice. We agreed to meet at
Seoul station at noon the next
day. I stayed with Donghyuk
overnight, and he fed me in
the morning. We met up with
Hyundong (our other guitarist) at about 10am and got on
a bus to Seoul station. Traffic
was a bitch, so we were late...
oh well. We got on a train arriving in Busan at about 4:15pm
and then the subway took us to
the Pusan National University
district that Moo-Monk is in.
Aaron, Ryan and I had been to
a show here just a month ago,
when the film fest was on, so
we knew where the place was.
We arrived to soundcheck before most of the other bands,
even though we were about an
hour late ourselves... Lack of
sleep started to kick in after
soundcheck - I don’t get anywhere near enough sleep dur-
ing the week, and I usually depend on Friday nights to catch
up, but 4 hours of sleep on
Donghyuk’s floor was no kind
of catching up - and I struggled to stay awake through the
opening three bands. At this
point, I knew I wasn’t going to
be able to give a good performance. The turnout wasn’t all
that great, either. We took the
stage to maybe 20 or so people.
I decided that if I wasn’t going
to be able to deliver an adequate vocal performance, I’d
have to make up for it with my
physical performance. In other
words, I was an obnoxious,
confrontational dickhead; pretty much the antithesis of my
regular self. Fortunately, the
people that did see it seemed to
like it. Busan’s scene is much
harder-edged than Seoul’s;
the hardcore bands, at least,
tend to be heavier and more
vicious-sounding. This was to
our advantage. After the show,
everyone headed to a bar/restaurant across the road. I met
so many people that there’s no
way I can remember them all...
at various points throughout
the night, I talked to most of the
guys in Nachopupa (who were
all great guys), and chatted to
the Sinklair guys again. Donghwi had travelled down too; I
later found out he’d been onstage singing into Aaron’s mic
during some of our set. I met
a straight-edge kid from Busan
whose name I don’t remember. Honggu tried his luck and
failed with some girls. I met the
members of a Busan hardcore
band called Snuff Film; couple
of girls, couple of guys. One of
the girls in that band had been
the one starting most of the pits
during the show. She found out
I was straight-edge and told me
to fuck off. I flipped her the bird
and grinned. It was all in good
fun. I was later told that she’s
a high-school student. Need to
check out that band sometime.
Later in the night, we headed
to a waeg bar that the Nachopupa guys frequent; they play
shows there semi-regularly,
apparently. Honggu and Hyundong got roaringly drunk. Honggu tried playing the in-house
drumkit and got reprimanded
by the staff. The two of them
pestered Will (Busan-residing
waeg and UE friend of Jon’s)
to play hardcore songs on the
‘jukebox’ and walked around
the bar singing along. Finally
we decided to go to a hotel.
Donghyuk fell down the steps
on the way out and gashed his
leg badly. When we got to the
hotel, Honggu passed out so
Aaron and I tied him up with
tape and drew on his face...
sorry Honggu!
SATURDAY NOVEMBER 22
DAEJEON
w/ UNICITY, NOEAZY, SINKLAIR, SINK TO RISE, FIND
THE SPOT
Practice the night before got
cancelled, because Aaron was
really sick. Daejeon is real
close to Cheonan, so I decided to take the bus. I knew Jon
might be able to make it to this
one, since he was in town, so I
was looking forward to it. I got
a cab to the bus terminal and
found out I had hopped into a
taxi driven by the biggest fuckwit in Korea; long story short,
what should have been a 34,000 fare cost me almost 9k.
The queues in the bus terminal
were fucking ridiculous, so I
walked to the train station instead and got a regular train
to Daejeon. Met Aaron at the
station; he looked like death
warmed up. Our fan club (i.e.
Ryan) couldn’t make it. Already
I kind of wanted to go home. I
called Honggu and he told us to
take a cab and let him talk to
the driver, so we did this. Then
ended up waiting half an hour
in the cold for anyone else to
turn up. Eventually everyone
turned up and we were told
how to get to the club. We arrived to find Jon and a friend of
his had even beaten us there;
at least it saved me having to
give him directions...! Not only
had we not practiced the night
before, but we didn’t have
practice the previous weekend
either... we couldn’t find a time
when all of us were available.
So confidence was pretty low
going in. We soundchecked and
all made a bunch of mistakes
trying to play songs, which
didn’t exactly boost our confidence. We eventually found
out we were playing second,
after Find The Spot. Since both
bands play a set barely over
10 minutes, this was in some
ways ideal in that it meant Jon
would be able to stay for our
set and still get back to Seoul
in time for Pornotarium’s live
debut. Though I think I’d have
preferred for one of the local
bands to go on before us to get
the audience more worked up.
Oh well. Doors opened and the
place started to fill up; we met
a Canadian girl called Taylor
who I’d previously met at the
GMC Summer Fest, and I was
wryly amused by the fact that
there was a bunch of schoolgirls - some still in uniform stood at one end of the stage.
Find The Spot played a great
set as usual, then we played...
a set. Not great, but not really bad. I got water all over
the tiled floor, which somewhat
ruined my own performance;
I could barely even walk, let
alone jump around like usual.
I accidentally knocked some
girl over and felt bad about it.
I accidentally knocked Jon’s
glasses off his face and felt bad
about it once I found out later.
Despite my best efforts, nobody moved around except to
get out of my way. We finished
the set... since Aaron was sick,
he was going to go straight
home. Jon and his friend were
going straight up to Seoul for
Pornotarium. I decided that
I’d much prefer to go home
and sleep rather than stay out
all night freezing to death. So
we did something I’ve always
hated seeing bands do: we left
after we finished our own set
and didn’t stick around to see
any of the other bands. Hopefully we can play Daejeon again
some day and make up for this.
SATURDAY DECEMBER 6
GWANGJU
w/ SINKLAIR, »çÇüÁýÇà´Ü,
BETTY ASS, CHOCOLATE
FACTORY, MAD ROOSTER
I didn’t go to practice the
night before... I figured it’d be
more worthwhile getting a good
night’s sleep instead. We’d
practiced the previous weekend, but there was miscommunication and Aaron didn’t get
told about it. So we hadn’t all
practiced together for almost
a month, which is retarded. I
went to the KTX station giving
myself plenty of time, knowing that trains to Gwangju were
far less frequent than trains to
Busan. Turns out if I’d been ten
minutes later, I’d have had a
two hour wait on my hands. Got
pestered by some Jehovah’s
Witnesses at the station. Found
out that Aaron was on the same
train I’d be getting on, and Ryan
was in tow again for this show.
On the train, I left my seat and
went to find Aaron and Ryan;
with them, I found Hyundong.
He told me that Donghyuk was
sick and couldn’t make it. Also,
he said Sinklair’s bassist was
sick so Sinklair had cancelled.
The good omens were piling
up... We got to Gwangju and
met up with Honggu and his
friend Jaeyoung. It was ridiculously cold so we went into a
Paris Baguette and got coffee.
Ryan bought a couple of cans
of sprayable party snow. Aaron
sprayed it in Honggu’s face.
We set out for the club; none
of us had a clue where it was.
After spending too long (okay,
about five minutes) standing
around in sub-zero temperatures, we were given directions
and went there. It was still too
cold inside the place. Unlike
the other venues we’d played,
which were all obviously live
music clubs that were obvious venues for a punk show,
this place looked almost like
a converted youth center. We
were playing with a streetpunk
band and a couple of pop-punk
bands. Weird lineup for us to
be on. Soundchecks happened.
The club only had three mics;
we need four, since everyone
except Donghyuk does vocals
at some point. Mad Rooster
played first, to a near-empty
hall. Sinklair turned up during this set; as it turned out,
their guitarist’s other band,
»çÇüÁýÇà´Ü,
who
weren’t
billed as being on this show,
had cancelled, not Sinklair
themselves. Chocolate Factory
were next. They covered The
Offspring. Hall was still nearly
empty. More worryingly, most
of the people who had showed
up seemed to be friends of the
pop-punk bands. Right enough,
we played and everyone cowered at the back. I was relatively docile and non-confrontational at this show, in light of
the fact that half the audience
were schoolgirls. Ryan decided
to spray us with the party snow
while we were playing. He got
it on Hyundong’s guitar, and it
fucked the guitar up temporarily. For a minute, I thought
we were going to be finishing
our set halfway through; probably nobody would have complained if we did. Betty Ass
went on and everyone started
having fun again, then Sinklair
played to a reaction not much
better than we got. Finally, a
pleasant surprise... one of the
Gwangju bassists would fill in
for a »çÇüÁýÇà´Ü set. Made
the whole show worthwhile, for
me anyway. After the show we
went to a local backstreet restaurant. The Koreans ordered
sundae; there was some soup
ordered for us waegs, which to
Aaron’s dismay turned out to
have egg in it. Takes some real
balls to be a vegan in Korea.
We got a hotel room and tried
to forget about the show, before getting the first KTX back
to Seoul; we got to the station
three minutes before the train
left, and once more would have
had to wait over two hours for
the next one if we’d missed it.
And thus, the circus left town...
can’t wait to do it all again some
day... but not TOO soon.
Since most of the bands we
played with aren’t from Seoul
and might be off the radar for
some in the Seoul scene, here’s
a quick rundown:
SINKLAIR
Our touring buddies. People
probably know them, since
Townhall put out their CDEP.
Melodic hardcore from Daegu.
I wasn’t a fan before the tour,
but I enjoyed the hell out of
their set all three times that we
watched them. The vocalist is
an awesome guy and, despite
being a scary looking motherfucker, so is the guitarist. He
told us his body-modification
dream is to have steel spikes
implanted in his skull to form a
mohawk.
NACHOPUPA
Busan streetpunk. If you don’t
know them, you really need to
check them out. They play in
Seoul semi-regularly. They’ve
got their own style, distinct
from the Skunk scene. Great
guys to hang out with, too.
FIND THE SPOT
Our sister band. Third best
band in Korea ;)
»çÇüÁýÇà´Ü
Features the drummer and
scary guitarist from Sinklair.
Grindcore/death metal. I fucking love this band. Also known
as Axcutor.
ÀÚÆó
Cheongju streetpunk. The
frontman, I heard, went to the
military a few days after we
played with them in Daegu.
GOLDEN TICKET
Emo rock featuring Sinklair’s
bassist.
GWAMEGI
Busan hardcore scene lynchpins and 24 Crew’s best known
band. Heavy as shit. Awesome.
SOUTH BAY
Busan streetpunk, members
of the TBTR (This is Busan,
This is Real) crew along with
Nachopupa. A couple of the
guys were really friendly and
awesome when Aaron and I
saw them back in October.
PANIC DISORDER
I think this was their first
show? They’re playing the
Townhall show on December
27. Good hardcore band, they
covered Wake The Dead by
Comeback Kid too.
UNICITY
NOEAZY
SINK TO RISE
We didn’t see these bands...
sorry, guys! I checked out
Noeazy online since, and liked
what I heard. Metalcore, a bit
heavier and more experimental than most though. They’re
putting out an MCD on GMC.
I don’t really know anything
about Unicity or Sink To Rise...
sorry...
BETTY ASS
CHOCOLATE FACTORY
Pop-punk is really not my
thing, sorry guys... both bands
got a good reaction from the
Gwangju crowd, though.
MAD ROOSTER
Gwangju streetpunk. They
play in Seoul semi-regularly; just played a show with
RUX and Suckstuff. I thought
they were kind of poppy for a
streetpunk band, but I really
loved the song Smoking And
Drinking.
Facts About
TEL
Verv
9 October 2008
Name: “Tel”
Birth name: Tel Tele-terrance Telleyrude.
Birth location: Strugelberger
Am Kunt, Germany
Birth Date: 21 November 1983
Pedigree: Born to a prominent English scientist who
develops new satellite technology in Germany, he was
named after the Telephone,
the Telegraph, and the Teleprompter. His father considered modulation/demodulation
to be the father of modern society as we know it .And his
father even listened to Kraftwerk.
His mother was a Welsh
shephard’s
daughter,
and
grew up living the simple life
in Ynysybwl, south Wales, just
outside of Cradiff and shyypfycking blwck mytyl hyrdcyrewich.
He is descended of several
prominent figures such as Terrance Breasterspoon, a prominent 19th century stuffy Englishman, and King Arthur. All
of the tables in his house are
round.
More facts:
- Winner of the 1988 youth
football keeper competition in
London, England.
- Runner-up in the Mr. Gay
UK competition, 1998. Youngest man to achieve this status.
He attempted to compete again
in 2008 but his boss did not
give him time off form his job
in Korea.
- Was the first teenager to
ever to transverse Greenland
in a solo-dog sled competition. He had to eat three of his
own dogs. This event led him to
vegetarianism.
- Has had sex with 65% of
all straight edge females in the
UK between the ages of 15 and
21.
- Has one son named Charles
Ichibod Parker, age 7.
- Set the land speed record
for a straight edge non-heterosexual by running a 9.9
second 100m.
- Has ridden on the backs of
famous skinheads at concerts
ranging from Roma, Italy to
Seoul, South Korea. He even
rode on the back of Ian Stuart Donaldsson in 1991 at the
age of 8. He is renown for being able to jump onto the back
of any large mammal without a
running start.
- 1996 Lillehammer Olympics silver medalist in Moguls.
- ESPN magazine in 2007
wrote an article about the 10
most obscure natural athletes
in the world; he came in at
number three. ESPN writer Jon
Leguizamo wrote:
Tel is an amazing natural
athlete who can jump nearly twice his natural height
and is capable of achieving erection more than 10
times in the course of an
hour of sexual activity.
The man attained myth-like
status in the 1996 Lillehammer games when one of his ski
poles broke so he finished the
race using his twisted, gnarled
and abnormally thin 35 inch
penis as a ski pole after breaking his other one on a snowy
embankment.
NASA has modeled several
appendages of robots they are
making for Mars exploration on
his amazing dick. Some people
say that this penis demonstrates a clear evolutionary link
between the Welsh peoples and
the Schetland pony.
- Tel is a singer in the black
metal band Lyrinx. He is known
in the black metal world as
“Telgenamnt.”
- Was the original suspect
in the 1993 murder of Euronymous. Some still claim Varg
Vikernes is the fall man.
- Kurt Cobain mentions Tel
in his suicide letter. It is believed that the album “from the
Muddy Banks of the Wishka”
was actually produced by Tel,
and that the song ‘Aneurysm’
was originally written about
Kurt Cobain’s feelings towards
Tel. (“I love you so much it
makes me sick... Huuuuuuuhhhhh yeahahhhhh...”)
- There is a copyright dispute still pending for the 1997
Smashing Pumpkins hit single
‘Tonight, Tonight’ which uses a
surprisingly similar melody and
beat to Tel’s original composition, “Midnight In Jon Dunbar’s
Garden.”
- Tel was the man who popularized the word ‘scobie’ for
the part of the body between
the asshole and the ballsack.
- Tel has burnt down several
churches in Norway. He came
to Korea in 2007 after he was
indicted for the 1991-1995
church burnings in Norwegian
high court.
- Tel only fucks whatever
he’ll also eat. This accounts for
the lack of straight edge females in the UK and in South
Korea.
- Expected winner of the
2009 Brokey for “Best Mammal
Rider.”
- Tel also published a book
of profound poetry in 1986
under the name of Maya Angelou. The book was called All
God’s Children Need Traveling
Shoes.
Itaewon Battle Royale
Summer Walker
Stompers in Itaewon hosted a very
successful Battle of the Bands last
November. Twelve bands took part
in three heats on November 8, 15
and 22. The top act of each round
and one ‘wildcard’ performed in one
big show on the 29th. The winner of
the overall competition received one
million won. The bands were judged
on four criteria: originality, musicianship, stage performance and crowd
response.
Round 1
November 8
The competion kicked on Saturday,
November 8 with more people than
could actually fit into the bar! The
crowd took advantage of the all-youcan-drink special, and boy! Did they
get into the music!
Concrete Organics
At 10:00pm right on the nose, The
Concrete Organics surprised everyone with the vocals of Shinae Ahn.
Their 40-minute set was soulful and
the judges seemed to like them. The
audience responded well to the guitar
solos and original songs. We certainly
haven’t heard the last from this fourpiece.
Captain Bootbois
Next up was the punk act, Captain
Bootbois. They got the crowd jumping and chanting “Oi! Oi! Oi!” in true
punk fashion. Itaewon has never seen
a faster, harder-driving drummer.
These guys usually play the Hongdae
scene, so it was nice to get some new
blood up on Hooker Hill.
Animal Dads
The Animal Dads brought their
style of indie-rock to Ole Stompers
next. Just one week before, vocalist
Ian Chiasson got his guitar stolen by
a taxi driver, yet he still brought some
good rock to the table.
