I am leaving today - no more to say
You can find yourself some
hooker if you really need a lay
You can keep your dope and
whisky and your chain-smoker’s cough
And just wallow for eternity in liquor and slot
– youn sun nah 5
i thought i should be a nice sister at least once in my life, so the other night, i cooked fantastic dinner for my sister and took her to youn sun nah 5 at the brisbane powerhouse. i really like the brsibane powerhouse. it doesn’t seem to be attracting as many people as it should, which is a shame, but there’s always something going on. we should make more frequent visits to the powerhouse, brisbanites! :) besides, the food at Watt is pretty nice, and it’s right next to the new farm park, so really, you can easily have some seriously fun multiple sensory experiences at any time of the day/night.
the concert turned out to be a very interesting one. youn sun nah 5 consists of four men and one female - the vocal, youn sun nah:
Youn Sun Nah – vocals
Benjamin Moussay – piano
David Neerman – vibraphone
Yoni Zelnik – double bass
David Georgelet – drums
you can find some more info at the Australia Northern Europe Liaisons website.
i quite liked youn sun nah’s voice - it sounded a lot like a good mixture of yoshie nakano (ego-wrappin’) and sora lee, and at certain times it remined me of bjork in a very subtle kind of way. nevertheless, it was quite unique in its own way and sometimes was really exciting when she wasn’t being shy or quiet. the music was great - not a conventional jazz type; nah even (very joyfully) rapped from time to time.
what i found interesting about this band was that the members were actually all from different cultures. french, hebrew, british, korean etc. they met at CIM in france, so they’re still based there. nah sings in korean, french, and hebrew as well, but mainly in english. so all these multi-cultural aspects are blended in musically, lyrically, and visually as well, which is great. i noticed how those songs in korean were mostly really sad, slow, repetitive and quiet - i almost cried listening to one of the songs - those in english, on the other hand, were more lively, daring, fun, sometimes cutesy, and in faster beats. i wonder why. i’m really curious how differently she feels when she expresses herself artistically in different languages.
i definitely have different approaches to communication when i speak in different languages. ok, no, i don’t intentionally pause and think “oh, i’m going to speak korean now so i should communicate this way” but changes just come naturally. and i tend to behave differently depending on which culture i’m in. so jaz, or hee-jeong, in korea would probably be very different to jaz in australia. but still, this is all on a conversational level - so i really wonder, for an artistic work to have a global appeal, what is needed? are there any core elements that make something more communicatively effective and appealing across various cultures? we’re living in a culture that’s overflooded with shallow formulaic products - yes, i’m generalising and i am aware of some ridiculously fantastic cultures happening in many corners of the world, but one can’t deny that what adorno and horkheimer claimed fifty years ago is still happening (no, i don’t agree with their totalistic macro-approach but i do definitely concur with many of their concepts): the manufactured souless culture may in fact be demoting our opportunity of enlightenment to babarianism.
i’m a big believer of aesthetics. i believe that there are core elements of aesthetics that can be communicated across any culture. this is definitely one of the areas that i’d like to study more in the future. at the moment i only have some vague assumptions.
anyway, youn sun nah 5 wasn’t the best musical collaboration that i’ve ever encountered in my life, but i did think that they had some of those core qualities of aesthetics in different ways, and i immensely enjoyed their performance. it was their last concert in australia this time, but if you do have a chance somewhere else in the world - i think their next destination is china or singapore - do check them out. it’ll be a fun night for your senses in a quiet yet exciting way.
