Thread by @BonicMichael

If anything has the ability to transcend culture & ideology and universally connect people’s hearts & minds, it’s music. Morten Traavik and Funky Sueyoshi bring Western music into North Korea, whose music students readily assimilate in their love of music.
nknews.org/2021/07/pop-ag…

2/“In spring 2013,…a small team of Norwegian artists headed into the heart of the Hermit Kingdom to record a tribute album to international pop stars a-ha, re-interpreted by elite accordion students of Pyongyang's Kum Song (Gold Star) Music School.”
shiptoshoremedia.com/products/take-…

3/The Sun Always Shines on T.V. in North Korea

“From the 2013 photo and recording sessions for the album "Pyongyang Gold Stars Play Great Popular Hits Vol.1", the whole a-ha debut record "Hunting High and Low" covered by a North Korean accordion boy band

4/"under the direction of Morten Traavik. More at traavik.info”

Pyongyang Gold Stars “Take On Me”
vimeo.com/552514081
Tack Listing:
Side A
1) The General Galloping On a White Horse
2) Take On Me
3) Train of Thought
4) Hunting High and Loww
5) The Blue Sky

5/
6) Living a Boy's Adventure Tale

Side B
1) The Sun Always Shines On T.V.
2) And You Tell Me
3) Love is Reason
4) I Dream Myself Alive
5) Here I Stand and Face the Rain
6) he Sun Always Shines On T.V.

6/Prior to the recording of Take On Us! by Traavik & PY Gold Stars, for six years Funky Sueysho, Japanese drummer and author, broke ground in “The North Korea Rock Project,” which resulted in the drummer visiting the DPRK five times between 2006 and 2012.”

https://twitter.com/BonicMichael/status/1328088280156389376?s=20

7/「Murumpyo (Question mark)」 is the first rock song ever recorded in North Korea, in Pyongyang in 2007.

北朝鮮初のオリジナルロック曲「Murumpyo (Question mark)」