Galaxy Express
Seoul rockers, Galaxy Express
took the stage just past midnight.
This trio took over Stompers and left
the crowd in shambles. They also
brought their share of fans. Jason
Epand of the Decadent Gonads (who
was seen, in Round Two) was spotted
singing along and head-banging to his
competition. They finished off their
set with Queen’s “We are the Champions” just to let everyone know who
THEY thought was going to win.
And they were right.
Judgement
After careful deliberation, the
judges announced Galaxy Express as
the winners of Round One, and Captain Bootbois as the 2nd runner-up.
Round 2
November 15
Round Two of Stompers Battle
of the Bands was even bigger! The
crowd braved the cold and rain to hear
some live music and take advantage
of the cheap booze. Six bartenders
could hardly keep up with what might
have been the most people who have
ever fit into the popular live venue.
Sotto Gamba
First up was Sotto Gamba. These
guys have played the Seoul scene for
years. You’ve probably spotted them
somewhere in Itaewon, Hongdae and
Sincheon. They put on a great show
that involved jumping up on the drum
riser and playing a kazoo. One might
have recognized Bob from the Zeplin
tribute band that played after Round
One the week before.
Decadent Gonads
In the second slot, the Decadent
photo by Summer Walker
photo by Summer Walker
Galaxy Express—Round 1 Winners and Overall Winners
Gonads shocked everyone when they
took the stage. Giving a high-energy
show from start to finish, they pumped
up the audience and had them shouting for more. Lead singer, Jason,
showed all of us exactly how one can
use one’s hair in a rock show.
The bass player, Garan, had to play
as hard as he could to be heard over
the roaring crowd. Mark Baker led
the way to a great performance that
locked them into 2nd place that evening, and a shot at the Wildcard slot
on the 29th.
Saint John the Gambler
Next up was Saint John the Gambler. No stranger to Stompers, this
multi-national six-piece had to
squeeze onto the stage to perform
their own style of gyspy-rock n’roll.
Rabihem
Last, we heard from Rabihem. This
was a new band to most of us, even
though we recognized the bass player,
Fred Bourdon, from bands such as the
Wise Guys who play most Saturday
Saint John the Gambler —Round 2 Runners-Up Pines—Round 3 Winners
nights at Hard Rock. Their original
songs were Iron-Maiden-esque and
they sounded great. The guitar solos
and the wailing vocals thrilled the
drunken Stompers crowd.
Judgement
The judges said it was a hard decision, and that it was a very close
race, but Rabihem was announced the
leader of Round Two. After the show,
Rabihem drummer Kim Dong-Jin,
could be seen taking a celebratory
nap on the comfy Stompers couches.
photo by Summer Walker
The Tear
Jerks
Jon Twitch
These days expat bands
aren’t rare, but expat punk
bands are few and far between.
The latest waeg offering is the
Tear Jerks, an Irish-style punk
band featuring Cain Barriskill,
the man behind the success of
Stompers Battle of the Bands
and the AIDS Day concerts. I
sat down with him in front of
a roaring computer screen and
had a chat with him.
photo by Summer Walker
Rabihem—Round 2 Winners
Pornotarium
Round 3
November 22
Round Three of Stompers Battle of
the Bands disappointed no one! The
previous shows told us what to expect: a big crowd and rockin’ music.
Outside the bar, as many as fifty people could be seen waiting for bands to
start. Polly’s Kettle and Cube (a new
bar in town, check it out!) benefited
from the extra bodies at the top of the
‘hill.’ Promoters kicked it up a notch
by adding a fifth band to the lineup,
which gave us more music and more
competition!
Dave Martin Band
The Dave Martin Band took a
three-hour train ride from Gwangju
to be the first band up! These guys
often play covers in Dave and Mike’s
Speakeasy, but they blessed Stompers
with hilarious original songs about
life in Korea. One of the best numbers
was all about Canadians. Priceless.
NeoConArtists
The NeoConArtists were up next.
They were meant to be the last band,
but traded with the Pines because
they wanted to get drunk and enjoy
the rest of the show. The reason for
their celebration was the going away
party of guitarist Brian Gibson, who
was on his way home. After impressing a large audience, they took away
2nd place and didn’t end up playing
in the finals, so ladies and gentlemen,
that was your last chance to see these
rockers... at least with this lineup
away.
Taxaderby Choo Choos
The Taxaderby Choo Choos don’t
normally gig. They do most of their
playing in the studio. But leader
Matty Netzke let them out for a bit
and they graced us with their original
set that was described by a member
of the Pines as being “... two kinds of
music: Country AND Western”. Well,
if it was C&W, it was a rockin’ C&W.
Brad Wheeler could be seen on the
drum riser AGAIN, as he was in three
different bands in the Battle.... hardest working drummer in Korea.
Stompers has never seen a band
like Pornotarium. The audience knew
they were in for a change of pace when
lead singer, Jason, walked out with a
giant mohawk and a pitcher of Cass
Red. These guys meant business and
brought their own cheering section. If
you have never experienced a Polish
vs. Chinese mosh pit then you would
be in the same boat as the judges; one
of whom was standing near the bathroom to let his eardrums rest, another
was sitting in his chair wide-eyed and
speechless and the other had jumped
up to link arms with a few other guys
to protect the band from the crowd.
Come to think of it, maybe it was the
other way around.
The Pines
After a broken-equipment check,
a glass sweep-up and a bio-hazard chemical mop, several familiar
faces jumped onto the stage. Local
scenesters were all asking the same
question: what’s George’s new band
going to sound like? Two other members of the defunct 40 Days were on
hand to see what George Bozanich
had put together. The result was a
bluesy five-piece that featured artists
such as ‘Sister Zee’ Kang and newcomer Matt Baker on drums. Pounding piano and thrashing guitar solos,
audience sing-a-longs and instrument-switching gave customers, as
well as the judges exactly what they
wanted.
Judgement
The Pines, in only their second gig
ever, walked away with first place for
round three. NeoConArtists placed
second.
Final Round
November 29
The final round of Stompers Battle
of the Bands saw the largest crowd
ever assembled on the ‘hill.’ People
crammed in to see who was going to
win in the finale. Tables were pushed
aside, chairs put away and the bar was
stocked up for what promised to be a
fantastic night. The winners of Round
One, Galaxy Express, the winners of
Round Two, Rabihem, the winners
of Round Three, the Pines as well as
the the judges’ decision for the ‘wild
card,’ Saint John the Gambler, were
ready for a fight!
The Pines
The Pines took the stage first. They
brought the same high-energy briliance that they had the week before.
The crowd appreciated their original
songs, and a few familiar ones that
George and Zee belted out for them.
Rabihem
Up next was Rabihem. They had
a bit of a different look this time
around, but still brought a flawless,
professional act to eager listeners.
Galaxy Express
The next half of the show was just
as good as the first. Local celebrities,
Galaxy Express, showed us what rock
is all about! Their original songs, in
Korean, had everyone jumping and
wanting more more more!
Saint John the Gambler
Then, Saint John the Gambler, who
was gearing up for their CD release
party in December, brought a different, dynamic sound that was stomping good.
Judgement
Who was going to win? Bluesrock? Hair metal? Dirty rock n’ roll?
International mix?
Well, considering the location of
Stompers, it should be no surprise
that the judges, as well as the audience, liked it dirty. Galaxy Express
won the million-won prize money,
as well as some new fans and maybe
even a venue to perform at on a regular basis. In the end, it can be assumed
that everyone walked away happy.
The audience discovered bands they
hadn’t heard of before and have a new
place to drink. The bands got to play
in front of big crowds. Stompers got
to know more local musicians, Korean as well as foreign, and everyone finally got to start recovering from four
consecutive weeks of hangovers.
For photos of each round, go to the
website: myspace.com/stompersbattleofthebands
Broke: So...Irish punk. How
Irish are you guys really?
Cain: Ha...ha, you’re not the
first person to ask that question! Actually I’m the only
Irishman in the band, the rest
of the guys are all American.
However Shawn and Cooper
both have Irish blood. John, our
guitarist doesn’t, so we give
him a bit of shit from time to
time. Every time he messes
up a song at practice, we say
“That wouldn’t happen if you
were Irish John, the Irish never
mess up!” He is of Scottish
decent though and I suppose
that’s the next best thing.
Broke: Irish style punk does
seem to have taken off in nonIrish countries, ranging from
the Dropkick Murphys and
Flogging Molly in the US, to
Royal Shamrock in Japan. Do
you like labeling your band, or
do you dislike being grouped in
with any of those other bands?
Cain: Not at all! I love some
of those bands; The Murphys
in particular are a big influence on us. I spent around two
years playing in a trad band
back in Ireland and I took what
I learned from that experience
and brought it to this punk
band.
Irish music and punk music are similar in many ways;
speed, cord progression, intensity, and attitude to name a
few. It’s only natural that these
two genres of music would
eventually come together. One
of the songs we play ‘Poor
Ned,’ a ballad about Australian
outlaw Ned Kelly, I first learned
from a grizzled old banjo player in a small pub on the west
cost of Ireland. And our song
“The Drunk Tank on St. Patrick’s Day” I first wrote as a
trad song many years ago. But
we do do some straight up Oi
street punk stuff too and even
a few heavier numbers; as we
are still are a new band, we are
still finding our sound.
Broke: At the shows you’ve
had so far, have you had more
Koreans or foreigners watching you guys?
So far, I reckon it’s been
about 60/40 expat to Korean.
It’s hard breaking the Korean
scene when you don’t have any
Korean members in your band.
I have played clubs in Hongdae before which have been
packed, only to have half the
crowd leave during the 10 minutes it takes to set up our gear.
But I’m hoping that will change
with the Tear Jerks as we are
definitely aiming to impress the
Korean crowd.
Broke: Do you think you
guys could appeal to Korean
live music fans?
Cain: Well if the crowd reaction so far is anything to go
by the answer is ‘Yes.’ The
Koreans in the crowd have
really been getting into it! So
many bands on the live circuit
here sound similar and we do
sound that bit different and I
think they appreciate that. We
played FF last weekend and I
had a bunch of Korean marines,
still in uniform, going absolutely nuts. And I’ve seen a fair few
Dropkick T-shirts around and
that has to mean something!
If people give us a chance we
won’t disappoint.
Broke: What are your plans
in the near future for the band?
Any special concerts? Any recordings?
Cain: Well we got a first gig in
Club Spot, at the Johnny Royal
album lunch on Christmas Eve
and then we’re playing the big
New Years Eve party at FF
with a bunch of other bands.
We have a few surprises in
store for that one! And yes the
Tear Jerks are heading into the
studio to lay down a few tracks,
mostly for our myspace page.
We are recording them in Bubblegum Studios. I’ve worked
with Hyun-Ho before and he is
a great producer so if they turn
out well, you might even see a
Tear Jerks E.P.
Broke: What do you want
Santa to bring you for Christmas this year?
Cain: John had a cordless
lead last week at our show and
I have to admit, I was a bit jealous. I’ve seen how Galaxy Express can use those things to
their advantage at live shows
and I want one. Also a return
ticket to Ireland would be nice;
it’s tough being away from your
family, friends and decent beer
at Christmas. So Santa if you
happen to be reading Broke in
Korea, please don’t bring me
a lump of coal like last year...
sl·inte!
Don’t Quit Your Day Job
Jon Twitch
Ever wonder what
all these punks do
for a living? Well,
so did I, so I asked
them. Here are their
answers. Not too
surprisingly, I didn’t
ask all that many
foreigners what their
jobs are.
Attacking Forces
—Jongo (guitar): export sales
manager
—Youngsoon (vocal): fruits wholesales store worker with his father and
freelance cartoonist on the side
—Minkyu (drums): organic farming
institution
BB Lucky Town
—Trash: designer for an entertainment company
—Bbie: distribution industry
—Bang: guitar shop.
CHADBURGER
—Aaron: teacher
—Donghyuk: unemployed
—Hong9: public service personnel
—Hyundong: university writing
teacher at a hakwon
—Tel: teacher
Find the Spot
—Chan Goon (vocal): university
student
—Byungju (guitar): university
student
—Donghyuk (bass): unemployed
—Hong9 (drum) - public service
personnel
Gukdo
—Myunghwan (guitar): unemployed
—Jaeseok (bass): public service
personnel
—Jakyung (drum): A4 paper delivery
Hollow Jan
—Vocal (Lim HwanTaek): sales and
customer service clerk
—Guitar (Lee SeungMin): assistant manager at an international trading company
—Guitar (Lee KwangJae): running
an individual business
—Drum (Lee EunKyo): college student
—Bass: looking for a job
ICBM
—Vocalist : freeter & indie filmmaker
—Guitarist: freeter
—Guitarist: public service personnel
—Bassist: student, film major
—Drummer: student. computer major
Lowblow
—web programmer
—doctor
—student
—foreign service manager
Rux
All members of Rux are counting on
the band for income
—Hyunhee (guitar) has a part-time job
—Jonghee (vocal) recently left
university
Things We Say
—Victor (vocals): university faculty
staff
—Yongjoon (guitar): public service
personnel
—Seungjae (guitar): running his own
clothing business
—Kiseok (bass): works for GM
Daewoo
—Hoonhee (drum): public service
personnel
13 Steps
—Dokyo13 (vocal): making
speakers
—Taeyeon (bass): window frame
manufacturing
—Ilwoo (guitar): playing Korean
traditional music
—Jinman (drums): university
student
Things We Say
Woncheon Lakeland and more abandoned stuff at Condemned Seoul — www.daehanmindecline.com/UEseoul
Shitty New
Zombies
Jon Twitch
Have you seen what
the kids are doing these
days? These days making a new counterculture is as easy as picking your nose. Back in
the ‘50s, ‘60s, and ‘70s,
countercultures meant
something. Say what
you want, but the punks,
skinheads, mods, and
yes, even hippies, have
passed the test of time.
Today’s new countercultures, I don’t know if
they’ll last longer than
their Top 40 musical
champions and trendy
styles, and I secretly
hope they won’t. Let’s
look at some of today’s
countercultures.
Hey everybody! Get a
load of these freaks!
I know this one might be an uphill battle, and to be honest I could
go either way on this. Nowadays, zombie walks and other zombierelated events are getting pretty big. Yes, zombies have made the
jump off the silver screen made previously by Clockwork Orange’s
droogs and American History X’s neo-nazi skinheads. I’ve been
stuck in Korea for a few years, but when I visited Canada this
summer, it was not too uncommon to see a random person dressed
up as a zombie just hanging out somewhere.
Associated music: I would assume a mixture of horror punk,
psychobilly, etc.
How they could be cool: Maybe if it was just a little less commonplace.
Why they suck: In order to pull it off, you need to be with many
other zombies, and you need to stay in the act, or you’ve got nothing. Basically, unless you actually start trying to eat brains, I’m not
going to acknowledge you.
Lowest point: There’s a reason punks don’t all wear two-foottall mohawks all the time: it’s a high-maintenance look. Imagine
walking around all day with full makeup, as well as blood stains
and other gore. It looks cool for the first two hours, and that’s only
if you’re not sweating too much.
How long I give it: Another few months, then it’ll be only occasional events, then it’ll disappear almost totally.
Juggalos
Juggalos (or juggalettes, the
female variety) are basically
followers of Insane Clown Posse. They could be likened to the
Kiss Army or Deadheads, were
it not for the fact that they take
themselves so damn seriously.
Associated music: Insane
Clown Posse, ICP-ripoff bands
How they could be cool: On
the surface, dressing up as a
clown seems pretty damn badass, especially considering
the popularity of famous demented clowns like the Joker
and John Wayne Gacy. I could
see a real draw to dressing up
as a clown and acting all goofy,
but the rap-metal would have
to be replaced by something
more clown-sounding.
Why they suck: They surpass the Kiss Army in lameness
thanks to the Dark Carnival,
the official fictional mythology
of Juggalos. The Dark Carnival involves six Joker’s cards,
each representing an...fuck, do
I really need to go on?
Lowest point: Over on www.
skinheads.net, it seems every
second basement neo-Nazi trailer
trash who registers there looking
to pitch in for the Race War has
some sort of juggalo allegiance.
Dude, you’re screaming 14/88 and
listening to a hip-hop group that
dresses up in clown makeup. Seriously, fuck off. I hope the Great
Milenko pulls your intestines out
through your nostril.
How long I give it: Five years
tops.
Wizard Rock
Yet another new countercultural style taken directly from
the movies. But what separates
this one from the others is that
it’s actively engaged in fandom,
whereas most of the others
are more of a retro-cultural
nod at cult films. Yes, this is
Harry Potter fans who dress up
in character and create songs
based around the perspective
of the characters they mimic.
