By Scott Freeman Cal Green was a guitarist who dabbled in a broad range of musical styles. Growing up in Texas in the 1940s and 1950s, he was at first influenced by the blues. Clarence “Gatemouth” Brown was his idol as a youngster. Then, in 1954, Hank Ballard and The Midnighters came thru town in [...]

By Jen Lee

By Scott Freeman

I’ve come to a decision. Now that we’ve come to the 10^th installment of Funky Seoul Corner, I’ve decided to devote every 10^th installment in the future to a 45 from the 80s. Now, when I say 80s music I don’t want you think Culture Club, Wham, Spandau Ballet and those kinds of groups. Nor do I want you to think of the 80s glam hair-bands, either. I state the aforementioned because 80s music, when we talk about it, usually has those kinds of referents. But Funky Seoul Corner is not about popular music of the 80s or about popular music in any era specifically–it’s about unknown and underappreciated music that deserves to be heard at least once, in my humble opinion.

By Jen Lee

Toon by Lee Scott and words by Iwazaru

With the election of Park Won-soon, the liberal independent candidate, in the October 26 mayoral election, the debate over free lunches, free college tuition and other welfare policies has dominated policy-making discussions around Seoul and the country.

One side that has emerged lately is that the increased cost of the free lunches is taxing local governments who have to allocate larger percentages of welfare spending to the free lunches away from other programs.

By Yann Kerloc’h

I shot these images in Busan, Korea, on October 8th. Some filmmakers and people related to movies took buses to see the female worker Kim Jin-suk, who had been occupying a crane on the grounds of her factory, Hanjin, for more than 8 months (since January 6). She has since come down.

This event is a complex story to tell and I guess only Koreans will get what it is about without further information. In addition to the link above, see here for 3WM’s coverage of the issue.

By Scott Freeman

Ok, so here’s what I did. I was searching thru one of my boxes of 45s and I ran across Ureaus’ “Let Our Music Make Love To You.” I thought this obscure disc would make this week’s Funky Seoul Corner quite brief. After all, who has ever heard of Ureaus and this track on the Mel-Mel label? No one, probably. So I went on the net to confirm my hunch.

Well, I wasn’t overwhelmed by what I found, but I did find more than I expected. Turns out that Mel-Mel was a label out of Washington D.C.. But Mel-Mel was a one-off label, meaning that the 45 you see before you was the only 45 ever put out on this label. Why only one release? I have no idea, actually. In the realm of funky, soulful hard-to-find 45s you find that one-off labels are not all that uncommon. I’m guessing, too, that Mel Edwards, the producer and arranger of the disc, was behind the label’s name. I’m also putting one and one together and kind of guessing that since Mel-Mel was from the U.S. capital, so too was Ureaus.

By Jen Lee and 3WM

It’s nearly December and the notorious Korean Mosquitoes or mogee continue to infiltrate apartments and pester occupants late in to the night. This year’s wacky weather led to a great absence of the pests in September thanks to all the flooding that basically washed them and their pools of eggs away.

Then, in November, we had some chilly weather and it seemed that they were gone for good until, over the past few days, the temps headed for the balmy range, hitting 16 degrees Celsius (60 degrees Fahrenheit) Sunday and Monday. Now they’re back and buzzing around in ninja mode.

By 3WM

Thousands of young adults pass through South Korea each year, teaching English in private schools that together make up one of the country’s largest industries. Korea, long isolated by culture and geography, with a complex language and set of social mores, can be a difficult place to call home. Chris Tharp has begun to make a name for himself as a travel writer, and in this gruff but affectionate memoir, explains why Korea can be both hard to like and hard to leave. He navigates his way through the timeless alleys and neon streets of Korea’s cities, painting a picture of a society that is at once ancient and utterly modern; he serves in the trenches of the English teaching industry, working his way from the private, for-profit academy to the university; he treks through the peninsula’s mountain valleys and rides deep into the country’s rural soul on the back of his motorcycle; he also explores the internal geography of Korea, from nearly being deported over a comedy performance, getting caught in the middle of a street riot, to staring face-to-face with North Korean soldiers along the DMZ.

By Scott Freeman

Marvin Smith is a legend within the Northern Soul and Soul Circuit. (Yes, I do use the present tense to describe him because in so far as I know he is still with us.) I could give you his full resume, but you can easily Google his name to find out that information.

Suffice it to say that he was a fixture throughout the 60s Chicago soul scene and most noted for his involvement with “The Artistics,” a soul group that put out a handful of LPs and 45s on local Chicago labels (Okeh and Brunswick).

The 45 you see before you is the second to last 45 that Marvin ever cut. This soul gem is on the Mayfield label, another Chicago label owned by the one-and-only Curtis Mayfield. (The influence of Curtis Mayfield on the soul scene, past-present-future, is undeniable. You will surely see him mentioned in future Funky Seoul Corners…) If you look at the 45 closer, you will also see Mayfield’s name listed as both the producer and the writer of the featured track, “You’re Really Something Sadie.”

By Jen Lee

By Jen Lee

Here in Korea a baby’s age is one year old at birth and then he or she turns two with the new year. Thus you could be born on December 28 and in less than a week you’d be two years old. That puts most foreigners in a weird position of answering age questions (which are part of almost any introductory conversation) differently about how old they are. Koreans will add years to your life which hits some with the odd feeling of being older when they don’t want to be (especially females). But it’s nothing personal.

By 3WM
For thousands of young Westerners, South Korea is an escape from reality. It is a place where money is easy and booze is cheap. By day they toil in crooked cram-schools, teaching the peninsula’s violent, video game-obsessed youth. At night they cut loose and embrace Korea’s famous drinking culture.

Among these disaffected young teachers is Alexander. Young, naïve and a little drunker than most, he is struggling to cope with life on the “wrong side of the world”. In The Dog Farm we follow Alex from girl to girl, beer to beer, across Korea, to Japan, and back again, in an unlikely love story.

By 3WM
Running from Monday, October 24 to Saturday, October 29,the exhibition is inspired by living beings that surround us. Their organic mechanisms turn into kinetics-moving structures and sounding devices, creating an interface for the audience to feel, see, and hear the arts and science of marvelous nature.

By Scott Freeman

Marvin Smith is a legend within the Northern Soul and Soul Circuit. (Yes, I do use the present tense to describe him because in so far as I know he is still with us.) I could give you his full resume, but you can easily google his name to find out that information.

Suffice it to say that he was a fixture throughout the 60s Chicago soul scene and most noted for his involvement with “The Artistics,” a soul group that put out a handful of LPs and 45s on local Chicago labels (Okeh and Brunswick).

The 45 you see before you is the second to last 45 that Marvin ever cut. This soul gem is on the Mayfield label, another Chicago label owned by the one-and-only Curtis Mayfield. (The influence of Curtis Mayfield on the soul scene, past-present-future, is undeniable. You will surely see him mentioned in future Funky Seoul Corners…) If you look at the 45 closer, you will also see Mayfield’s name listed as both the producer and the writer of the featured track, “You’re Really Something Sadie.”