Dan Deacon, January 28 Concert; Still Blissed Out

So I managed to get out of the house on Saturday night to see one of the most singular artists out there right now, and one of my favorites: Dan Deacon.


There's music that's good to get people dancing at parties -- I always thought The Chemical Brothers' were good for that. And there's bliss-out music -- sometimes that's the same stuff.

And there's music that's musically dull, but gets asses shaking, and because people feel good when their asses shake, it may lead to bliss-out-like states (though it's more thanks to the atmosphere than to the music itself). I always thought Black Eyed Peas' Let's Get Retarded was a good example of that. And there's simply "Jump up and down" music. All of these play well at dance parties.

But if, instead of humans gathering for a dance party, the musical instruments grew hands and feet, and gathered somewhere to have a party, and maybe got high first... Dan Deacon is how I imagine that party would sound.

source

Dan Deacon did a show last Saturday night, and I went, and boy I'm glad I did. I like writing about bliss-outs, and I don't know why, but dance and house music are some of the most bliss-out prone styles out there, when you share it with a room of two or five-hundred people. A few of the tallest joys I've experienced in shared moments (the romance between me and wifeoseyo aside) have been dancing to techno-ish music.

And Dan Deacon is a genius in that realm. He takes loops and electronic squeals and shapes them into journeys that get more fun, the louder you play them. And then suddenly the electronic squeals are singing words: my buddy Yujin (from Yujin is Huge) joined me for the show, and as I struggled to describe Dan Deacon, he said, "So it's like Fantasia had a dance party"... if memory serves. I was several beers deep by then. The first three times I listened to Dan Deacon's albums, I didn't get them. Before deleting them off my hard drive, on a whim, I cranked the volume... and I got it. Now I love it, but I have to warn you not to listen to Dan Deacon while driving: you'll speed.

But to avoid making his show just about him and the musics he can make, Dan Deacon spoke to the crowd, and worked a lot to get the crowd as involved in the music as he could. He regularly cleared a circle in the dance floor, and asked the audience to do funny games or activities that would get everyone doing the same thing.

Some were silly, some were awesome, but all of them increased the feeling of connection with the music, with the artist, and with the rest of the crowd. This was his goal, I'm sure, and it took the concert to a whole other level:
(picture from the opening act)


I've been to an Arcade Fire concert where they left the stadium through the crowd in Vancouver, and that was awesome, but this was something else, and the intimacy of sharing a bliss-out was an experience I hadn't had.

He asked the entire crowd to follow this girl in the beige jacket, who'd won the right to lead the dance in a contest on his website.


During the last song of the show -- the encore -- you can see how he and the audience are just as in tune with the music, and each other.


The last song -- a new track called "USA" ended (not seen here: sometimes I put my camera away and just enjoy stuff) with a progression of warm chords that brought the high of the night down into a mellow sharing, everyone around Dan Deacon moving together and bobbing their heads in something I can only call communion. Joy can be shared, bliss and art can be experienced together (with each other, and together with other people), in a way that an isolated dude with an MP3 player on the bus will never understand, until someone gives him a hi-five and pulls him into a tornado of dancing people.



And that's why you should go to a Dan Deacon show... and go for it. Dont' stand by the wall and watch. Jump in. Two days later, I'm still exhilarated.

This picture sums up dance parties in a couple of ways. I like it.


After the show, I thanked him for coming to Seoul, and for his music. He was a cool guy, because he wasn't trying to be cool: he was the guy who lives down the hall in your dorm, except really, really, really good at making music that makes people completely happy.

Weekly Round-up: Links from the Radio Show, and Something Funny

Every Thursday, at 8:30AM, I present a short piece called "Blog Buzz" on TBS English radio 101.3's morning show. In it, I discuss the stories that have been generating buzz, or just catching my interest as something unique, interesting, or worthwhile, on the Korea blogs, during the last (approximate) week.