Associated music: Harry
and the Potters, Draco and
the Malfoys, the Remus Lupins, the Whomping Willows,
Kingsley and the Shacklebolts, the Moaning Myrtles, the
Parselmouths, etc
How they could be cool:
Delve deeper into the fantasy
genre, get some more folkmetal influences, and play more
for the Finntroll-heathen kind
of audience rather than the
preteen-library kind.
Why they suck: At its core,
this is fan fiction. And fan fiction sucks.
Lowest point: When they become adults and are still pretending to be students at Hogwarts.
How long I give it: Ten years,
just long enough for the franchise to go stale and for them all
to start developing paunches.
Countercultures
Vampires
Visual Kei
Most people can agree that
absolutely everything that has
come out of Japan (post-1945
of course) has been totally
awesome. Well, that’s being
a little generous. Prevalent
in Japan is a variety of fashion countercultures, ranging
from tanned kogals to baby doll
gothic lolitas. Kogal style just
looks skanky, but I can really
appreciate the appeal of gothic
lolita. The one movement that
I will single out for this article
is visual kei, the only one that
combines fashion with music.
Associated music: glamrock, punk, metal
How they could be cool: if
only hot Japanese chicks were
allowed to join, and they weren’t
allowed to make music.
Why they suck: Punk isn’t
really about fashion. Neither
This is becoming all too
common: a bunch of youths
are influenced by a movie to start dressing up like
droogs/zombies/vampires/
pirates. These Somali youths
watched a few too many pirate movies, and now they
sail the high seas avasting
ye mateys and swabbing the
decks.
Associated music: soundtrack
to The Pirate Movie
How they could be cool:
Ditch the AK-47 for a cutlass,
replace one hand with a hook,
one leg with a peg, and one
eye with an eyepatch. Yarrr
matey!
Why they suck: Unlike those
people who play zombie or
vampire dressup, these socalled pirates have been known
to actually take lives.
Lowest point: The 2005
attack on the MV Seabourn
Spirit, a luxury ship. Yeah,
this thing was a sitting duck,
but the dumb pirates failed
to kill anyone, and lost
a speedboat when it was
rammed by the cruise liner.
Go back to Treasure Island,
you dunces.
How long I give it: NATO’s
on the case now, and when
NATO starts meddling with
your counterculture, it’s time to
get a haircut and get a real job.
Two years before the waters
around Somalia are safer than
a backyard pool.
Somali Pirates
is metal, even. Glam is, but
only in a mocking way. These
styles are about saying fuck
you to fashion. Which is why I
hate these cosplay freaks saying “We’re not much different
than you.”
Lowest point: Dudes dressed up.
How long I give it: This is Japan. They’ll be doing the same
thing with a slightly different
look 50 years from now.
First zombies, now vampires.
Vampire subculture, as recently lampooned on South Park, is
too easily mistaken for goth, an
older counterculture I had no
respect for until I discovered
there was something worse.
Associated music: crap
How they could be cool: The
only way it could work is if they
take it to extremes, like what Talk
Like a Pirate Day did to pirates
and Zombie Walks did for zombies.
Yes, I would respect them more if
they wore a cape and fangs and
said “I vant to suck your blood.”
Why they suck: Technically,
they don’t. Suck blood, that is.
Just like the zombies, these
people are just poseurs.
Lowest point: Perhaps in how
the individual vampires specialise,
you find its most lame point.
There are sanguinarians who really believe they need to ingest
blood, and psychic vampires who
believe they can suck the psychic
energy out of others. And in the
vampire community, there are
even non-vampires who act as
donors, either donating blood for
their vampire friends or donating
psionic energy for those psychic
vampires. At this point, you can
clearly see that this is a fantasy
taken too far.
How long I give it: I dread
that this one will last a while,
maybe ten years, which is long
enough to give it status as a
counterculture eligible for occasional revivals.
Top Ten Most Photogenic Punk Musicians
Jon Twitch
To give you an idea of what I look forward to when I shoot photos, here is the top
ten list of people to photograph, in no particular order.
Donghyuk/Samchung
Tel/Chadburger
I’ve only seen him once, but he left quite an impression on me. By that I mean he
left quite an impression on my glasses; I haven’t been able to bend them back into
the proper shape. This guy knows how to move and he doesn’t stay on stage. Just
make sure you don’t get too close, or that’s the end of your camera. Also, it’s nice
photographing someone with blond hair for once.
Jinseok/Skasucks
Donghyuk has several things going for him. He usually wears white, including a
white doo-rag. His movements on stage are very slow but convey a lot of power.
Generally the crowd doesn’t get too close or go too nuts, so you can get right up
close. This means it’s easy to get some very intimidating photos of this guy.
Kiseok/Geeks
Of all the people on stage, Jinseok has the most visible character. His posture is
interesting without resorting to cliche poses, and he moves exactly enough to be
easy to photograph. Plus he usually whips out a sax for a few songs which always
looks good. He’s developed a very characteristic look; the only downside is that he’s
usually all dressed in black which doesn’t work on camera well.
Skele/Bootbois
Whenever you watch Captain Bootbois, your eyes are
instantly drawn to Skele. He
generally shows up well in
front of dark backgrounds because he usually wears white
T-shirts and there’s no hair
getting in the way. Plus, you
may have noticed he goes
fucking nuts on stage. Even
better, he doesn’t always use
a microphone, so when he
belts along with the chorus
there’s no microphone getting in the way of his mouth,
something that ruins shots
with many other musicians.
Of course I was going to mention the Geeks. The more you see them, the better
you know exactly which moments they’re going to jump. Usually he does four little
hops followed by a big leap. Also, there are a lot of good crowd interaction shots
on singalongs.
Victor/Things We Say
Myunghwan/Gukdo
There are a lot of similarities between TWS and the Geeks, but Victor himself is
much different for photographing. He’s got his signature shuffle-and-kick move, and
when he’s not singing he’s baring his teeth. The photo to aim for with Victor is with
his foot kicked up in front of him and his teeth flashing at you.
Orc/Blood Pledge
Blood Pledge doesn’t play
much anymore, but I try never
to miss Orc on stage. He’s big
for a Korean, and he has this
look that suits his old nickname. Plus, when he sings he
has some very unusual facial
tics that are great to capture.
Sadly, I always got the impression that he’s a little sensitive
about his appearance, which is
too bad because he’s one guy I
really like to see on stage.
I like photographing Myunghwan for the same reason I like photographing Jongjae
and Hyunbum of Couch: he dresses up and looks flashy in pictures. He’s a little more
active than them, so it’s easy to get great photos.
Jonghee/Rux
all members of Couch
It’s hard to pick a member of Couch that’s best for shooting. Hyunbum and Jongjae
generally wear a lot of spikes and accessories. At times they will have their hair
up in mohawks and dyed bright colours. Their movements are predictable but not
rigid. Sharon is my favourite drummer to photograph because usually she has her
hair dyed, and she wears unusual colours. Plus she looks oddly dainty playing drums,
and she doesn’t tilt her head to the side like most drummers do. Why do they have
to do that, anyway?
Jonghee can be hit and miss, depending on what he’s wearing. However, you know
whenever you’re watching him that something historical or controversial could happen at any moment. He goes between moving around and staying perfectly still,
which is useful. Often he is joined on stage by other people to sing choruses. Hell,
everyone sings along, which means shots of the crowd are great. My favourite time
photographing him was at DGBD once when the drummer couldn’t make it, so he
filled in for him. He was wearing zombie makeup and basically rooted on the spot due
to being behind the drums, so I got a ton of great photos of him.
Christmas Gift Ideas
You’ll Wish You Knew About A Couple Weeks Earlier
9/11 Plush
All the cuteness of 9/11 combined with the gruesomeness of homemade plush
toys, this set of cute little Twin Towers being struck by planes will provide hours of
entertainment around the Christmas tree, Hanukkah candelabra, or burning cross.
Dildo Gas Mask
If you can’t think of numerous applications for this, you’re just not creative
enough. A gas mask with a detachable 16.5” dildo, so you can...well, just put it on,
and you’ll pretty well figure it out for yourself. Warning: a reviewer on their website cautions: “I discovered that it’s not suitable for officewear. I would imagine
this may also be the case in blue collar occupations.”
Mourning Stone
So your loved one has passed away. Now their corpse is slowly decomposing in an expensive box that you paid for and will never see again. Since we’ve
already taken so much of your money already, how about splurging out on these
little stones? Oh, what do they do? You simply place them on the grave of your
loved one, and walk away knowing that you spent a significant amount of money on
a token gesture that will never be repeated. The best part: mourning stones can
be collected so they can be resold later. They are, after all, more expensive and
longer lasting than flowers.
Post-Rapture e-mail
I’ve got Good News and I’ve got bad news. The good news is the Lord has returned and He has whisked you up to Heaven in reward for your faith. The bad
news is you had a lot of stuff you weren’t done with, and many people you cared
about were heathens and are going to suffer on Earth at the hands of the AntiChrist. They will be in agony when millions of Christians suddenly disappear, and
they will know that you were right all along.
There are actually many competitive online services offering online storage and
encrypted messages to be delivered only after the Rapture. For instance, at the
site www.youvebeenleftbehind.com, you can pay $40 a year for this wonderful
service.You can leave instructions to your teenaged daughter who has fornicated
with her boyfriend, or you can send a note to your Hindu neighbours ridiculing
them for believing in an elephant.
The site works on a dead-man’s switch, or better, a raptured-man’s switch.
Five Christians scattered around the US log in every few days, and if three of
them do not log in for more than three days, the Rapture alert will be activated.
An additional three-day period passes before the server sends out its messages,
to prevent a false triggering of the system (and probably nothing would scare the
customers more than receiving premature Rapture messages informing them that
they missed the Jesus-boat).
Champagne Enema
It is well known that your rectum has a faster absorption rate than the upper
reaches of your digestive tract. It is also very easy to buy yourself a home enema
kit. If you’re going to try this, go for the sparkling wine or champagne, and you’ll
feel the bubbles tickling your prostate. You may be surprised to know that an
alcohol enema can get you incredibly hammered. In fact, your colon is so efficient
at absorption, alcohol poisoning is a serious threat even for major alcoholics like
Verv. So rather than letting all that liquor just sit there in your ass, I recommend
expelling it immediately. What better way to celebrate the New Year than with an
anal eruption all over your lover’s face and chest?
Sid & Nancy, Verv & Monbu
Verv
28 January 2007
I think that Frank Sinatra probably
sang that song originally for Sid, and
I think that the song rightfully belongs to Sid.
I think this was before punk ever
had any exposure to other genres of
music. This was back in the days of
testicles.
Sid Vicious cut himself open some
days, and on other days he licked his
girlfriend’s tits in front of a photographer, and on some days he would do
a lot of heroin. In fact, some days he
would do so much heroin he would
literally die. When he got bored he
would kill his girlfriend. He killed
her with a knife one morning because
he thought it would be cool, but he
didn’t like it so he went outside of his
room and wandered the halls of the
Chelsea Hotel crying. He cried like a
fucking bitch.
He had bruises on his head because
he let people hit him sometimes.
Now let’s go to 30 years later. The
year is no longer 1978. It is 2008. And
the dreams of a man are coming true.
A boy meets a bukkake cutie by the
name of Monbu Ran. She is even only
one year older than him (born on 17
March, 1983 in fact).
She has similar interests (music,
bukkake). She even practices martial
arts.
Monbu & Verv end up falling in
love due to similarity of hobbies.
They are both forward thinking
people.
But we are going too fast. Let me
tell you about Monbu Ran.
She was excellent in the film My
Only Sex Pet Is Female Teacher. One
review of this film says:
Scene 2 has Ran in the Teacher’s office alone. A male student will come in
and touch her face. I have to admit Ran is
really cute. No wonder the student loved
to touch her face. Damn! She looked
like a student more than a teacher. The
student kissed her with alot of tongue action. Subsequently she was tight up with
a rope. The student exposed her tits and
played with her nipples until it erected.
Some tit-fondling actions ensues...
with Ran putting up some convincing
performance.[sic]
And that isn’t the only good review
that Monbu Ron has ever gotten. In
fact, some people say that she is one
“Verv, I want to have a child that looks
like you. I want to teach it the martial art
that I practice and have it be a professional wrestler. The baby can wear a pig
mask when it is a professional wrestler,
and before matches beautiful women can
urinate all over him.”
“Verv, I want you to sodomize my
rectum with your fingers. I want to shit
on your fingers and I want you to taste
them.”
of the most celebrated bukkake stars
of our time.
Her most outstanding performance
may have been in Puru Puru 2.
Ran plays a student surrounded by
three teachers. She gets on the table and
pisses on the floor for everyone to see.
Next she is masturbating while a guy
plays with her nipples. She gets on all
fours to blow her teacher while the other
guy shows her asshole to the camera and
plays with her pussy. Heavy finger fucking occurs while the other guy is videotaping. Next they have sex in missionary
position, change to Ran on top while
blowing the other guy. Next to doggy
position and back to missionary before
the male student cums on her tits. The
teacher then comes in for more action and
fucks her doggy before cumming in her
mouth. It is cute to see Ran turn around to
catch the cum shot in her mouth.
Can you imagine how awesome
this is? She seems like she is very
good at performing sex acts with
multiple partners. Don’t you wish
that was you? In 2008, people will not
drink all night and then go to samgyeopsal houses to eat shitty pork. They
will go to Monbu & Vervs house in
Uijeongbu.
Speaking of pork, she once noted
she wanted to be licked by pigs:
Interviewer: And you wanted to have
sex with one ever since?
Ran Monbu: Ahahahha, well, I want to
be licked by their tongues.
Interviewer: You’d rather have a pig
do that than a real guy?
Ran Monbu Well, it’s a new experience, you know? What’s the problem
with it? Ahahahah.
I agree. This would be a very new
and very sexy experience.
I think that I will see if Monbu Ran
can come to Korea with the Hat Trickers on the 10th of February to speed
up the work of Fate. I am preparing
to purchase 10 to 15 pig masks for all
of my friends so that we can put the
masks on and lick her body.
When we are
done
licking
her body we do
other things. My
favorite way to
fuck a bukkake
star would be
missionary. This
seems
boring
but this facilitates the bukkake spray down. I am
forward thinking but from now on I
will be the only one to have vaginal
intercourse. Only bukkake for other
people.
When we do this action I want my
friends to be there to do the bukkake
with me. I want to hear them make
comments like,
the pig mask!”
“Hey Verv, make an ‘oink!’ sound.
Monbu will like it.”
I think my confidence would be
boosted if we all encouraged me to
fuck this woman.
The song for this bukkake session
to accompany us will be none other
than Sid Vicious’ ‘My Way.’
I want to do it in a dark room with a
bedsheet on the
wall playing the
Sid Vicious music video. Over
and over again.
When we are
done making a
mess on her, I
want to lay on
the ground in
my pig mask.
I want her to piss all over me. I
want to be covered in the urination
of this woman while wearing a pig’s
mask. I want her to hit me in my fucking head and say,
Verv, when you are
done fucking that vagina
can I look into it and learn
about it? Can you teach
me about this vagina?
“Hey Verv, you are fucking this cute
girl really well!”
“Hey Verv, you fuck like a champ!
You give it hard but not too hard.”
“Verv, when you are done fucking that
vagina can I look into it and learn about
it? Can you teach me about this vagina?”
“Verv, I haven’t seen you fuck like this
in years—you look very spry.”
“Verv, eat her pussy while you wear
“Verv, you are really awesome guy. I
want you to wipe the urine up with this
towel and suck on it. I feel good and
pleased that you are drinking my urine.
This is what I look for in a husband.”
I want her to also say:
“Verv, we should get married. I will
piss on you whenever I need to take a
piss. I will let you wear your pig mask at
the dinner table and I will be a good hostess for your superbowl parties. During
World Cup season we’ll buy matching
uniforms and the back of mine will say
‘Verv’s Girl.’”
I think that I would like to talk
politics with Monbu Ran while wearing the pig mask, and I would like to
start a punk rock band. Monbu Ran
said she likes to sing, so I would like
her to be the singer in my punk band.
We will be called “Monbu Fucked By
Pigs.”
Shows can climax in urination sessions.
But we will be drug free, because
the last time punk rock this good happened it ended in drug overdoses.
We’ll also never stab Monbu Ron,
nor will we ever do anything that
would compromise her dignity as a
human being unless we’re wearing a
pig mask.
If I can do one thing before I die,
it might be to fuck Monbu Ron. And
to come on her face. And then to lay
down and have her piss on my chest
and face. I would even take my pig
mask off just to get pissed on the
face. I also want to wear the traditional Japanese underwear during this
session.
But I want you, all of my friends,
to be there. And I want you to cheer
loudly and energeticly in all the right
spots.
