A thumping rock beat, driven by the toms and snare. Face-melting guitar solos with screaming distortion. An over-the-top vocal crescendo into the upper limits of the singer’s range.
The music may have sounded like something by an 80s hair metal band, but the lyrics told another story, invoking a 5,000-year history, the spirit of Mount Paektu and a “love of toil that shall never die.”
“As by the people’s will we strive, Korea shall forever thrive!” belted one of North Korea’s most famous singers, as fireworks went off and leader Kim Jong Un and military officials applauded.
A highly unusual performance kicked off a military ceremony in Pyongyang on Sunday, state television footage showed, as a nine-piece band fronted by female musicians in DPRK flag T-shirts played a heavy rock rendition of the country’s national anthem, “Aegukka.”
But one expert told NK News that the performance was not the first time that North Korea has experimented with rock music, even as it cracks down on foreign influence, and may have even been an attempt to build on the “virality” of new pro-Kim propaganda music released earlier this year.
Sunday’s performance took place at the start of a ceremony at the Mirim military parade training complex in Pyongyang, where Kim Jong Un pledged to hand over 250 new “tactical ballistic missile launchers” to “front-line units” on the border with South Korea amid escalating tensions.
Footage appeared to show former Moranbong Band singer Kim Ok Ju leading the group, which also featured a guitarist, bassist, two keyboardists, a drummer and three backing vocalists.
Other former members of the girl group, famous for its novel blend of rock and pop that deviates from other propaganda music, may have also performed on Sunday, though the footage’s low quality makes it difficult to confirm.
The party daily Rodong Sinmun referred to the rockers as the “combined military band” and reported that their “dynamic tune of revolutionary military music” added “joy and militant enthusiasm” to the event.
But while the leader Kim clapped at the end, the blank expressions of audience members during the performance suggested that many were not quite sure what to make of it all.
Peter Moody, a postdoctoral scholar at the George Washington University and expert on DPRK media, told NK News that the performance wasn’t the first time Pyongyang has experimented with “hard rock or metal-sounding music.”
He noted that the Moranbong Band formed in 2012 and the Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble from the 1980s both delved into rock music during their careers.
“The DPRK has also been on the receiving end of cultural diplomacy initiatives involving rock and metal for quite some time,” Moody said, citing visits by Japanese drummer Funky Sueyoshi from 2006 to 2012 and Slovenian band Laibach in 2015.
Kim Jong Un’s older brother, Kim Jong Chul, is also known to be a fan of rock music and electric guitars, having traveled abroad to watch British guitarist Eric Clapton perform in both Singapore and London.
“Clearly prominent North Korean musicians have some windows into internationally circulating genres of music, including metal, even if the state attempts to prevent the general population from accessing foreign music.”
The popularity of foreign media inside the country, particularly pop music, movies and television from South Korea, has become a growing concern for Pyongyang in recent years, and the state has moved to suppress the spread of outside culture as part of efforts to promote loyalty to the Kim regime.
Moody explained that during times of “intensified crackdowns” on foreign culture, there is more “incentive for the state to produce local, indigenized varieties of foreign cultural styles to reduce the chances people will look elsewhere to satisfy their craving.”
In April, North Korea released a new song praising Kim Jong Un as the nation’s “friendly father,” and the song was not only reportedly popular among North Koreans but also went viral globally on platforms like TikTok.
Moody said Sunday’s hard rock performance may have tried “to build on the accidental attention” of April’s propaganda release, and it’s possible that this arrangement was partially “planned with an international audience in mind.”
For now, it remains unclear whether the new hard rock anthem will achieve the global success of the paean to Kim Jong Un, but technical problems may limit its appeal: With high-definition broadcasts of North Korean television currently inaccessible, the only readily available version of the performance features slightly garbled audio that likely won’t be music to most people’s ears.
Edited by Bryan Betts
The music may have sounded like something by an 80s hair metal band, but the lyrics told another story, invoking a 5,000-year history, the spirit of Mount Paektu and a “love of toil that shall never die.”
“As by the people’s will we strive, Korea shall forever thrive!” belted one of North Korea’s most famous singers, as fireworks went off and leader Kim Jong Un and military officials applauded.
A highly unusual performance kicked off a military ceremony in Pyongyang on Sunday, state television footage showed, as a nine-piece band fronted by female musicians in DPRK flag T-shirts played a heavy rock rendition of the country’s national anthem, “Aegukka.”
But one expert told NK News that the performance was not the first time that North Korea has experimented with rock music, even as it cracks down on foreign influence, and may have even been an attempt to build on the “virality” of new pro-Kim propaganda music released earlier this year.
Sunday’s performance took place at the start of a ceremony at the Mirim military parade training complex in Pyongyang, where Kim Jong Un pledged to hand over 250 new “tactical ballistic missile launchers” to “front-line units” on the border with South Korea amid escalating tensions.
Footage appeared to show former Moranbong Band singer Kim Ok Ju leading the group, which also featured a guitarist, bassist, two keyboardists, a drummer and three backing vocalists.
Other former members of the girl group, famous for its novel blend of rock and pop that deviates from other propaganda music, may have also performed on Sunday, though the footage’s low quality makes it difficult to confirm.
The party daily Rodong Sinmun referred to the rockers as the “combined military band” and reported that their “dynamic tune of revolutionary military music” added “joy and militant enthusiasm” to the event.
But while the leader Kim clapped at the end, the blank expressions of audience members during the performance suggested that many were not quite sure what to make of it all.
Peter Moody, a postdoctoral scholar at the George Washington University and expert on DPRK media, told NK News that the performance wasn’t the first time Pyongyang has experimented with “hard rock or metal-sounding music.”
He noted that the Moranbong Band formed in 2012 and the Pochonbo Electronic Ensemble from the 1980s both delved into rock music during their careers.
“The DPRK has also been on the receiving end of cultural diplomacy initiatives involving rock and metal for quite some time,” Moody said, citing visits by Japanese drummer Funky Sueyoshi from 2006 to 2012 and Slovenian band Laibach in 2015.
Kim Jong Un’s older brother, Kim Jong Chul, is also known to be a fan of rock music and electric guitars, having traveled abroad to watch British guitarist Eric Clapton perform in both Singapore and London.
“Clearly prominent North Korean musicians have some windows into internationally circulating genres of music, including metal, even if the state attempts to prevent the general population from accessing foreign music.”
The popularity of foreign media inside the country, particularly pop music, movies and television from South Korea, has become a growing concern for Pyongyang in recent years, and the state has moved to suppress the spread of outside culture as part of efforts to promote loyalty to the Kim regime.
Moody explained that during times of “intensified crackdowns” on foreign culture, there is more “incentive for the state to produce local, indigenized varieties of foreign cultural styles to reduce the chances people will look elsewhere to satisfy their craving.”
In April, North Korea released a new song praising Kim Jong Un as the nation’s “friendly father,” and the song was not only reportedly popular among North Koreans but also went viral globally on platforms like TikTok.
Moody said Sunday’s hard rock performance may have tried “to build on the accidental attention” of April’s propaganda release, and it’s possible that this arrangement was partially “planned with an international audience in mind.”
For now, it remains unclear whether the new hard rock anthem will achieve the global success of the paean to Kim Jong Un, but technical problems may limit its appeal: With high-definition broadcasts of North Korean television currently inaccessible, the only readily available version of the performance features slightly garbled audio that likely won’t be music to most people’s ears.
Edited by Bryan Betts
