I'm a little obsessed with traditional Korea pop. One of my favorite vocal groups is The Pearl Sisters, featuring sisters Bae In Soon and Bae In Sook. I can't find much about them in English. From what I can tell, their mother originally encouraged them to sing as "The Kim Sisters". Lee Nanyong was an actress and singer during the Korean War and it sounds like she got her daughters involved in 노래 (norae, song) contests held on the military bases. The girls like performing and soon were recording. They became popular with the backing of Korea's godfather of rock'n'roll, Shin Jung Hyeon, the subject of my next post.
Anyway, if you know more about the sisters, leave a comment.
Contemporary K-Pop is such weak, fashion-oriented, easily-consumed and forgettable junk that researching the 50s, 60s, and 70s Korean Pop, Folk, and Rock scenes has been a real joy. Korea has a wealth of musical treasures. You just have to dig a little to find them.
I can't wait to hit the used record stores in 남대문시장 (Namdaemun Market) and attempt to find some of the music I've grown to love.
Much of the late-sixties to mid-seventies pop & rock music is garage and folk influenced. There is plenty of progressive and hard rock around but the best is the psychedelic tinged folk and folk pop and songs like The Pearls Sisters' garage pop.
"Shadows of the Two" and "I'll Wait" (During the first song there's a little pause in the audio that lasts about 3-4secs.)
The next one is called "커피 한잔" and is probably the best song about "a cup of coffee" I've ever heard:
I like "I Can Not" quite a bit. It's a nice garage pop number:
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