Maybe we can even see if we can
get a band to perform during this.
Sid & Nancy are now dead and
gone. But both of us are living.
Dreams HAVE come true before.
A wise man once said: “Some say
I am a dreamer, but I am not the only
one.” So really, it can happen. People
have done greater things than this,
some people have even abolished
slavery and fended off invasions by
Nazis.
If you ever bump into this woman,
let her know about my ideas and let
her know how amazing of a man I
am. Let’s see if we can get this band
going. I promise this would be the
greatest punk rock music since Sid
himself.
In The Cabin Of
Sexual Extravagance
Verv
12 November 2008
In the cabin of sexual extravagance
there exists a man with an internet
connection and a subscription to
Asian Movie Pass.com
All day long the man reads profound literature, tucked away in his
warm cabin; fire burning; hand lotion
both at the computer and at the coffee table in front of the television set.
He never chafes. Just gets gunk in his
pubic hair.
He meditates on the grandeur of
our vast world; he listens to controversial music made by bald European
people who are hopelessly nostalgic
for der guten alten zeiten.
He enjoys the facial expressions of
Monbu Ran and the dying cat noises
she makes during intercourses.
He smiles. He thinks. He laughs.
He comes... Home early to watch his
movies.
A bottle of Wodka, a bottle of Soju;
a fire; a film; patient waiting for Friday night to sit awkwardly around
girls.
He has a dog that sometimes looks
confusedly at his owner. He has a gun
to protect his Japanese adult video
collection and massage oils.
He has everything he needs.
Basically, the man in the cabin of
sexual extravagance basically owns
your face.
Idiots Having Kids Hey
Need More Car Bombs
Verv
18 May 2007
The idiots are people who are so
incredibly dense that they get married
at age 18 or 19 and pop out children;
they have no plans for success but
they love each other so much that
they get married. This was foolish because their love is the first of their life
and it is so passionate that it involves
pregnancies and love makings and disasterous lacking of condoms.
The idiots are also the professionals who have planned for their children for upwards of a decade. They
have professional jobs and are so old
they can barely even conceive a kid
because they are fucking dusty old
cunts & cocks. These people know
about ‘laws’ and ‘hospital treatments
for sicknesses’ because they work in
these fields, but they do not know
things like ‘even though children
should eat healthy you should still let
them have white bread + candies instead of rye bread + peaches.’
These people are even worse than
the white trash because their kids
become yuppies who are part of
this moronic establishment of white
collars who think culture is French
cheese and not French film, who
think culture is Yo Yo Ma because the
cello is so old but think that full body
tattoos and bukkake are sins.
I want to kill these people in a car
bomb in a gated community.
I want a Muslim with a chanting
tongue and all his friends to stone his
daughter on her way to school.
I wnt to become a Muslim if it
means I can eat kebabs of lamb and
garlic outside of their houses in a
large caftan and military jacket,
hooting and hollering and clamoring
to cut off their fucking heads with a
relatively dull knife.
I want to become a Muslim if it
means I can shoot AK-47s at enviromentally friendly neo-cars and SUVs
in rich neighborhoods, if I can sodomize a 42-year-old woman with fake
tits and a 6-year-old son watching me,
not using lube and wiping blood onto
the 3000 dollar couches and throwing
her husband’s corpse into a cement
backyard pool next to gardens of precious flowers.
I wnt to be a Muslim if I can blow
up a private Catholic school and circumcise a 17 year old girl with a fake
tan.
The idiots keep having babies and
producing the scum of the Earth, a
white trash with an apple pie + a flag
that doesn’t understand the ideas of
‘global consciousness + being part of
a greater society,’ and the idiots who
have the babies that are environmentalists with trust funds and 7-year college degrees.
I only want to be a Muslim if it is
a Genghis Khan style Muslim. I do
not believe in the ‘God is Great’ or
the ‘we shouldn’t drink beers and we
should be nice to people sometimes,’
I just want a decent excuse to kill a
soccer mom and turn her Ford Explorer into a car bomb to fill the faces
of rich women with metal.
nauseous memorials outnumbering
even 9/11 dedicated to these cunts
they call ‘artists.’
There is no other group of people
that needs to die more.
If I had a choice of living in a world
with al-Qaeda or pop stars, I would be
the first to reverse the war on terror
and pull all American interests out of
the Middle East and anywhere else
they asked. If my life could be spent
without the disgust of pop music and
pop icons, I would be well satisfied.
Obscenity is not Sid Vicious cutting himself with razors and playing
while strung out on heroin while
Johnny Rotten exposes his penis adn
talks about how Belsen was a gas...
Obscenity is Britney in a schoolgirl
uniform or Christina coming up with genius lyrics such as “I’m a genie in a bottle
/ you’ve got to rub me the right way.”
If Islamic fundamentalists agree to
blow up the Grammys, the Oscars, and
other masturbatorial pop star festivals,
if they agree to send gunmen after people responsible for making these noises,
I will be the first to sell out Israel and
agree to never set foot in ME interests.
Osama, let’s put our differences
behind us. The enemy of my enemy
is my friend.
Riddles
Up In This Zine?
compiled by
Verv
with assistance from
accidentalcharm
sepuku
jules
1. You use this between
your head and your toes; the
more it works, the thinner it
grows... What is this?
2. The more you take of
me, the more you leave behind...What am I?
3. Brad was tired and had
a long day; he was sick of
everything. He opened up
the 12th story window and
jumped, yet he survived and
did not break a bone. How is
this possible?
4. When is a door not a
door?
Bomb the Facts About
Grammys Warriors
Verv
18 September 2006
Do these guys ever play a concert
before they have a huge hit? I was
wondering...
How did 98 Degrees or N’Sync or
Backstreet Boys start? Is there some
underground scene everywhere wehre
people go and check out the pop?
It says something when you can get
people who invest the bulk of their
lives into the passion of producing
sound but they will never have a fraction of the fame that 18 year old, halfnude women with studio processed
voices have...
Three cheers for the Mickey Mouse
club. Those kids need to get raped and
sent to work in Afghani brothels.
Someone needs to bomb the Grammys.
Honestly, if the hundreds of pop
icons who attend the grammys were
to die in a magnificent explosion, I do
not care if it was Islamic fundamentalists that were coming for me next...
Part of me would smile wider than I
ever had before, and my only regret
would be that I wasn’t there to personally observe the beauty of a hundred pop stars exploding into pieces.
However, I am certain that such
an eventw ould produce five years of
Can We Get Some
Verv
9 November 2008
Ladies & gents I’ve been a bona fide
warrior for five and a half years. So I
want to tell you what we are all about
and just the most essential facts you
need to know about warriors before
the next time you run your fucking
mouth off without knowing anything.
So chew on this... Let this be the
food for your thoughts throughout the
day, ya turkey.
(1) Warriors don’t have sympathy
for anyone—especially the elderly.
Warriors hate elderly beggars the
way that a college kid hates President
Bush—with an almost irrational zeal.
They say that this is because warriors believe they ought to die young
and more than that hate pathetic human beings who need to beg money.
(2) Warriors require at least 2 liters
of hard liquor a week to maintain
their combat ready status. Without
this alcoholic intake the warrior is apt
to lose their will to live.
(3) Warriors require prostitutes
even if they are married or in a loving
relationship.
Why, you ask?
Because warriors would murder to
death any normal girl with their sexual ferocity. They do it because they
love their wife and if they took out the
full extent of their sexual aggression
upon her it would result in death.
(4) Warriors often shit while squatting, not sitting down.
Over the years of beign on the
move this is an acquired skill only
possessed by Asians and warriors.
Often times scrap paper or leaves are
used to wipe the anus.
(5) Warriors use tobacco products.
(6) Warriors have so much charisma that sometimes Hollywood makes
movies about them.
(7) Every time a warrior dies a child
somewhere dies of Sudden Infant
Death Syndrome; the child’s spirit accompanies the warrior to the gates of
Hades where the warrior subsequently
sells the child’s soul to a demon to take
its place in Hades, and then the warrior
ascends into Valhalla.
5. I have an eye but cannot
see and I am faster and stronger than any man, yet have
no legs. What am I?
6. There’s a man who lives
on the top floor of an apartment building. Every day he
goes to work, he takes the
elevator all the way down.
When he comes home from
work, on days that it is not
raining, he takes the elevator
halfway up and walks the rest
of the way. But, on days that
it is raining, he takes the elevator all the way. Why does
he do so?
7. A man is walking through
the woods far from any civilization. As he’s walking, he
comes across a cabin. Without looking inside of this
cabin, he instantly knew that
anybody that was still inside was dead. How did he
know?
8. What’s
sticky?
brown
Answers on page 27.
and
Ten Bands that should Reunite
10) Egg Scramble
5) Ghetto Bombs
9) Shorty Cat
4) MR27
Now I’m not much into ska-punk, but this group was fairly young and if
they’d kept learning more music they could’ve gotten pretty good. Maybe
they’ll be back in the future, maybe in other bands but they better keep
the uniforms.
It’s easy to criticise a band for capitalising on girliness in order to get
attention. Most Shorty Cat shows were an even mix of teenage girls and
foreign guys in the back trying to decide which band member they’d be
most likely to do. Still, Shorty Cat did what they were supposed to and
they doubtlessly inspired a ton of future bands, and it would be nice to
see them back together.
8) Pippi Longstocking
Kind of before my time, but I wouldn’t mind seeing this band. They were
the ones who got in trouble during a live performance, when one of the
members spat at a camera, right? A little silly in this post Music Camp
age, but it would be nice to see more bands from that age still around.
These guys were getting pretty big, with their own KTF ad and highprofile performances. Then something happened, I’m guessing conscription-related, but it’s a shame they haven’t been talked about in a while. I
guess bassist Joohyun might be a little busy with his new project Galaxy
Express now, but it would be nice to see these guys again.
Of all the bands on the list, this is the one I’m most confident of seeing
again. Burke will be back. He knows he can’t stay away from this country.
3) Couch
Are they even gone? I think their drummer is in Japan or something, but
I’m not sure. They are definitely a classic Korean band that will go down
in infamy as Korea’s most hated punk band. We need more of that. Bring
them back.
3) Couch
Are they even gone? I think their drummer is in Japan or something, but
I’m not sure. They are definitely a classic Korean band that will go down
in infamy as Korea’s most hated punk band. We need more of that. Bring
them back.
7) Choke Slammers
2) Jiraltan99
These guys played very few shows, and I never figured out who was
the guy in the Mexican wrestler mask. They were closely connected with
Re/animator, another band that should get back together. But only one of
these two bands involves a Mexican wrestler mask.
Jiraltan99 was a skinhead band fronted by Seungpa before he went into
the skinhead retirement plan: rockabilly. Well, he’s still a skinhead until
he gets those tattoos removed. After he left, they continued on as Dirty
Small Town, but that band was a shadow of their former greatness. Hell,
it doesn’t have to be Jiraltan99, just get Seungpa on a stage again.
6) Oi Broker
1) Seoul Penetrators
A short-lived oi band fronted by everyone’s favourite Korean skinhead Jiwoong, they played a few shows with the equally short-lived label Hon Records.
However, Jiwoong belonged on stage, and it’s a shame he’s never been back,
aside from guest vocals for one or two Dirty Small Town shows, in which he
showed us what the band should have been like.
Seoul’s self-declared best rock band, these guys proved that dressing
in drag and covering ‘80s songs doesn’t take a lot of talent. Eerily, there’s
another foreigner band who has taken on the name Penetrators, but they
seem totally unrelated to the previous band.
Self Mutilation
Pro
- It looks artistic, cool and profound.
Verv
25 October 2008
Hey guys I was thinking about self-mutilation today and this is what I got for you:
Con
- Blood is sticky
in the hairs of your
arms and a hard
stain to get out.
- It’s kvlt as fuck.
- Scars are left.
- It makes everyone kind of nod
and smile.
- Not everyone
likes being kvlt.
- it is a release
of aggression and
pain.
- Sometimes the
act is misinterpreted.
Say
What!?!
Tales of Korea
Outlanders
Book Review
Jon Twitch
There’s only one zinemaker
that Broke in Korea looks up to,
and that’s Scott Bug. Sure, he
has glossy covers, and his book
bindings are more than just a
couple staples, but this guy has
been pumping out zines longer
than we’ve been at it on a wide
variety of Korea-themed topics.
His latest release is Outlanders: Tales of Korea, a look at
some of the most bizarre characters and happenings centered
around expats in Korea. Most
of the stories are about freak
encounters with eccentric foreigners, such as the creepy
homosexual on the subway or
the American ranger assassin.
The tales range from flabbergasted to reverential to “Damn,
I wish I gave that guy more
beer.” Scott Bug has assembled
an impressive squad of writers,
including your humble Broke
editor, who in the company of
professional journalists, popular bloggers, and a smattering
of the eccentrics themselves.
The tales are set mostly in
the ‘90s and 2000s, with a few
stories set as far back as the
‘80s and ‘70s when Korea was
a much different beast, but the
expats sound about the same.
My two complaints about this
book are that there is no table
of contents, and there is no
list of contributors, both which
would’ve made this review a
lot easier to write. I recommend everyone pick up a copy,
at the very least so you can
see whether you’ve been mentioned in it. It may be released
in Korean as well. Also, Scott
Bug is considering expanding the collection and making
a more official release, so that
one might be worth waiting for
as well.
Roots Time
Walking into Roots Time was
a life-altering experience for
me. Never have I found a place
that played the music I wanted
to hear, without having to pay
a rental fee and DJ it myself.
Then here’s Roots Time, this
tiny basement room that makes
Skunk Hell look big, where the
lights are dim and the reggae
beats are so thick you can smell
them in the air. This place is a
great little location in a convenient part of Hongdae. The peo-
ple who run it are nice, although
I was a little surprised when
they claimed that Roots Time
is the first reggae pub in Korea.
The only problem with it is the
basic menu which lacks food or
even draught beer, and the only
thing you can order is a markedup bottle of Korean beer.
Price: X
Menu: X
Music selection: XXXX
Experience: XXXX
Reggae Chicken
Reggae Chicken is hidden
away across the street from
all the Hongdae amenities and
hidden behind the old railroad
tracks. The location was more
inconvenient, but my one time
going there it had more people
inside than I’ve seen in Roots
Time in all my visits there
put together. A lot of thought
has gone into the interior design, certainly more than Roots
Time. The menu is much better, and you can naturally order
a number of chicken entrees, as
well as choose from some nice
(pricey) foreign beers. The
dishes have names like Kingston Wings, and have nothing in
common with Jamaican cuisine
at all. I was hoping for some
jerked chicken, but no such
luck. The menu was more than
at Roots Time, but the experience was less.
Price: X
Menu: XXX
Music selection: XXX
Experience: XX
Reggae Pub
Yeah, this Itaewon bar is
much older than Roots Time.
It caters to GIs, so you hear a
lot more modern synth reggae,
dancehall, and lover’s rock,
rather than the earlier, better
stuff. It’s a decent sized place
that could probably hold a show
if anyone ever tried (never has
been attempted though). What’s
more, their menu actually has
Jamaican style jerked chicken,
and it’s pretty good and not at
all Koreanised like you would
normally expect.
There are few reasons to
come to this place, but if I’m
wandering aimlessly around
Itaewon (a rare thing), I’ll
probably stop in here for a little
while.
Price: XXX
Menu: XXX
Music selection: XX
Experience: X
Misheard Lyrics in Korean Punk Songs...Revealed
Nevin Domer
Remember the good old
days? Or maybe you don’t. Or
maybe the whole concept of
“the Good Old Days” is just a
myth. Things tend to move in
cycles, at least Darby Crash
thought so and so it seems do
some of the Korean punks. For
this issue of Say What I’ll look
at songs from two of the popular punk bands that are not just
holding on but trying to break
through and build a new future
for the Korea punk scene.
“개목걸이 차자”
by the Patients
This song was requested by
several people on bROKe, but
I wanted to know if there was
more to it then just a statement
on punk fashion so I asked the
Patients’ bassist Sumin for an
explanation.
“This song is about remembering the passion and drive
of youth, the idea that bands
would play anywhere, at anytime, for no money; just for
the excitement of playing. This
was especially true in the Korean punk scene around 1999.
Not many bands could play and
many punks were arrested... So
wear what you want (i.e. dog
collars) and do whatever you
want. If you want to play just
play, set up a stage anywhere.
One time we got paid in dumplings for playing a show. That’s
what this song is about.”
날씨가 추워도 달린다. 날씨가 워
도 달린다.
Even when the weather’s cold
we keep going, even when it’s
hot we keep going
콧물이 얼어도 달린다. 만두만 먹
고서 달린다.