Here are some of the things I shared this week:

My Two Favorite accounts of Seollal this year were Xweing, a Chinese Malaysian who lives in Busan, reflects on the differences between Lunar new year in Malaysia, and in Korea -- because I'm from a culture that doesn't celebrate Lunar New Year, Korean New Year is basically a family thing, where in Malaysia, there are street parties, decorations and fireworks -- it's a much more public event.

http://xweing.blogspot.com/2012/01/celebrating-cny-in-korea.html 

There's a wistfulness here, kind of like the writings Western expats have when they write about Korean Christmas, that you don't get from Western writers talking about Korean New Year, and it's very interesting. Western expats write about Korean Lunar New Year with more curiosity, because it's new to us, so Xweing's perspective is refreshing.

If I Had A Minute To Spare has a New Years account that seems more familiar to western expats, about visting his wife's family in Gangwon-do. 

Ask A Korean continued his series on Suicide in Korea with part four: worth reading, and a reminder that saying "Korea has a suicide culture" and leaving it at that is an intellectually lazy cop-out: observing a cultural phenomenon insists we ask, "How did the culture get this way?" --there's still work to be done. Especially in Korea's case, where in the early '80s, Korea's suicide rate was one of the world's lowest.
http://askakorean.blogspot.com/2012/01/suicide-in-korea-series-iv-how-suicide.html

What should you do this weekend?

If I had to choose only one thing Chris in South Korea has ever made, to be linked, spread, and shared, this would be it. The entertaining and helpful flowchart "What to do this weekend?" (a polished final version of one he made a little while ago) asks a bunch of simple questions that guide you towards a host of sights and activities to try or see all around Korea. Good weather? Bad weather? Flush with cash? Broke? Wanna live it up? Wanna take it easy? Tired of palaces and temples? There's something for you. It's Seoul-centric -- Going to Daegu or Busan are options on the "Get out of town" side, but it's interesting, and if you try to do every single activity on the list, you'll have a frantic year (or two) in Korea, but come away having had a pretty darn good experience of the country.

Give it a look! Bookmark it, link it, share it, and refer to it.

Last One:

Finally, we didn't have time to cover it on air, last week or this, but I'd like to send you to check out Charles Montgomery's great piece on the problems (he's had) with Korean self-study. It's an entertaining account of the circular "new book/tail off/forget what I've learned" cycle. The article ends with a good argument for getting into formal classes.

Interestingly, it's hosted as a guest post on the blog of Hanguk Drama, whose author is a self-taught Korean speaker, and has managed to find a method or motivation Mr. Monty didn't. Go read it here.

A couple more:
These weren't on the radio, of course, but Stephen Colbert's interview of "Where The Wild Things Are" author Maurice Sendak is laugh-out-loud hilarious. Part 1:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Part 2:

The Colbert Report
Get More: Colbert Report Full Episodes,Political Humor & Satire Blog,Video Archive

Source

And... I've been on a Tom Waits kick lately. He's probably my favorite singer... and that's some rare air up there... and he's made about ten albums I'll listen to without even thinking about hitting the "Skip" button... and that's hard to do. Offhand, I can only think of two or three other artists who have made more than two albums during which I'd never hit "Skip"

Maybe some day I'll blog a list of albums I listen to without ever hitting "Skip," but not today.

Today, here's a list of Tom Waits' albums, ranked from worst to best, and I'd recommend any of the top ten to you, if you love music that takes you on a journey, and a well-written song.

Baby News!

Not mine, though. Go to Ms. Lee To Be's blog and congratulate her on the arrival of her little one.

While you're there, browse her archives for some very insightful posts on the Korean pediatric hospital/doctor/care system.

YAY!

The Deal with 떡 (Ddeok): Korea's Weird Rice Cake

This stuff.

(Image source)

There's a ddeok shop not too far from where I live, that sells the best ddeok I've ever eaten. And I've eaten my share: a former home of mine was near Nakwon Sangga, also known as that huge building that sells tons of musical instruments (and features a movie theater best known for [perhaps formerly] being a gay hook-up spot), and at one end of the pass where the road goes under that building, there are two shops, across the street from each other, that sell really good ddeok.

