May 10 2008 The Return of Burke Burke has returned from the US for his wedding. I ran into him and his fiancee in Hongdae, and got them to pose for a few pictures for me. It turns out they have been posing for pictures all day so I probably contributed to their stress levels. It has been a while since I stopped by Skunk, but I had a lot of errands to do. Mainly, I needed to donate money to Nevin's tour. Next month, he's bringing the Chinese band Demerit over, and they need donations to pay part of the way. Foreign tours often rely on donations, and it's a good idea to fork over a little money to help bands out. By the way, check out Burke's new site Park Hyun, where he posts political rants and some very interesting musical experiments. |
May 13 2008I'm working on the next issue of Broke, which means it's time to ask for more votes for the Second Annual Brokey Awards. It's important to note that these awards are intended as a retrospective of 2007, not a survey of the current punk scene. There are a lot of notable omissions, but the reason is because the last issue was released in January, and the ballot with nominations was printed back then. There are many new worthy nominations, but they'll just have to wait until the end of the year for the Third Annual Brokeys of 2008. Same as last year, nominations were accepted on the Broke in Korea message board, and the ballot was printed on the back page of Broke #5. Below is a form containing all the categories and nominees.
To vote, copy and paste the text above and e-mail your selections to jon underscore dunbar at hotmail dot com. The deadline is May 19. Winners will be announced sometime around then.
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April 12 2008 Farewell to Jesse Show I wasn't feeling great so I didn't take a lot of pictures. The only band I photographed was BB Lucky Town, and then I felt like going home early. The show had a pretty high attendance, and apparently Chulhwan said that Jesse has more draw than any other band except Crying Nut. |
April 12 2008 Ska Show at DGBD There were a lot of shows going on in Hongdae on the same night. I stopped by DGBD to see a ska band from Japan called Ska'sh Onions. They seemed more like a Sublime-rock-with-horns kind of band than an actual ska band, and most of their songs didn't have the right beat. Of course Kingston Rudieska made up for it with more traditional sounds. I didn't stay long for either set because I had to get to Jesse's goodbye show. |
April 6 2008 Return to Seoul I caught the KTX at 7:20 with Diane, Jeff, and Trash (although those last two got there with only seven minutes to spare) and we returned to Seoul shortly after 10. First thing on my mind was to get home, throw all my clothes in the laundry and shower. Then I said hi to Jung's parents who had been standing there gaping at me. There were a lot of cameras on the trip so I'm looking forward to seeing what everyone's got. So far I've seen Jeff's stuff. Jeff made it up to the amusement park, and then the next day he and Trash hung out in Busan. Rachel has a gallery on Facebook. She didn't make it up to the amusement park but she has some good pictures of Okpo as well as a lot of everyone during our transit. Everyone else, show me the links to yours. |
April 6 2008 Bae Jung Elementary Our last stop in Busan was the Bae Jung Elementary School, which Will had recently discovered not far from his home. He and Ed had visited it the previous week, but their visit was cut short by some workers out front. The only way I know of to see their pictures online is on this site. Will's second visit (with me) And you really have to see more of Will's pictures. His gallery of an abandoned leper colony in Busan is spectacular, as are his travel shots of Cambodia and Burma. |
April 6 2008 Busan All the places we went in Busan were within walking distance of each other, so I got a lot of city pictures while we were on foot. In this part, we passed by a massive abandoned construction site and tried to figure out what was going on with a closed-down hotel next door. |
April 6 2008 Chin Goo Theatre When Will first contacted me, he mentioned there was an old dilapidated theatre he wanted to check out, but he couldn't go there alone as it is a well-known gay hangout. I brought along Diane to serve as the opposite of a beard, we paid our 3000 won at the door, and started taking pictures, careful not to photograph any of the middle-aged men trolling around inside. Diane and I got out on the roof, where I poked my head inside a door only to see two Korean men engaging in a session of (fully clothed) heavy petting. I decided it was time to get out of there and called Will and Ed from outside to let them know we'd be waiting. |
April 6 2008 Busan Everyone wanted to leave early in the morning, but I slept in and headed back around noon with Will and Diane. We had a lot to do in Busan. Just a couple minutes out from the harbour, Diane and I looked out the window and discovered an abandoned skyscraper. This was the best shot I could get after we got off the ferry. Hopefully Will will have a chance to get closer soon. |
April 5 2008 The Journey Begins The thing to remember when planning a trip with Korean punks, is that to them, 8am is late at night, not early in the morning. We met at Seoul Station between 7:30 and 8am, and I discovered that the majority of people coming along had stayed up the night before. The impressive thing is that everyone pretty well made it on time. |
March 29 2008 Down to Nothing A promising night with two foreign bands was ruined thanks to the rain. Not enough people showed up to support the show, and while it was nice to have more elbow room than usual, the show probably lost a lot of money. I made short work of the 7/11's supply of Stout, as I felt it was my duty to pick up the slack from all the non-drinkers there. As I told Tel, "For every beer you don't drink, I'll drink two." As it turns out, Tel didn't drink a large amount of beers. |
March 14 2008 Happy White Day Good old White Day, the day us men pay back our women for all the nice things they got us on Valentine's Day. I know that in western countries they are celebrating Steak and BJ Day but quite frankly we got that one out of the way on February 14 here. |
March 8 2008 Downhell I only found out Downhell was playing in Skunk a couple days earlier. They've been getting very big lately so it's surprised more attention wasn't put into promoting this show, but it looked like most of the people in Skunk hadn't seen them before. Unfortunately the reality TV show that's been following them around wasn't there. I guess they knew we'd probably do something.