Even when our snot freezes we
keep going and when we have
to live on dumplings we keep
going
개목걸이 차자! Hey! Hey!
Let’s wear a dog collar!
개목걸이 차자! Hey! Hey!
Let’s wear a dog collar!
개목걸이 차자! Hey! Hey! Hey!
Let’s wear a dog collar!
개목걸이 차자!!
Let’s wear a dog collar!
앉아서 나불대는 건 정말 쉽더라
you know it’s really easy to sit
around and run your mouth
가만히 점잖 배는 건 누구나 다 할
수 있어
anyone can stay still and pretend to be dignified
이겨낼 수 없는 상처라면 지고 가
야지
move past the wounds you
thought couldn’t be overcome
피할 수 없는 일 따원 즐겨버리자
enjoy the things that you can’t
avoid
“And Again”
by Rux
RUX is a band central to the
Korean scene and has been going strong since 1996. Through
that time they have been able
to stay true to their own sound
while always trying out new
ideas. “And Again” is a song
that exemplifies their drive to
create their own way not tied
down by the ideas of others or
even by the weight of their own
past.
다시 또 긴 긴 겨울은 가고 또다른
파란 봄이 오겠지
After the long long winter another green spring will come
again
언제 그랬냐는듯이 거리는 활기를
되찾겠지
and we will recover the vigor
we once had
아무도 그 누구도 다시 또 그렇게
이유를 묻어 둔채
Nobody, everybody we have to
bury our reasons
새로운 현실을 만들어 또 바쁘게
나아가야만 하겠지
and move forward building a
new present for ourselves
I say, Again… and Again… and
Again… and Again…
기대는 다시 실망을 낳고, 그랳게
서로를 져버리겠지
disappointed grows from our
expectations until they become
one and the same
소수의 꿈은 짖밟힌채, 또 다시 긴
겨울이 오겠지
the few dreams we have cry
out like a dog trod upon and the
long winter will come again
아무도 그 누구도 다시 또 그렇게
이유를 묻어 둔채
Nobody, everybody we have to
bury our reasons
내일의 미래를 만들어 또 바쁘게
나아가야만 하겠지
and move forward building a
new tomorrow for ourselves
I say, Again… and Again… and
Again… and Again…
“절대로 반북될것 같지 않는 역
사는
The history that couldn’t divide
the Korea people
그렇게 계속해서 반북 됩니다!!”
continues to divide the Korean
people
“난 너의 미래 따윈 몰라, 난 너의
생각 따윈 몰라.
I don’t know what your future
is. I don’t know what you think
난 의 푸념 따윈 몰라”
I don’t know what you are blabbering about
“난 나의 미래 조차 몰라, 난 의 생
각조차 몰라.
I don’t even know my own future. I don’t even know my own
thoughts
난 나의 뿌리 조차 몰라”
I don’t even understand myself
Yeah! This is Jong-hee
Speaking out loud to all the
young punks!
And… all the people out there.
“Please don’t give it up!”
Speak it out loud!
Within’ that all the ‘influences’
you ate!
Prove yourself! Express yourself!
Make it yours!
What you see! And what you
believe in!
You can make your own World!
Don’t just stand there! Speak
it up!
Strike em’ Down!
Strike the system!
Cause I’ve got an idea
With a whole new conception…
I can has
Broke in Korea?
The Bimonthly Bootfuck
I’ve been thinking about
feeding this one my boots
for a while now. When I first
started coming to Hongdae it
was a great little place, quirky,
eclectic, and peaceful at night.
Now, it’s been taken over by
clubs full of alcoholics who just
want to drink with their own
kind and go home with strangers. And a lot of the diversity is
being disappeared as the interesting stores close down, and
are inevitably replaced by shoe
stores. Or Starbucks. And the
area administrators have made
it clear they don’t like having
a punk club around--techno
and hip-hop clubs, sure, those
people don’t have a reputation for causing problems--but
those punks are freaks.
So I say maybe we don’t need
Hongdae anymore. Maybe it’s
time to move on, find an area
that hasn’t surrendered to gentrification, and claim it as our
own before anyone else can. It’s
happened in the past; Hongdae
hasn’t always been the center of
live music in Korea. So let’s find
a new place. It doesn’t have to
be far, maybe even somewhere
near like Gwangheungchang,
or a place even fewer people
have heard of, where rent is
low, there are fewer competing countercultures, and every
second store doesn’t sell shoes
or expensive lattes. Join me in
saying fuck Hongdae, and let’s
move on already.
Broke Crossword
by Jon Twitch
ACROSS
1 Acid
4 Adenosine nucleotide
7 Narcotics feds
10 ___ out justice
11 Bluebeat or two-tone
12 When a door isn’t a door
13 Female equivalent of sir
14 Money owed
15 Russell of Korea Gig Guide
16 A continent
18 Christian eaters
20 ___ Madang
22 Straight-edge
25 Skunk Hell locale
28 Toilet
29 Korean skinhead label
30 Me ___ Him Call it Us
31 Oblique equilateral parallelogram
34 Ska predecessor
36 Moon Ska band
38 Cancel
39 Irritated
43 Pairs
44 Bob ___ III
46 Chocolate bar
47 Jamaican ecstasy
48 December 24
49 I Killed the ___ Queen
50 Abu Dhabi island
51 Japanese bukkake star
Monbu ___
52 Korean educational TV
channel
DOWN
1 Turn over a new ___
2 GoGo ___
3 Death
4 Oriental
5 Boxing match end
6 US Treasury Secretary
Henry
7 I and I ___
8 Antennae (slang)
9 Noah’s ship
10 K-1 or Pride
12 Amid
17 KIA product
19 ___ Stuart Donaldson
21 Spirit
22 Camera type
23 Orgasm noise
24 Captain ___
26 Adam ___
27 Tokyo
29 Larry Flynt’s magazine
32
M*A*S*H
indentured
servant
33 Pub
34 Fool pitier (2 words)
35 Dillinger ___ Plan
37 Goes with value, vector,
and space
38 Former Hongdae club
40 Plant
41 God of love
42 BSDM master
43 Punk ethic
45 Eggs
The Gambler Folds
CD Review
Saint John the Gambler
Trains For the Sea
Asah!
Jeremy Toombs
Things I’ve been listening to
lately: The Band’s Rock of Ages,
the Byrds’ Sweetheart of the Rodeo,
Gene Clark’s self-titled album, and
Bob Dylan’s John Wesley Harding.
If you don’t know these albums suffice it to say I’ve been on a countryrock kick of late (all my life). And
now I can add Saint John the Gambler’s Trains for the Sea to my playlist to augment my collection of the
aforementioned genre. To the fans of
Saint John who know them primarily from their live performances, you
won’t be disappointed. And to those
who may come by this album without hearing, no, without experiencing the band in all of its live glory,
well, don’t feel too bad because this
album does deliver the goods. And
besides, you don’t know what you
are missing.
From track one, “Rollin’ By,” the
high-energy pull of the music will
hook you in and just when you think
it’s gonna let you go by way of a
bass solo that feels like an outro but
is in fact just holdin’ you back for
the song’s finale. Then the minor
chord electric guitar strumming
that brings in “Throw a Fish” keeps
going just long enough, keeps you
waitin’ till the drums kick in and then
the fiddle starts cryin’ and I do mean
cryin.’ Beautiful and wild. Then to
the waltzing “Blue Eyed Blues”
featuring the accordion which is
part of the band’s trademark sound.
This song is also a great one to sing
along to once you hear it a time or
two. Or you could do the waltz if
that’s what you do. Personally, I
just sing along not knowing how to
waltz. “Give Me Trains” is one of
my favorites. I grew up in what used
to be a big-time railroad town. Well,
the big-time ain’t there no more, but
the trains still roll through and as a
kid I would lament that nowadays
you can’t really ride the rails anymore like in the old country songs.
I reckon a new train song as high
quality as this one is the next best
thing.
“The Photographer” shows us a
quieter side of Saint John. The bowed
bass is fantastic as is the picked guitar behind it and Mark Baker’s voice
is really showcased here as the song
builds up and if you are a weaker individual or maybe just highly sensitive you could maybe feel a bit sad
with this one. Lyrically, it’s one of
my favorites on the album with lines
like “I’m not drunk yet; I do not
fall over.” sung with just the right
amount of pathos. Excalibur is a perfect piece of music. The bowed bass
giving way to the fiddle is just right.
At just under a minute long, it’s just
long enough to listen to two or three
times in a row just to appreciate it
all the way.
Mark Baker’s unique vocal stylings and the harp playing go along
with the drivin’ kick drum to really
kick off what would be the flip side if
this were vinyl in “I Love You Baby.”
“Deadman” I see could become one
of my favorites due to the advantages
of listening to a song on an album vs
live since oftentimes in live performances lyrics can be unintelligible
(due to no fault of the singer). But
here, the lyrics stand out (as they do
on the rest of the album). And as on
the previous song, there is some real
nice horn work going on here. Likewise, the lyrical clarity of “Bitch and
Bones” as heard on the album would
make this song a standout on the album if it weren’t for the fact that there
is no filler material on this album (I
just stopped typing to clap along
with the chorus; it wasn’t a conscious
thing, it just happened. Go on and
just try to type something while you
listen to this without clapping along.)
There is also some superb accordion
work on this track. Highly enjoyable.
I’m not sure where “Vaudeville Rag”
comes from; whether it’s Mark Baker’s voice through some kinda voice
thingamajigger or who’s playing the
wind through the trees or whether it’s
original lyrics or an old Irish song
which is what it feels like, but what
I do know is that it’s just right. It has
that feel of legitimacy of a decision
properly made to be put here on the
album. “Tie Her Up.” There’s classical music and then there’s classic
rock and then there’s classic country
and then there’s classic murder ballads. Tie Her Up is a classic murder
ballad with some wicked guitar playin’ augmented by some fine bottom
sounds on the bass. Its screamin,’
crashin,’ seemingly chaotic ending is
fantastic.
Now here it comes, the finale.
The last word. “Dirty Auld Town.”
It’s a grand ending to the album,
what I consider a signature song of
the band. It’s a wonderful little Irish
blues song…I for one believe it when
Baker sings of cutting the town down
with his sharpened axe. The accordion/guitar interplay midway through
the song is just lovely. In fact, take the
time for several listens to this song.
The fiddle and bass move around
each other provocatively while the
drums just make you want to stomp
your feet…and then right there at the
end you just want to keep stomping
and it ends.
The end. That’s the only thing
wrong really. After a few listenthroughs of the album, I can’t find
much to say bad about it…nothing
at all really. If you’re not already familiar with these songs, I’d say you’d
want to be soon. And if you’re already a fan, this album with just pull
you deeper in and leave you wantin’
for more which you can’t have, by
the way.
Hideously
Shitty Band Names
Jon Twitch
It’s hard to tell when the
art of naming bands was lost.
Maybe it was when rap-metal
bands started misspelling basic words like Corn and Limp
Biscuit. Or maybe it is an older
phenomenon. Either way, this
is the golden age of hideously
shitty band names.
We start with the worst possible name of all time, The
Devil Wears Prada. Yes, this is
a band. Their defence for why
they named themselves after
a Meryl Streep movie is that
they formed before the movie,
and named themselves after
the book. Still, not very fucking
excusable.
I was put onto the scent of
all these godawful names when
some friends started talking
about The Number 12 Looks
Like You, another trendy HotTopic-wearing
metalcore
band, no doubt. The Number 12
Looks Like You, in case you’ve
never heard them, writes clever songs with titles like “Sleeping With the Fishes, See?” and
“Don’t Get Blood on My Prada
Shoes.” It’s times like this that I
start to think Osama Bin Laden
was right.
Anyway, through last.fm, I
found a ton more bands that
were recommended to listeners
of The Number 12 Looks Like
You. Have a look-see.
-Me and Him Call It Us
-The Jonbenet
-The Tony Danza Tapdance
Extravaganza
-iwrestledabearonce
-Sky Eats Airplane
-Drop Dead, Gorgeous (I see
what you did there, comma!)
-Gay for Johnny Depp
-Versus the Mirror
-He Is Legend
-I Would Set Myself on Fire for You
-The Plot to Blow Up the Eiffel
Tower
-I Killed the Prom Queen
-Cutting Pink with Knives
-Stand Before the Firing
Squad
-Man Is Mostly Water
-Vessels Cast from Crippled
Hands
-Arsonists Get All The Girls
normal clothes + tattoos
+ looking in odd directions during photograph +
obvious frontmen = typical
shitty fucking music that
should just resign itself to
MTV and not pretend to be
anything else.
—Verv
CD Reviews
Christmas Punk CD vol 1
Cujo Entertainment/Moonsadan
Jon Twitch
Are you tired of Christmas carols?
Wait, don’t answer--I already know
the answer. Plus, unless I’m reading
over your shoulder, I won’t hear you.
Am I reading over your shoulder?
Maybe you should buy me a beer.
The Korean punk scene circa
2000 can save you from the misery
of Christmas music. This first of two
compilations features anti-Christmas
songs, some which are lambasts of existing Christmas carols, some original.
Most of the songs are skate-punk with
a slight ska-punk bent, and the band
list includes names that haven’t been
spoken in a while, including Punch
Drunk, Run Carrot, Blue Punk Bugs,
and No Brain back before they sold
their souls. Oh yeah, and I’m amused
by the cheap South Park artwork.
The song that sticks in my mind best
is “I Wanna Hate Your Merry Christmas” by Half Brothers, which combines “Feliz Navidad” skillfully with
the awesome title phrase repeatedly.
It’s followed up by a screechy guitar
solo of “Angels We Have Heard on
High” by A-zak, another instant Christmas classic. Each song starts with what
sounds like seasons greetings but soon
gets corrupted by the snotty vocals of
Korean punk of the time.
This is a great CD that capitalises
and comments on the cultural phenomenon of Christmas. It makes me
wonder what the bands of today could
put together with this concept.
Christmas Punk CD vol 2
Cujo Entertainment
Jon Twitch
One year after the first Christmas
Punk CD, Cujo put out a second one
with the same feel-good anti-carol
songs. This one has a few more names
that are more familiar to a modern
audience, with the first album’s Half
Brother and No Brain being joined by
Burning Hepburn, Punk Killer, Counter
Reset, 99 Anger, and Rock Tigers. Plus
there are bands that I’ve never heard of,
including the first band named simply
South Park, who do a great version of
“Jingle Bell” (just one bell apparently).
The next track is the surprisingly sincere “Dear My Snow Man,” with female vocals by Karasade.
Despite the lack of South Park artwork, I have to admit this album is
stronger than the first one. You’ll agree
when you hear “Silver Bell” by Burning Hepburn, in which they manage
to cram in some “Anarchy in the UK”
somehow. No Brain is in full form too
with their cover of “Jingle Bell Rock.”
Both these CDs are worth getting.
Who knows, it might be possible to
get a copy at Hyang Music.
Burn My Bridges
Townhall Records
demo CD-R
Gary Norris
Burn My Bridges first demo CD-R,
from Townhall Records, is loud and
full of fast, sludgy guitar. The recording is not even ten minutes in length.
Four of the tracks clock in at under
two minutes. The demo reminds me
of what I like most and hate about the
early American punk and hardcore
scenes.
“Still Alive,” the band’s attempt
at a hardcore anthem, is just under
three minutes. Much of hardcore is
a cliche. I don’t think it takes much
to make an aging freak like me happy. First, I don’t need to listen to a
vocalist insist I should “never surrender.” If I was going to surrender,
it would have happened already.
And listening to bands sing about
being alive sounded funny even
when I was a kid. I always thought,
and what punk wouldn’t, “Who
Gives A Shit!” I am well aware of
how wasted most people’s lives are.
“Still Alive” is a slogan ready-made
for a soju advertising campaign.
That old dude in the alley, he’s
STILL ALIVE!
The same thing goes for hardcore
acts singing about crappy relationships like in “Relationshit!” By
the time Jin Myung Hoon shouts,
“I believed you. . .I had to believe
you,” I am already skipping to the
next song. Stop the whining! Yes,
we all know she’s not your friend
anymore. (And it’s probably because your friend is fucking her,
right?) Good hardcore is never sentimental. Kick her to the curb and
find a real friend. Until then, let’s
keep the faith.
This sounds like a bad review,
doesn’t it? It’s not. “Another Day,”
“We are the Same,” and “My Turn”
are great songs. Burn My Bridges’
strength lies in their vocals and
overall sound. With these songs,
I am taken back to 1986. I was
sixteen and riding with my crazy
neighbor to soccer practice in a
shitty Honda Civic while listening
to our overplayed cassette tapes
each filled with what are now classic punk and hardcore songs. One of
our favorite bands was Bad Brains.