What is ddeok? If you live in Korea, and interact with Koreans, you've probably had this experience: a Korean says "Hey there (your name): I'd like to give you a traditional Korean snack. It's really delicious!" The degree of enthusiasm might vary, but a whole lot of Koreans like ddeok, some enough to make overstated claims about its deliciousness. Then they give you a round thing that's perhaps the size of a mini-muffin, half a piece of pound cake, or a large piece of candy or toffee. You put it in your mouth... and it's this weird, heavy, dense, C-H-EEEEE-W-Y rice-tasting thing that's mildly sweet at best, and perhaps covered in powders that make it the experience of eating it similar to putting a spoonful of flour in your mouth with a hunk of unflavored, unsweetened toffee (that doesn't get softer in your mouth), or gummy peanut butter (that doesn't taste like peanuts). To be polite, because of the very expectant look on your Korean friend's face, you say "oh yeah. It's good." But your mind is racing, going "can I spit this out without being noticed?" and "What the HELL is this?"

You decline a second piece, and avoid it in the future.

There are three main ways people encounter ddeok: in soup (ddeok guk - a traditional new year's meal), in spicy sauce (ddeokbokki, a very popular street food), and as a snack, in little slabs or balls.

If we must assign everything in Korea a western/international parallel, then ddeok is Korea's Christmas Cake: heavy, popular holiday gift, really filling, acquired taste (to say the least), many varieties, REALLY well-loved by those who like it, but those who don't like it really, really don't get what the fuss is about... and the subject of a disproportionate number of situations where somebody has to pretend they like a holiday gift more than they actually do.

Image source

I won't say ddeok is my favorite Korean food, but if you put it in front of me, I'll try it. As with most foods, I don't usually like foods per se -- I like good food. Crappy food is crappy, and a crappy version of my "favorite" food is still crappy, while good food is good, and a good version of a food I usually don't like, is still good. I've had maeuntang (usually a dish I REALLY dislike) that I loved this year. And I've had spaghetti (which is my favorite dish, cooked properly) that I hated.

Now that that's out of the way, I'm always startled by how strong, and negative, the response is when I ask, offer, or discuss ddeok with an expat -- it's not the most accessible of Korean foods, I know, but the reaction, it seems to me, is out of proportion... especially considering that many people I know who hate ddeok as a snack, still happily eat ddeokbokki (ddeok in spicy sauce). In this post, I'm talking about the snacks, which are packable, so they're often encountered on picnics and field trips.

As always, after thinking about this a little too much, I've cooked up a personal hypothesis as to why ddeok gets such a negative response.

Problem 1: As with Kimchi, Korean Koreans have grown up around other Ko-Ko's, so they don't have outside reference points who haven't grown up eating the same foods, to provide an outside view and inform them, "Hey there. Chapchae's a very accessible food for people who don't know anything about Korean food. So is bulgogi. You might want to hold off on juk (bland rice porridge) and nurungji (bland scorched rice) soup and not build people's expectations for soju or kimchi too high, because at best they're acquired tastes, and don't taste as good to people who didn't drink their way through university/grow up with them." The same echo chamber/cultural pride double-whammy that leads (the kind of) Koreans (who offer to show new FOB expats around) to believe every foreigner in Korea wants nothing more than to see palaces palaces palaces (when I got here, the first three Koreans who wanted to show me around Seoul all, independently brought me to Gyeongbokgung) contributes to a lack of self-awareness about which foods non-Koreans will take to more easily, and which require some briefing on what to expect.

As Joe Zenkimchi has been telling us, in his sexy way, for years now, many Koreans simply have no idea which Korean foods are appealing to non-Koreans. To the detriment of Korean food promotions, and the successful introduction of new arrivals to Korean foods. I've seen this some people around me as well: yes, dwenjang is a representative Korean food... it's also really strong-smelling and tasting, and takes a few tries to get used to. It's a great pick for someone inquisitive who's been here three months, but not for someone who only has a week here.

Problem 2: there's really no snack similar to ddeok in the west. Even the rice most westerners eat isn't the sticky variety they like in Korea. Most chewy snacks in the west are very sweet (think salt-water toffee, skittles or the various brands of fruit-flavored chewy snacks). Most bland-tasting snacks are salted and/or quite crunchy (think corn chips, shortbread cookies, or plain popcorn), and often/usually taken with flavorings or garnishes (butter, salsa, dips). Foods that are somewhat similar to familiar foods are easier for people to like, because we can categorize it more easily - that's why genre movies and musicians are easier to promote than genre-defying films and musicians. Which radio station do you put Florence and the Machine onto? Rock? Pop? Chamber? Folk? Twee-folk? Aw screw it. Because there's no readily available snack category I could recognize and assign ddeok to, I don't know how to respond to it.