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March 1 2008 Rux Single Release It's been a while since I saw Rux last. Hell, it's been a while since I was at a show, but that's not the point. Rux had a great set with an enthusiastic crowd, which is something we've been missing here lately. Also I hung out with a bunch of foreigners and had a pretty good time. And Jonghee, send me that e-mail about Japan. |
March 1 2008 Rux Single Release I know it's been a long time since my last time out. Still, I'm surprised it's been over a month. I had to go out to talk to Jonghee (by the way, I'm still waiting for your e-mail), and I was fairly confident he'd be at this show. There were a lot of bands, but the conditions inside weren't great for photography, so I only took pictures of two bands. Rux had a short set at the start, and then Crying Nut played a surprise set. This was the first time they'd played in this club since it became Skunk Hell, so it was sort of a return for them. It sounds like they've had trouble playing at Skunk because of their manager, but they finally managed to do it. I still have a lot more Rux pictures to go through, but it was a photo-heavy weekend what with the abandoned gynecological office and Samia's going-away party. |
February 15 2008 Condemned Seoul I know this page is going slow. There will still be updates whenever I go to shows, which isn't as much these days. Lately I've had a lot of major additions to my other page, so go and take a look at Condemned Seoul. I've got abandoned neighbourhoods, schools, university buildings, a baseball stadium, and all the Cheonggyecheon you can swallow. |
January 27 2008 Bye Mike (again) Mike's one-year stay in Korea is up, and he's moved back to Germany. I had dinner with him and Gigi last Sunday. It sounds like he'll be back in a couple years again, so I doubt this is the last we'll see of him. Unfortunately I couldn't go to his going-away party in Hongdae on Wednesday because I've gotten tangled up in a big fat web of misunderstanding and Internet vigilantism. |
January 26 2008 Midnight Boot Party I spent the evening with Verv and Joe, who'd been drinking since the morning. The alcohol started to wear on us all before long. Joe passed out in a restaurant and woke up with the urge to go home; we talked him out of it. Verv wanted to do something nice for Mike, who's going to Germany, so he volunteered to slash his forehead open so his face would be drenched in blood. I guess the knife was too dull because he couldn't cut it open. Here he is in the mirror trying to intimidate himself into bleeding. Anyway, it was a fun show, beginning late at 10pm. All four bands were entertaining, and it might not have been crowded but that just gave us more elbow room. |
January 12 2008 GMC Show The highlight of the whole show was these three Korean guys wearing fursuits--one flying squirrel, one white tiger, and one Hello Kitty. They moshed and floorpunched their way through most of the show, and at the end they obliged us with group photos. I'm half repulsed and half impressed by their bravery. And damn right I'm proud to pose next to them. |
January 12 2008 GMC Show When Donghyun showed up, I asked him to introduce me to his Canadian drummer. It turned out Kirk, the guy I'd been talking to all night, was their new drummer. I was surprised. This gallery features Samchung and Captain Bootbois. For the Bootbois set I spent most of my time in a corner on stage. |
January 12 2008 GMC Show The main reason I came to this show was because I heard Captain Bootbois had a new drummer from Canada. I was also looking forward to seeing Joe and Verv again, and I had word that a couple friends were in town from Busan. They never called, and Joe and Verv were very late. At the start of the show, the only other foreigners were Jesse, Diane, and a guy I hadn't seen before named Kirk. One thing I noticed, and remarked to some of the musicians who hadn't noticed before, was that hardcore shows attract a large proportion of girls. Especially odd considering the prevalence of slogans like "Way of Men" or "Brothers for Life." |
January 5 2008 Broke in Korea #5 I've released the fifth issue of Broke a little later than I would've liked. Originally I wanted to put it out before the Korean election, but it wasn't ready in time. Then I announced it would come out on Christmas Eve, but I wasn't allowed to go out that night. Instead I gave Verv the file and he printed out 30 copies, so Santa Claus did come after all. I printed 30 more issues for the Terror show and most of them found their way into people's hands that night. Anyway, it's a pretty good issue, although there's slightly less musical content than previous issues. I'll put the articles online soon. |
January 5 2008 Terror Show After the show, I rescued three members of Terror who'd been separated from the rest of the band and all their Korean guides. |
January 5 2008 Terror Show I really don't know much at all about hardcore, but it's always fun to take pictures at hardcore shows, moreso than other types of music that are further up my alley. Unfortunately there was too much condensation inside, so while I was taking pictures I had a cloth in hand and I would wipe the lens clean between shots. You can see near the end it was getting harder. |
January 5 2008 Terror Show The lights inside Skunk were too bright for my usual camera tricks, so I decided to bump up the film speed and shutter speed and take pictures with natural lighting. There's a bit too much noise but it's a different look than my camera usually has. It also turned out to be too slow to capture jumps and fast action, but I didn't have many choices in there with my flash. |
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Jon underscore Dunbar at Hotmail
010-3212-2812
No long distance calls please; they won't work.
Seriously, don't ask me right now.
Please remember that these photos are all copyrighted to me. If you want to use them in any way, there's a 90 per cent chance I'll give you my permission, and be able to give you a copy with a higher DPI.Copyright Jon Dunbar 2004
Photos taken by
Nikon CoolPix 950
digital camera.