That shit always got us going. We’d
play “Pay to Cum” and go crazy.
Myung Hoon’s vocals remind me of
H.R., and the changes on “We are
the Same”—my favorite track—
sound like the classic changes on
Bad Brains’ first release.
I picked up this demo at the Have
Heart show at Spot in Hongdae. It
was my first weekend in Seoul. I am
still listening to it.
Judgement Night vol 1
GMC Records+Big Deal Records
Jon Twitch
This is an ambitious project that
unites Korean hardcore with Korean
underground hip-hop. It’s a good idea,
and highlights the many similarities
between the two genres (when you
leave out race), which include dress,
artwork, the way the singers carry
themselves, and musical similarities.
Also, I think I hear a few N-bombs
being dropped in the Firestorm song
“Amigos Para Siempre.”
This album features the best of
the Korean hardcore scene, leaning toward the metalcore side of the
spectrum with bands like Vassline
and Samchung. There’s an auditory
variety between tracks by 13 Steps,
Captain Bootbois, and so on, with
the strangest inclusion being a song
by the Apop, who are more of a poppunk band.
The hip-hop on the album is not
your typical Korean hip-hop; these
are violent songs with a distinct underground style you wouldn’t hear
on the radio. The album takes a major turn at track 12 with Kaz AKA
Capo’s song “Ohh La La,” featuring
the chorus from the Teena Marie song
later made popular by the Fugees. My
favourite song is
“Final Murder” by DJ Memphis featuring DVS (Detroit Velvet
Smooth?), which comes close to
bbongjjak rap.
What bothers me about this album
is how the two sounds are segregated
at opposite ends of the CD. Hardcore
listeners can easily listen to the first
eleven tracks, and hip-hop listeners
can tune in for the last eight, without
either ever needing to listen to the
other side. This seems like a collaboration for individual purposes rather
than a mixing of ideas. I would’ve
liked some pair-ups between genres
and guest rappers on hardcore songs.
Isn’t the idea to find common ground?
This is the first in a series of concerts
and albums, so hopefully we’ll see
both sides start to get closer before
long.
Sinklair
Datura
Townhall Records
Jon Twitch
I would’ve liked to do more research into these guys, but unfortunately their homepage is on Cyworld,
which locks out anyone without a
national ID number unless you send
a scan of your ID card, a sample of
your DNA, and submit yourself to a
rectal exam, or however you get into
Cyworld.
Anyway, I can tell you that this is an
emotional metalcore band and they’re
from Daegu. They’ve played in Seoul
for the GMC Summer Fest, the Have
Heart tour, and recently toured across
the peninsula with Chadburger. A
helpful sticker on the CD case says
this is for fans of Endzweck, Shai
Hulud, and strongarm. This album
is only four songs long, with guest
vocals from the guy from Vlack Plot
on the song “One Step Forward.” It’s
well produced and it sounds good, but
if you really like this kind of music
you probably won’t be satisfied until
they make a full-length release.
Downhell
Karma
Dope Music
Jon Twitch
For Downhell’s second album,
they threw out a lot of little tricks to
get your attention.
Most notably, they got waegs
involved. The album is produced
by Alan Douches, the guy who
ruined the 13 Steps album “This
is the Reality that We Confront,”
although on this album he proves
he is either better with metal than
hardcore, or he was just having a
bad day when 13 Steps sent him
their masters.
Also, their regular drummer
stepped aside for this one so that
internationally acclaimed drummer
Mike Terrana could jump in. Terrana, who bears a startling resemblance to Sloth from the Goonies
from a distance, has worked with a
ton of bands, including Driven, Empire, Masterplan, Razorback, Rage,
and a ton more. With him seated
behind the drum kit, Downhell is
certain to rise close to the apex of
Korean metal.
This album contains an interesting
variety of songs, including two live
tracks, a music video for the song
“Karma,” and two versions of the
song “Hwa Du,” one in English and
one in Korean. They also cover “Into
the Pit” by Fight, a post-Judas Priest
project by Rob Halford. Halford is a
good match for vocalist Mark “Ishi”
Choi, who I’m sure would punch you
if you ever actually called him Mark
to his face.
I still can’t help but feel a little
bad for their drummer, but this album will probably earn them the
reputation as Korea’s hardest working metal band.
Tear the Shadow
Revive Through Broken Heart
GMC Records
Jon Twitch
Metalcore is the big thing in Korea these days, and it’s one of those
things that Korean bands can’t seem
to do wrong. I have to admit I don’t
recall seeing Tear the Shadow in
concert before, but they are one of
those competent metalcore bands,
often compared to Killswitch Engage.
These guys seem to come from
Sogang University, where they got
their start in the official band club
Gwang-ya, which is Korean for
“night of insanity.” Since 1998,
Gwangya has cycled through a large
number of musicians, recruiting
members from the freshman year
and replacing them as they get too
old like Michael Jackson does with
his playmates. The ninth incarnation
of Gwangya reached the end of their
tenure, and they’ve stuck together as
Tear the Shadow.
Looks like we’re in store for even
more metalcore, and I can’t help
but wonder what the future holds
for Gwangya. Will they start pumping out metalcore bands as fast as
a Catholic family pumps out new
babies?
Secret Asian Man
Assignment Cross the DMZ
Skull Moon Records
Jon Twitch
This is the millionth one-man project to come from the enigmatic Hellking, a Korean living in LA. This time,
he takes on the moniker Secret Asian
Man to bring us some above average
surf rock. It’s an impressive recording
with excellent production, made even
more amazing by the knowledge that
it’s one guy playing all the parts. I
guess this goes to show that you don’t
need a full band and you don’t need
a fancy studio to make great music-and in fact, I wonder if he would be
this prolific if he was held back by a
full backing band.
Of course this album is mostly instrumentals, with excellent non-vocal
originals like “Cross the DMZ” and
“Dragon of Downtown LA.” There
are also a couple songs with vocals,
one in English and one in Korean. In
“Cold War of Love,” Hellking gives
us what for in English. The Koreanlanguage song, “Spring,” is a cover
by Korean ‘60s music legend Shin
Joong-hyun.
So far, Hellking has covered surf,
dis-core, psychobilly, pogo-punk,
and who knows what else. I can only
guess what he’ll give us next.
K-Town Punks and Skins vol 1
Boss Sadist/Hellking Split EP
Skull Moon Records
Jon Twitch
It must be hard to find good musicians to collaborate with in LA,
because here’s another Hellking solo
project. This time he teams up with
fellow one-man-band Boss Sadist, a
Korean-Japanese skinhead also based
in LA.
From Hellking we have seven
songs, which includes two originals,
one very familiar cover, and four
songs from four different previous
Hellking albums, all re-recorded for
this project. Considering how many
genres he hops, it’s hard to see a distinctive Hellking coming out from
all the songs aside from his frenetic
speed and versatile but distinctive
voice. Korean punk fans will recognise his final track, “Together Moshing,” a cover of, you guessed it, Spiky
Brats, in which he does a good job of
sounding more like Jaeseok than Jaeseok often does.
In contrast, Boss Sadist’s recordings have a lot more internal cohesion. His songs follow a simpler
formula, and are played with a fierocity to match Hellking’s. Over time a
very distinct character emerges from
his voice. By the time I got to “I’m
a Sadist” I started to feel like I knew
the guy. The songs run together a bit
more than Hellking’s stuff, but that’s
only because they’re mismatched
on genre flexibility. In every other
regard, these two might be a perfect
match.
This will probably sound like
blasphemy, but they should consider
starting a band together.
Legends of Kamelot
Chapter 1
Verv
21-25 November 2008
I sat in my apartment with my
legs on the coffee table watching some news report on the
shitty economy; a half empty
bottle of wodka precariously
propped against a pillow and a
mutilated national geographic
with a pair of scissors were at
my side.
I was drunkenly constructing a mural of nude tribal
women and young boys filled
with sexual tension holding
rifles in menacing fashions -it seemed to fit together well,
like both parties were trying to
convey a naive sense of third
world innocence but coming off
about it all wrong. I approved of
it -- I approved of everything
about it: nudity mixed with the
threat of violence. I was mildly
aroused.
My phone began playing
the Village People’s YMCA;
I smiled. It was Yolanta and I
shifted slightly so my cock
would have room to grow upon
hearing her voice.
“Yaaaa.... Dobra Suka.” I
heard her giggling and the
noise of heavy traffic.
“Yaaa... Tempy chuju you
fucking idiot. Your Polish is
getting better...” The stress
was on ‘idiot’ and it came off
in a way that reminded me of
a Russian scientist (a Russian
scientist that sounded like they
might be able to suck testicles
through a urethra).
“Ohh, yeah... I was just
studying some when you called,
actually...” Lying is my way of
life.
“Oh yeah, that’s great...
That’s great... So who is coming over, again?”
“Oh I do not know...” I looked
at my watch and realized I had
not invited anyone else over
and that Cliff was still taking
a nap on the other couch. “I
guess, like, everyone is coming over...”
“Oh yeah...”
“Like... All our friends. Every
one of them. And they’re bringing their friends. And Kamyar is
coming all the way from merry,
old England.”
“Oh, wow...”
“Yeah, it’s going to be a very
important night. Kamyar will
perhaps bring some treats. I
was just so excited to hear
about this present giving that
I even got you a present.” I
quickly grabbed the abnormally sharp scissors and begain
scratching away the top surface of my flesh on the webbing of my left hand. I bit my
tongue for a second as the
blood came to the surface and
started trickling down the back
of my hand.
Yolanta laughed: “Well I’ll be
there in like 30 minutes...”
“Good! And oh yes... Buy five
wodkas and five liters of orange juice and a lot of turkey
bologna, pepper jack cheese,
Jewish rye bread and gray
poupon. I will pay you when
you get here.” She laughed
and called me crazy and we bid
each other goodbye. I began
to lick my fingers and spread
my blood over the nipples of
the various women in the collage while CNN International
reported millions of jobs lost
in the Chinese manufacturing
industries.
I was hoping for more news
of dead babies and tainted milk
and hopefully something about
Japanese businessmen taking
advantage ofChinese prostitute’s hard times to make more
WWII reminiscent sex tours,
but it didn’t come and the lack
of sex and death killed the high
of speaking with Yolanta on
the phone. My favorite story,
though, was the one about the
Chinese boy who became mentally retarded from toxic tooth
paste and whose mother kept
crying and wailing about it. It
was so emotional and tragic
and wrong that I almost shed a
tear looking at the both sticking his tongue out and trying to
bite his ear.
I realized that I never masturbated with blood on my
hands and wondered if it was
anything like vaginal copulation
with a woman while she was
on her period. The nude native
girls with my blood on their
tits almost cut the mustard but
not quite so I quickly channel
surfed to Black Entertainment
Television certain their daytime music videos would be
dripping with fat bottomed girls
doing dances worthy of stuffing
kilbasa into their buns.
I doubted Cliff would be
awakened by the wet slapping
and if he was I would say it was
a practical joke and he would
call me dude and roll over on
the couch. I was extra sloppy
on the shaft hoping to wake
him but in the end he barely
budged.
20 minutes later I was cleaning blood and seminal fluids out
of my pubic hair with my right
hand while I speed dialed everyone I knew. I took a few
pictures of my blood soaked
member in the mirror moments
before and intended to leave
these on my camera so later,
when folks were asking about
the cuts on my hand and I was
saying it was a “shaving accident” they would understand
the joke... I pictured them hitting the ‘review’ button on my
camera and being surprised. I
guessed I would have a decent
rise out of half and... A less decent rise out of the other half.
But that was the half that could
go home early, anyways.
Most people would arrive in
the next hour or two or three
and Chris was having a birthday party somewhere else and
Kara was broke so I’d pay for
her taxi and Jon and both Richards and several people with
two syllable names I frequently
confused for one another due
to their Asiatic features responded with cryptic smiley
faces and “be there later.”
Yolanta knocked on the door
shortly after I applied the after
shave to my unshaven testicles
and was doing some last minute
eyebrow trimming. Cliff had to
hold the door open and in spite
of the group effort Yolanta
managed to drop a bottle of
vodka in the entryway which
immediately shattered on its
side, giving off a fume that
made me smile with anticipation for the nights antics.
“Oh shit... Sorry... Shit...” She
awkwardly danced around the
broken bottle trying not to step
on the shag carpet with her
shoes nor to rub in the glass;
it was an usuccessful dance
that culminated in me grabbing her and throwing her over
my shoulder. She protested at
first but no protest laced with
laughter was really a protest. I
enjoyed the feeling of her small
waist on my shoulder so I kept
her up there while Cliff and I
herded the shards of glass into
a small pile with our feet.
Cliff swept them up along with
a small pile of dust on our lineleom entryway while I carried
Yolanta to the fridge, directing
her to place our supplies in the
feezer and keep two out and to
grab some ice. For another five
minutes or so I kept her in the
fireman position while I prepared drinks and chatted about
the economy and the Chinese.
After a spell I put her down in a
chair and pulled off her Chuck
Taylor punk rock shoes in such
a fashion that would allow me
to catch a glimpse of her panties under her leopard print
skirt. I nodded in my mind...
Also leopard print. This was
the sort of news I needed when
there were no deaths to report
on television.
Life got depressing after
Barack Obama victories.
Cliff sat down on the couch
and began lighting up a joint; I
left the door ajar so the neighbors could fulfill their voyeur pleasures and brought the
drinks to the television.
For three hours Yolanta and
I fucked our brains on wodka
while Cliff baked his; slowly
people filtered in with their
own booze and joints and raunchy jokes and it was a perfect
blend of lowlife metalheads,
punks, skinheads and... Foreign
students who had neither a
sense of fashion nor a sense of
right or wrong and were merely
excited to fuckers.
Someone was playing the
shittiest albums in my collection on my computer in the
corner while Cliff prepped a
bong; Yolanta and I spoke at
length about President Obama
and Communists and Polish history and different ways
to say obscene things in Polish. She became less awkawrd
as she drank and by the time
nine PM struck Kimczak and
Bialy were already long gone
on their way to pick up Kamyar
from the airport. In spite of the
open seats now on the couch I
insisted Yolanta sit in my lap so
Jason and some Korean named
Gyeongbo could enjoy Leni
Riefenstahl’s Triumph Of The
Will with us.
I felt like a bad host but when
a shriek of half-joy and terror
went up from a small corner in
the room I realized the camera had been discovered and I
smiled to myself as the photos
were being slowly shown to
everyone by Jon Dunbar. He
had a savvy way of introducing
them. I kept hearing him speak
in his loud, drunk voice,
“Hey, you ever see a breadstick with tomato sauce in a
pile of cat hair? I do not know
why Verv doesn’t use the garbage can...” or
“Hey, you ever wonder what
a night with Verv would be
like?” or
“Hey, I just found Pornotarium’s new album cover...”
Jon did not show Yolanta
the pictures which was both
relieving and disappointing. A
very drunk Nellka hit me on the
back of the head and was about
to say something when Walony
simply gave me a high five and
said ‘Very nice, very nice...’
I looked at my watch and
knew that within the hour my
friend Kamyar would finally arrive.
It was 10 PM when I got the
phone call from Kimczak.
“What is it?” I was in a particularly good mood and did not
want to be interrupted. I was
listening to Jon Dunbar speaking drunk about how I am his
best friend on the Korean peninsula which never gets old because it strikes home as both
true and profound. Of course,
because Jon was drunk the
conversation flipped back and
forth from the fact that we were
best friends and the fact that it
was so strange that we had uncovered the Slavic community
but both of these seemed to tie
in together somehow.
“I don’t know what is wrong
but we are at the Airport and
I do not see your friend. He is
gone or something.” I sighed.
As a man who served in the
Army I realized that the likelihood of Kamyar actually not
arriving there or having randomly wandered off was nonexistent. He would have called
and he would have had enough
common sense, even for an
alcoholic Anglo-Iranian, to
wait at the airport. However,
I imagined he may indeed be
passed out drunkenly at some
location in the airport that may
theoretically require effort to
find.
“Kimczak... Stay there... I
will be there soon.” I hung up
the phone before he could protest. I know he did not want to
wait at Incheon airport while I
drove 45 minutes but he had no
choice in the matter.
I began pushing Yolanta off of
me and stated quite simply that
we were driving to Incheon.
“I’m... Drunk.”
“That’s OK,” I said. “I’ll
drive.” Naturally the slightly
less inebriated people at the
party protested but these fell
on my deaf ears. I then told the
blatant lie that instead I would
take a taxi right as I reached
for my keys. None realized that
I would have no purpose for
these keys as I would not be
locking the door on a room full
of 15 people.