Problem 3: It's often one of the first Korean snacks a Korean sticks under the nose of new expats... or at least introduce far too early in the Korea experience. Ddeok is good in its own way, especially when it's fresh (it's like croissants that way: don't even bother eating a croissant that's more than 24 hours old. Ditto for a good ddeok. The best time to eat it is when it's fresh out of the steamer.) But it's a very Korean type of snack, and as such, people new to the cuisine would be better prepared to enjoy it for what it is, and compare it to other reference points within Korean cuisine (in which context it makes more sense), if they already have a solid grounding in the variety of tastes and textures that are common to Korean meals and snacks.

Problem 4: The ddeok expats are given is often not the best example of ddeok. I've had some good ddeok, and I've had some bad ddeok, and the stuff wrapped in plastic the you can pick up as an afterthought next to the cash register at the Ministop on your way to meet that new Canadian teacher who you're going to show around Gyeongbok palace? Not the best. That's like talking up Canada's beer culture (microbrew. mmm) and then introducing it with a can of warm Molson Canadian (Canada's Hite).

I think more expats in Korea would like ddeok if they were given good ddeok, and were prepared for it, both by having had a variety of Korean foods and snacks beforehand, and with a little warning about what's to come, and being alerted that many find it an acquired taste. I'm kind of a fan now... if it's good, but it took me a while to get there.

Wikipedia is going dark to protest SOPA. So Did I.

Why am I against SOPA?

A South Korean parallel: South Korea has laws protecting the nation from North Korean spies, that were written in the Cold War (that is: harsh and a little reactionary, because that was the political climate at the time). Problem is, now that South Korea’s a democracy, those laws still haven’t been updated to account for the fact South Koreans have way more freedoms now than they did in the ‘70s, when thousands of journalists and critics of the government were arrested and/or had their reputations or careers ruined.

And the reason it makes me nervous to come across laws that cast such a wide net is this:

First: It’s impossible to monitor ALL online activity that might be North Korea friendly/threatening to the stability of the South Korean government. In the same way, it's impossible to block ALL content that might be pirated.

Next: If we can’t monitor ALL activity, we must ask by what principle people decide who to monitor, and who to ignore: when to exercise the law and bring someone in for interrogation, and when to let it slide. When to move to shut down or block their website, and when to let it slide.

But: All too often, the way decisions are made on who to scrutinize, aren’t so much on who’s actually most North Korea friendly, but who’s pissed off the government currently in power the most -- simply because they're the ones who got the government's attention 

So: The law amounts to free license for people with power to hound those who piss them off, by pulling on a pretty-much unrelated hook that almost EVERYBODY has in their cheek, which will, regardless that it’s not really connected to the offense they committed, still put them in a really bad position. If we make farting illegal, then I have a blank slate to accuse anyone I dislike of farting and thus get them out of my hair on a 

There’s just too much danger of selective application of this law to become a lever that the moneyed businesses in power use to bully the little guy, and control what the little guy sees and reads. When this guy's podcast got too popular, there was a convenient way available to shut him up without having to look at the legality of prosecuting him over his podcast. And they did it.

3. The people trying to protect copyright online are fighting a losing battle, and whether this law gets passed or not, will find themselves needing to find a new revenue stream anyway. Even the SOPA will only delay the inevitable, which is this: record companies become irrelevant, because technology's reached a point where anybody can cut an album with some instruments and a computer, and digitally distribute it and become famous in their musical genre, if they're good. And it's good for music that it's so easy to make music.

Here are the two best posts I've found explaining SOPA. Go read them. If you're an American, write your local congressperson. Do it.

http://blog.reddit.com/2012/01/technical-examination-of-sopa-and.html

http://www.pajiba.com/think_pieces/the-stop-online-piracy-act-sopa-and-the-protect-ip-act-pipa-explained-with-profanity-.php

The video at the beginning of this post is a great explanation of why EVERYBODY (not just Americans) should care about this:

http://lifehacker.com/5860205/all-about-sopa-the-bill-thats-going-to-cripple-your-internet