I felt aggravated and upset
and Yolanta was still in a good
mood and talkative but being
in a substance induced state of
mind I did not have the common
courtesy to accommodate her
conversation. I took on a very
cold tone and barely acknowledged her as we drove until
she finally became quiet and
got a slightly hurt look on her
face. She was not used to the
brooding, irritated Verv and I
was too drunk to put on a mask
to hide this part of me.
I began smiling in a very sadistic manner as I realized the
silence was absolutely killing
her -- she had tried to work
my car radio but it simply had
no antenna because I did not
need one. I never listened
to the radio, only to my own
MP3s. She did not feel like she
had the right to turn on my iPod
to listen to music and though
she noticed me noticing her
fiddling with nobs I had decided
I would not turn on my iPod and
we would simply take this ride
in complete silence.
She was drunk and she liked
me and we were passing a
beautiful evening together and
now she was hurt and confused by my behavior and she
brought her knees to her chest
and folded her arms around
them assuming one of those
teenage fetal positions. My inner smile grew. I’ve never been
able to explain it but I have always loved pushing the buttons
of women in my life. I think because my mother set no standards for me it was always a
relief when she was irritated
because it seemed like someone cared. I guess I liked shitting on these women because I
loved seeing them care.
Yolanta looked out the window for a while and then
sighed.
“What’s wrong, Verv? Why
are you acting this way?”
“Oh... I am just concentrating... On driving. I am drunk...
You know...” She audibly
sighed, continued looking out
the window into darkness.
When we arrived at the
Incheon airport 20 minutes later she looked at me the whole
time I was finding parking
places, trying to look for some
sort of reaction. I did not return
the look even for a moment
and exited the car and closed
my door. I was so intent on not
looking at her I wondered if she
would follow and was delighted
that she did not.
I guess I was delighted because I figured there would
be a good chance she would
be crying or on the verge of
tears when I returned. I’d seen
Yolanta cry while drunk before
and I knew she was the type to
mask her sensitive feelings in a
punk rock image. I thought the
best ‘welcome to Korea, enjoy your stay’ gift I could give
Kamyar was one of Yolanta’s
tears.
Soon I saw Kimczak and Bialy standing about outside the
airport with confused expressions. Kimczak went into the
same spiel about not being able
to find him and then expressed
concern at my drunkenness and
my driving. I just laughed.
“Follow me... I’m in the Infantry!” I said simply to them.
Kimczak annoying corrected
me by pointing out that I was
just a driver and a MI guy when
I was in the Army. I said ‘same
difference.’
After 10 minutes of looking
around I came to the bus stops
and saw an odd figure in a suitcase rack. I knew immediately
it was Kamyar who was fast
asleep. After a few pokes he
looked up and smiled drunkenly. Only Kamyar would do this.
“Wah wah wee wow...” I simply said, with a smile, and Bialy
did the same and soon we were
all saying ‘wah wah wee wow’
and the first moments Kamyar
and I ever spent with one another were spent doing Borat
impressions and shaking hands.
I was delighted that Kamyar
was already drunk.
The banter continued and
when we got to the car Yolanta was red faced and nursing
a screwdriver I did not even
know she had brought with.
She tried to look tight lipped
and mad.
“Oh shit, Yolanta is fucking
mad... What did you do, Verv?”
Kimczak said this with the
same hilarity he always said
everything. The world could be
ending and he would still say it
in the same voice. I do not think
the man had any other emotion
besides a general jovial commentary on the worst of situations. It was like he was separate from everything.
“I don’t know, man... I’ll cheer
her up.” I smiled. Everyone
could tell from my smile that I
would do anything but. Kamyar
was not sure how to act so he
just half-grinned, split between
Kimczak’s general amusement
at life situations, my sadistic
alcohol induced mood and Bialy’s withdrawal into himself in
these rough times.
Everybody entered the car
which became a tomb of silence. Yolanta’s skin had
turned pink and she kept pushing her blond hair back, looking at the ground. Kimczak
politely made conversation
about nothing with Kamyar in
very hushed tones while Bialy
looked on in concern. I wore an
eerily happy smile while looking at Kamyar and asking him
lewd questions about the flight
attendants. Somehow Kamyar
had the common decency even
while intoxicated to not play
into these.
As this died out I decided I
wanted to see fireworks just
like any human being does and
now that we were on the highway it was a good opportunity.
“Why the long face, pussycat? Give me a smile!” I said to
Yolanta. The silence somehow
grew even thicker. She looked
away and didn’t respond. Kimczak laughed under his breath
and I heard him whisper ‘oh,
fuck’ to Kamyar. At least
someone enjoyed a continuation of our Borat references.
“Come on, pussycat... It is a
long road back to Hweegyeongdong...” She hunched over a little and looked straight forward.
I looked closely and I could see
only sadness on her face. I was
shitting on her day and shitting
on the build up we’ve had for
the last few weeks and I was
laughing on the inside in the
way only mad men understood
-- I was like the man setting
his own car on fire or kicking
his dog just to hear it yelp.
A small tear rolled down her
cheek which she quickly wiped.
The whole situation was such
pure madness to her -- intelligent conversation and total
bonding over punk rock and
Leni Riefenstahl and weeks of
perfect friendship that hinted at
something more being reduced
to this senseless act of cruelty.
My drunken self ate this up like
a Lioness eating a gazelle.
“Pussycat, do you want to
listen to some Kaki Buchae?
‘Bong, bing, bong bong bing
bing bing?’” I knew somehow
I had fucked up the reference
but it really did not matter at
this point. Joking about Borat was just the perfect hell I
could create in the moment and
she began weeping softly and
openly.
“What the fuck are you doing to me?” She wiped her eyes
and at that moment my whole
body shot forward with some
inexplicable burst of emotion;
half of me was about to burst
into laughter and another part
of me wanted to put a gun to
my head and blow out my
brains, wondering why I always
did this; wondering why I got a
kick out of any of this.
“Oh fuck, Verv... Why do you
have to be such an asshole?”
Kimczak mumbled. It made me
smile a little wider on the inside and come that much closer
to wanting to theoretically blow
my brains out.
“What did I do... Why are you
doing this?” Yolanta had waited
a few more painful moments
and suddenly I began feeling
sad about the whole situation
and I wanted to cry and I was
hoping for something to happen
that would make everything
better. I had slightly sobered
and realized the state that I
was in...
I guess I always liked shitting
on something beautiful because
once I had anything beautiful
it quickly began feeling like a
nice shirt that I am too afraid to
wear to dinner because it might
get stains on it. I had only had
one of those shirts before and
I had decided to never buy one
like it again. I hated the color
white.
I hated that Yolanta was 20
and pretty if not a little country-ish and naive in her appearances. I hated that she
listened to good skinhead and
punk music and was impressed
by my stories and paid me such
large honors, speaking of me
in high regard and treating me
like some sort of idol. Once in
a blue moon I can find a woman
who worships the ground I walk
on and the last thing I needed
in my life was another figure
to unconditionally love me and
laugh at my jokes and slowly evolve into my emotional
punching bag.
I hated the fact that if I told
her things it might actually influence in some way the way
she thought. I hated that she
respected me as a human being. I hated her for liking me
and giving me this opportunity
to turn my back on Yongjugol
whores and actually have a relationship with someone.
The only women I could ever
like were the ones who didn’t
like me.
My plan to give Kamyar
Yolanta’s tears as a gift seemed
like it had generally failed as I
realized that some stranger’s
sadness actually was not really
quite a gift.
I was not sure what I was
about to say but I was determined that whatever came out
next would fix the situation.
“Yolanta...”
“What?”
“I was just trying to drive...
And I was drunk... And I was
so angry because... No one
could find Kamyar. And I was
worried. And I couldn’t concentrate. And Kamyar is such
a good friend. So I didn’t know
what to do and I didn’t want to
talk. And... I didn’t know what to
say... And... I was worried that
Kamyar would be... Offended...
That we were so late... I’m just
really stressed, Yola. And I
never do anything right. And I
am so worried that my neighbors are going to ruin our party
and... We even got marijuana in
there. We’re gonna die. I do not
know what to do. I do not even
know why I am driving this car
drunk.” My voice got more
emotional as I spoke.
Kimczak was the first to respond with an “Oh, fuck...” I am
not sure what he meant to convey with it but it seemed accurate either way.
“Really?” Yolanta sniffled. We
were quiet again. “I’m sorry...
I... Didn’t understand...”
“Yeah you know I was just
stressed and I didn’t know
how to respond and I am drunk
so...”
“OK...”
Everything slowly got better
over the next 15 minutes and
the situation was diffused. We
saw one of those Korean vans
that sells porn on the side of
the road and I made a joke and
Kamyar laughed and conversation started back up as I introduced everyone to him.
The atmosphere in the party
had improved even more and
when we entered we saw Mihao
laying on top of Walony wrestling over a bottle of tequila
and everyone was laughing and
Nellka the gypsy came up with
a happy face and suggested we
go to a Noraebang.
Everyone was happy. So we
were happy.
I do not remember much else
from the evening other than
Kamyar singing ‘Piano Man’
and both he and Yolanta and
Cliff trying to get my legs into a
taxi cab while I held a half-used
Ramyoen container beneath my
mouth in case I barfed.
The next day I woke up in my
underwear and a t-shirt with a
fully clothed Yolanta sleeping
on my floor. I could still taste
vomit in my mouth.
I remember nothing else but
later Kamyar told me we had a
really nice conversation about
his flight over at the Noraebang and that at some point
I knocked over a table full of
soju bottles that smashed on
the floor creating a small sea
of alcohol within the karaoke
room; Walony, Kamyar and
myself urinated on the already
wet floor of the Noraebang and
that was about 6 AM and we all
went home.
I guess I regret not staying sober enough to remember much of my first night with
Kam.
This is a continuation of Legends of Kamelot.
I think this is what you like
more than the last installation.
Legends of Kamelot
CHAPTER II: I SAY GOODBYE TO MY FAVORITE PROSTITUTE &
EAT A DELICIOUS OMELET FOR BREAKFAST
I came into full consciousness
and looked down at Yolanta
sleeping on the floor and I felt
a sense of regret. I also felt
still far too caught between
drunk and sober. I needed to
get drunk.
I also needed to repent for
my actions last night. I realized in my heart of hearts that
this was no way to live my
life and in this drunken nature
I had essentially jeopardized
what could be the last woman I
pursue in my life. Of course, it
was too soon to think of her as
‘the last woman I would pursue
in my life’ but this didn’t matter. I was a man that was into
extremes.
I am not happy unless something seems hopelessly important and melodramatic.
I would never take any half
measures in my life and would
not start by minimizing the importance now. Somehow, if I
could make everything seem
important it would be. Right.
I tiptoed over Yola and
searched for a clean pair of
pants to put my dirty ass in.
Yola woke up for a second and I
looked at her and quickly came
up with a lie:
“I am going to go to the gym.
I need to work out.” I figured
this was a great lie. I look good
in this lie... I am young and aspiring and I might not be overweight someday or something
like that. She nodded and went
back to bed. It was 10 AM. I
guess I had only slept for a few
hours.I put on the pants. My
legs felt dirty against the clean
Levi 501s. I pealed off my old
shirt and walked out of the
room holding the new under my
armpit. I liked the way my barrel chest looked in the mirror in
the hall and I thought the beer
belly didn’t look so bad.
I thought about my uncle
Brian. I looked similar to him.
When I was a boy I looked
up to him and knew he was a
real man because he drank a
lot, chewed tobacco, had a giant chest and arms and a beer
belly. I thought this was a great
image to pursue -- a man who
looked like Bluto from Popeye
and spoke in a gravelly voice
and was a carpenter by trade,
just like Jesus and my dad.
Outside the room I saw
Katarzyna and Jan were sleeping in front of my TV with a
copy of Lord of the Rings II on.
I was tempted to watch but I
figured I would be back before
the Battle of Helmsdeep. They
looked nice and pleasant and
I think they were a good example to have in my life. Cliff
and Kamyar were sleeping near
Cliff’s bong. It looked like they
fell asleep while smoking it.
I pulled a half consumed
bottle of Wodka from the fridge
and plugged my nose so I could
swig a sizable amount to push
me back over into the land of
intoxication. I decided to do
this twice to be sure. Then a
third time for good measure.
I realized I had grabbed one
of my favorite shirts to wear
and I had intended to wear it on
a special day. For a moment I
thought about putting my “Better Dead Than Red” shirt away
but I knew today was special. So
I wore it anyways. It shouldn’t
get too dirty. It would be off
in 30 minutes. Then on again.
Then I’d be back. I’d watch the
battle of Helmsdeep and wake
up Kamyar and everyone else
by noisily preparing ramyeon.
I walked calmly and quietly.
It was Saturday morning and
the only people who were out
at 10 AM were lamers who
didn’t party the night before so
I disrespected them by putting
on my most arrogant and aloof
expression. I gave a beggar all
my change and listened to Burzum on my iPod.
A really old looking woman
gave me an evil eye when I
walked into the prostitution
district and I smiled at her and
bowed. She remained motionless for a few seconds and
gave me the slightest bow in
return.
It must suck living next to the
prostitution district.
I walked quickly.
I was drawn there like a magnet and I saw her delicate face
behind the glass window. Her
name is Bora and she is 22 and
I fuck her for $60 at a time.
She smiled and laughed and
said something about how she
was waiting for me but I didn’t
catch it all because she always
spoke in a shitty Choella accent. Whenever she spoke fast
I only caught half of it.
As I went to the other room
and undressed and as I waited
for her to return in only a bra
and panties I wondered how
much money I would save in
the coming months not fucking
prostitutes anymore. I wondered if I could give all this
money to poor people and be
a saint. I could help people.
Change their lives. Make things
easier for them. I wondered if
I could invest all this money in
Yolanta and be an overly kind
and excited boyfriend -- the
sort that sweeps a woman off
of her feet and convinces her
that she is the man for him.
Maybe I could buy more CDs
or just watch my bank account
get fatter. I could get a five
string bass guitar. I wasn’t sure
why I needed this. I always
played in drop C and only used
the top two strings.
When Bora entered the room
I started consciously blocking out everything that was
happening because I suddenly
regretted coming here in the
first place and I wanted to start
crying and for a moment I was
about to get up and leave. I
wanted to cry because this was
wrong and I was a bad Christian and had always been a bad
Christian and I didn’t want to be
a bad Christian and Jesus was
talking to me.
I started to get an erection
from Bora’s supple lips. And
“Jesus wept.” John 11:35. The
shortest verse in the Bible. And
Jesus wept like Yolanta and as I
became fully erect Jesus asked
me why I was doing this to him
and then I ignored Jesus for the
next 10 minutes of my life and
concentrated on getting off so I
could say to Jesus,
“You know... I was just...
Having a rough morning...
And... I...” but then I realized I
couldn’t really lie to Jesus because he is omniscent and so I
just started to say in my mind
while I had Bora in the doggy
style position, sorry, Jesus, I
just do not understand why you
love me at all. It is so naive. It
is like loving the snake that is
about to bite you. It is like loving the Lioness that is clamping
down on your gazelle neck and
crushing the life out of you.
Jesus, it is wrong for you to
love me because I am only going to hurt you.
I stopped thinking about Jesus and I licked my finger and
began stimulating Bora’s rectal cavity with it, sucking on it
several times and tasting some
rusty substance that I guess
was Bora’s anus, until I finally
put it in and she bucked back
against me harder and I did my
best to finish quickly.
Jesus, it’s OK. You can love
me again. I feel like I am born
anew and I won’t have to do
this ever again.
We’ve made our peace.
Now weep no more and go
forth and Love the rest of the
world and forget me to my
woman, my alcohol and my
working class job. I will give
my soul to you each time I pray
before meals and I will give you
all of my children’s souls and I
will argue for you on the internet debate forums. Goodbye for
now, Jesus. Love, Verv.
I thought about the video I
saw of a Nepalese man getting
his head cut off and the weird,
hollow scream-gurgle he made
as he died. I wondered if Jesus
made this sound when I ejaculate inside of prostitutes.
I thought of the woman who
wrote the book When The Rabbit Screams or something like
that. Rabbits have no vocal
chords and make the strangest
bellowing noise. The woman
who wrote this book heard
two women in Germany make
this sound when they were recounting the times they used to
be raped by their fathers.
Did Jesus make this sound
when
I
ejaculated?
This
strange... Weird... Exhale of
air... I figured it sounded like
the Nepalese man who got his
head cut off in the video I saw.
The Nepalese man was a
Communist rebel or something so I guess he might have
theoretically deserved it. Jesus
wasn’t into politics that much
so I guess He doesn’t deserve
this.
Bora looked back at me and
laughed and before she could
say anything I spoke.
“This is the last time, Bora. I
am going to give you a tip.” She
looked at me suspiciously and
she didn’t believe me because
I had said this before. I jumped
off the bed and never looked
back at her. She said something
about how I should wear a scarf
because it is December and
cold and I agreed and I wished
her a nice Saturday.
“Go to Church tomorrow.
And if you ever need anything,
just call me. Have a good life.”
I didn’t know what else to say
and she laughed at my words
and I laughed back, I wasn’t
sure if it was with her or at her
or at myself.
I bundled up and went home
and I got back just in time to
watch the Battle of Helmsdeep.
Everyone was asleep and I was
excited and wide awake and I
love the part when the guy is
standing in front of the castle’s
entrance and says,
“Whatever comes through
that door... Stand your ground!”
Mentally, I said the same and
I looked over at the door to
my room and Yolanta came out
quietly and offered me a smile
and proceeded through the hall
delicately.
She asked me how my work
out was and I said it was so good
I even ejaculated. She laughed.
I laughed. Donia taught me the
word for ejaculation in Polish a few weeks earlier and I
somehow remembered only the
medical term for it it so I guess
it made me sound sophisticated and like I wasn’t fucking a
whore 25 minutes ago.
Yolanta even laughed a little
more a few minutes after the
joke and told me how smart I
was in my Polish studies.
She asked me where the eggs
were and made me an omelet.
She used some Swiss cheese. I
really like Swiss cheese in my
omelets.
I think I even like omelets
more than I like sex. But you
can’t eat an omelet all day. Especially not on the weekends.
The omelet was better
than the sex and I felt really
a whole lot better about the
whole situation and took out
Lord Of The Rings II and put in
the film Quarantine because it
was scary and I wanted to see
Yolanta scared.
She screamed out and
grabbed my arm several times
and during the final 10 minutes
of the film she intermittently
watched the film and buried her
head in my chest. She was very
scared. I liked it a lot. I think
I might have fallen in love or
something.
Other people were waking up
when she screamed during the
final 7 seconds of the film and
she looked cute and flushed and
she made them delicious omelets, too.
Top Ten Harmful Religions
10 Tibetan Buddhism
Ah, that wonderful Dalai
Lama. Preaching peace while
receiving $1.7 million each
year from the CIA and training an army in Colorado for the
eventual overthrow of Chinese
rule. This guy has all sorts of
Hollywood celebrities including Richard Gere and Steven
Seagal, which is odd considering his belief that oral, manual,
and anal sex are unacceptable.
I suppose the anus is to be used
only for defecation and gerbil
storage, according to Buddhism.
Typical behaviour: acting all
holier-than-thou while plotting
a violent revolution intended to
turn history back a couple hundred years
Their plans for this world:
returning Tibet to a theocracy,
where every family must surrender their eldest son to become a monk
What they’ve given us: annoying Hollywood celebrities
who think they know the solution to all life’s problems
What they’ve taken away:
Hollywood secularism
9 Wotanism
This version of German
neopaganism was started by
American white supremacist
David Lane as an alternative
to worshipping a 2000-yearold Jew. Christianity is descended from the racial religion of the Israelites, so good
Aryans should worship their
own racial gods, which happen to include Odin (Wotan)
and his crew. What’s more,
Wotan is an acronym for Will
Of The Aryan Nation. That’s
all well and good, but about
as random as suddenly worshipping Ra or Quetzalcoatl or
some equally outdated god.
Recently,
Wotanist
Hardy
Lloyd declared himself as a
prophet of Wotan. He preaches that martyrdom will send
the Aryan soul to Valhalla,
that Aryans must have white
eyes, and that Wotanists must
live in tight family units waging white man’s Jihad against
the non-believers.
Typical behaviour: marching
in parades holding Nazi flags
and crying “White Power!” or
“Rahowa!” then getting upset
that someone wants to take
their freedom away
Their plans for this world: a
world populated only by pureblooded Aryans
What they’ve given us: a lot
of laughable white power music
What they’ve taken away: interracial sex
8 Catholicism
Basically, this is a more oldfashioned version of Christianity that worships a man known
as a pope who is said to be infallible. How it is possible for a
human to attain that is not men-
tioned. Although Catholicism
is generally less preachy than
Christianity, its big problem is
in how badly it messes up its
followers. If you were raised
Catholic, you’ll never escape it,
not even if you give it up at age
18 and spend the rest of your
life as an atheist. You’ll still be
programmed to believe that the
human body is evil.
Typical behaviour: seeming normal, and then suddenly
having a bipolar attack and attempting suicide
Their plans for this world:
a world where sex is only for
reproduction, and the number
of children you have is equal to
the number of orgasms you’ve
experienced (unless you’re a
woman, in which case the latter
number is zero).
What they’ve given us: guilt
What they’ve taken away:
enjoyable sex
7 Mormonism
So did you hear Jesus returned to Earth again? But this
time, he respawned in North
America before it was discovered by Columbus. He discovered a lost tribe of Israel, but
shit went tits up, and ended
with God cursing this tribe with
dark skin. Yes, they became
the Natives we later would
become acquainted with. They
also abstain from alcohol, caffeine, and casual swearing.
They’re one of those religions
that took advantage of America’s freedom of religion, using
it as a means to oppress their
own followers.
Typical behaviour: saying
“gosh,” “golly,” and other lowrent swears, and unforgiveably
missionary work
Their plans for this world: a
world where marriage is defined as the sacred bond between a husband and his wives
What they’ve given us: the
most violent straight-edge
scene in the world
What they’ve taken away:
caffeine, alcohol, profanity
6 Unification Church
The Moonies follow Reverend Moon Sun-Myung, the
Messiah. The Moonies have a
real thing for the US and have
a large presence there. A few
years back, they used a senate building to have a coronation for Moon, where he was
ordained king of the universe;
the event had several members
of the American government
in attendance. Suddenly the
Christian religious right isn’t
looking so scary, is it? These
guys have a strong relationship
with the US government for
their anti-communist stance,
which just shows how desperate the Americans are for allies
if they’re siding with nutbags
like this.
Typical behaviour: I’ve never met one, so I’m guessing
they’re just extremely corrupt
Koreans who believe that faith
in the ludicrous equals piety
Their plans for this world: a
world governed by the United
States of Moon
What they’ve given us: Inchon, the movie that destroyed
Lawrence Olivier’s career
What they’ve taken away:
dignity to anti-communism
5 Eschatological
Christianity
The Bible says that Jesus
will return, and when He does,
we’re all going to suffer. For
some reason there are small
fringe groups of Christians
who want this to happen. Basically, they want to kickstart
the Apocalypse, simply so
they can say “I told you so.”
The Book of Revelations vividly describes this process,
and eschatological Christians
try to ease some of the prophecies along to sort of force
God’s hand. This includes
the demolition of the Islamic
Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem and rebuilding the Jewish
Temple. This is because the
Anti-Christ is prophesied to
declare Himself to the world
from its front step. So without
the temple, the Anti-Christ
will have to do it on a park
bench or a soapbox or something.
Typical behaviour: a sort of
gloating “I know something you
don’t know” attitude and poorly
disguised smirks as they fantasise about you being tortured
for eternity
Their plans for this world:
the End of Times
What they’ve given us: the
War on Terror
What they’ve taken away: uh,
the whole fucking world
4 Providence
That’s the name of this
Moonie dissident group led by
messiah/rapist Jung Myungseok. He got his followers
to send him pictures of tall,
pretty, and young girls, and
he would select his favourites,
who would be brought to him
for some surprise sex. According to Providence, Jung is the
Messiah, and that the only way
to atone for the Original Sin
of Adam and Eve is by sleeping with the Messiah, which
apparently cancels out Eve’s
intercourse with Satan (when
did that happen anyway?). In
1999 he fled rape accusations
in South Korea and spent the
next the next eight years on
the run. While hiding out in
Japan, he would summon up
to ten female followers each
day to sexually assault them
under the pretense of “health
checks.”
Typical behaviour: abducting
girls so their leader can stick
his penis inside them
Their plans for this world: all
tall, pretty, and young females
will atone for Original Sin by
being raped
What they’ve given us: a trail
of messed up girls
What they’ve taken away: the
innocence of nubile cult girls
3 Scientology
“The best way to get rich
quick is to start a religion.”
With those words, third-rate
science fiction author L Ron
Hubbard founded Scientology.
Essentially, Scientologists believe in reincarnation, and that
any random thought you could
ever have is a memory recovered from a previous life. They
use a cheap lie-detector test
to help you relive past lives,
and they eliminate possessing
spirits known as thetans from
your soul. Of course, all of this
costs money. Once you get to
the level OTIII, you learn the
story of Xenu, which was reprinted in issue #7 of Broke.
Thanks to Tom Cruise’s batshit behaviour in recent years
and a public campaign called
Anonymous, the credibility
of Scientology as a religion,
and as shoddy fan fiction, is
dubious. The only reason it’s
so high up on this list is because it’s the only religion in
the world to have a navy (don’t
correct me if I’m wrong—I
don’t want to hear about more
religious navies).
Typical behaviour: wild mood
swings, unblinking stare, glibness
Their plans for this world:
everyone pays them a shit-ton
of money and signs their soul
away for a billion years, and
the thetans are stripped from
our souls, and Xenu is kept
in his underground prison for
eternity
What they’ve given us: Battlefield Earth
What they’ve taken away:
some of Hollywood’s most talented
2 Judaism
First off, I’m not an antiSemite, and I’ve never met a
Jew I didn’t like. The reason
they made it to this spot is because of the influence they’ve
had on other religions. And I’m
not talking about the MiddleEast; that shitstorm cannot be
blamed on one faction. What
started as a simple tribal religion for Israelites has spread to
all corners of the world, notably with the spin-off religions
of Christianity and later Islam.
All three religions are distinct
now, but the latter two plagiarise a lot from the Hebrew
Bible, and they essentially
worship the same god--Yahweh, also known as Jehovah
and Allah. It’s sort of like how
the Queen of England is also
the Queen of Canada and the
Queen of New Zealand. So for
Judaism’s role in forming other
religions, it earns my number 2
spot.
Typical behaviour: to be
honest, most Jews are pretty
cool people, and don’t all act
one way
Their plans for this world:
following God’s first commandment: Go forth, be fruitful, multiply
What they’ve given us: Christianity, Islam, circumcision
What they’ve taken away:
polytheism
1 Atheism
Okay, it’s not a religion—it’s
the rejection of all religions
on the grounds that they are
untrue, dishonest, thieving, or
whatever. But let’s face it—
reality sucks. That’s why we
drink to forget on the weekends. Maybe it is safer to bury
your head in the sand and believe a cosmic superhero will
beam you up to the afterlife
where you will be forgiven
for your sins and praised for
the good you’ve done in your
life. Okay, probably not going to happen, but if you can
keep this psychological house
of cards standing long enough,
you’ll live a long and happy
life without ever worrying
about why there’s something
from nothing. And for blowing
a wind on the world’s houseof-cards religions, atheism
deserves the number one spot
on this list.
Typical behaviour: an upturned nose whenever anyone
brings up religion
Their plans for this world: an
end to superstition and ritual
worship
What they’ve given us: rationality, and a childhood-shattering view of how the universe
really is
What they’ve taken away:
eternal life
Riddle Answers
1. soap
2. footsteps
3. Brad was a window washer and he
jumped into the building.
4. when it’s ajar
5. hurricane
6. He’s a midget who can’t reach the
button for his floor. When it’s raining, he
uses his umbrella to reach up and press the
higher button.
7. airplane cabin
8. stick
Crossword Answers
ACROSS
1 LSD
4 ATP
7 DEA
10 METE
11 SKA
12 AJAR
13 MAAM
14 IOU
15 MARK
16 AFRICA
18 LIONS
20 SANGSANG
22 SOBER
25 HONGDAE
28 LOO
29 HON
30 AND
31 RHOMBUS
34 MENTO
36 TOASTERS
38 ABORT
39 ITCHED
43 DUOS
44 LOG
46 AERO
47 IRIE
48 EVE
49 PROM
50 YAS
51 RAN
52 EBS
DOWN
1 LEAF
2 STAR
3 DEMISE
4 ASIAN
5 TKO
6 PAULSON
7 DJANGDAN
8 EARS
9 ARK
10 MMA
12 AMONG
17 CAR
19 IAN
21 GHOST
22 SLR
23 OOH
24 BOOTBOIS
26 ANT
27 EDO
29 HUSTLER
32 MOOSE
33 BAR
34 MRT
35 ESCAPE
37 EIGEN
38 AURA
40 HERB
41 EROS
42 DOM
43 DIY
45 OVA
Nabiya Cat Shelter
Jon Twitch
Hidden away in Itaewon is a
shelter for homeless cats run by
volunteers. These people pump
some serious money into the
shelter, simply to ease the suffering of a sadly small number of cats
at a time. If you ever think about
adopting a cat, you really should
go to a group like this. But please
don’t buy a cat on a whim; a cat is
a life companion who could stay
with you up to 20 years.
Broke: Who runs Nabiya?
Nabiya: Juyun Yu (Joon) started Nabiya as she felt there’re
more cats who need help when
she rented a separate place for
her own rescued cats.
Broke: Where do you rescue
cats from?
Nabiya: There is an online
community called KOPC (Korean
Organization for the Protection
of Cats). The runner of Nabiya and Korean volunteers are
members of this community.
Most of the cats are brought
from the neighborhoods of the
members of KOPC when they
ask for help. As Nabiya is in
Seoul we accept most of those
cats in need from Seoul area.
We take friendly cats or little
kittens who can be saved from
becoming wild.
These days as Nabiya is
becoming well known, lots of
foreigners bring their cats because they give up taking them
back to their home countries.
Quite a few of our shelter
cats once adopted by foreigners come back as well because
their housing status is no longer pet friendly or they realize
it’s too costly to take the cat
back home.
Prolly they didn’t study
enough how much it would cost
and what the process will be to
take the cat back to their home
country.
Broke: Is it much of a problem with foreigners adopting
cats and returning them?
Nabiya: Yes, it happens a lot
and we got 4 cats back from
those foreign adopters during
the past week. We are very
disappointed that happens when
they promised us to take them
back to their home countries.
We are going to be more
strict and straightforward on
adoption from now on.
Broke: What do you do with
rescued cats?
Nabiya: We keep them at the
shelter till we can find a home
for them. We try to find foster homes for cats who cannot
mingle as well.
Broke: How do you prioritise
which cats to rescue? ie) will
you rescue cats that are more
likely to be adopted and become
pets? Or will you rescue cats
that are unhealthy and will likely die if they aren’t rescued?
Nabiya: We would help both
cats but we don’t want to keep
sick cats at the shelter and we
do not have enough finance to
help those because we spend a
lot for the shelter cats already
once they get sick. If someone
wants to help a sick cat on the
street, we recommend to take
it to a vet clinic because we
can’t do anything about it.
Broke: Have you ever had
any problems with diseases
brought in by rescued cats?
Nabiya: Yes, a few months
ago, pan leukopenia killed 10
shelter cats, mostly kittens.
Broke: Let’s say I find a litter
of stray baby kittens living in my
alley. What would you advise me
to do? What options do I have?
Nabiya: I would suggest you that
you bring them home if you can
catch them. Or take them to a vet
where they will accept them.
We can help if you need
help to catch them but we are
not available 24 hours a day.
A shelter is not safe for little
ones and it’s best if you can
keep them till you can find
homes for them.
Taegun
Broke: Tell me about trapneuter-return. Do you guys
participate in it? Do you offer
help to anyone else who does?
Nabiya: KOPC helps. if you
want help you can deposit about
200 000 won for trap rent and
you can do a trap/neuter/return.
There are many supporting
clinics for feral cat neutering.
Or you can contact your district
office for more information. We
do not trust the district authority because it’s a random trap,
but Seoul has started TNR citywide last April.
Yongsan and Gangnam make
it as volunteer so that you can
rent a trap from a clinic and do
TNR yourself as well.
Broke: I think Korean attitudes toward cats are changing. Do you agree?
Nabiya: it’s changing as many
young people start to keep
cats as pets but still there are
doomed spots where people
take advantage of stray cats or
free-roaming cats. They make
medicine for arthritis. Moran
Market is notorious for that and
for dog meat as well.
Broke: What are your biggest
expenses?
Nabiya: Clinic costs when
cats are sick...cuz it becomes
an epidemic if one is sick.
We do everything we can to
save their lives although they
are dying...and euthanasia is
our last option and we have
done it only once so far.
Broke: How can we help
Nabiya Shelter?
Nabiya: You can make a donation, foster cats, volunteer.
Find out more at
cafe.daum.net/kittenshelter
Note: Serious thought must
go into adopting a cat. These
are not roommates. Don’t be a
dick on this; they need love.
Ssamzie
Tori