Commie block, brutalism, oppressive, USSR, cultural revolution, North Korea 1960s economic miracle, North Korea 1970s stagnation, North Korea 1986 September 5th night of the red candles, North Korea eternal bear market, \u201c2003 name swap of the Asiatic Black bear and the Danish major league semen producing bull (soon to be native to North Korea) in order to bring about economic revitalisation\u201d. You just finished rehearsal. You\u2019re a Lieutenant in the Korean people\u2019s army, musical division. Moranbong band, your parents would think it\u2019s a big deal – they\u2019re working in spartan conditions harvesting soybeans, but you\u2019re only third seat. It\u2019s hypothesised Kimmy boy lost interest after the producer penned \u201cLet\u2019s study (For the glorification of our nation)\u201d. At the same time General Kim Yoo-Sin – lead conductor mysteriously disappeared (hypothesised to be a concubine, Kimmy did pick the starting 10 of Moranbong himself after all), it went rapidly downhill since then, from a true Juche band to a Red Army Orchestra clone with over 96 members. But dear God those tomboys in military uniforms are hot, you\u2019re patiently waiting for the next full-scale famine so when you do suck on their titties it\u2019s for Juche purposes of bone enrichment. Anyway, you\u2019re walking back to your commie block from rehearsal, browsing the \/dgl\/ board (dispatches [from] glorious leader) on your intranet\u2019s Mount Pektu Snow Shoveling forum. Postings are terse, except for one retard named \u201cBandi” trying to get you to read his book about how kafkaesque Pyongyang is and why you should escape your workless life, does he not realise how derivative is. \u201cYankee go home!\u201d you exclaim, to the immediate applause of the Kim Il-Sung statue manual grass cutter. \u201cKeep cutting grass, grass cutter\u201d, contrary to \u8001\u5916 belief, eating grass is not the imperative of these thankless heroes of the Juche ideal, preservation of the supreme leader\u2019s land is. Turning the corner on to Vinylon Street 1265 your commie column comes into view: since you have a degree in Juche science from the atom university of Pyongyang (designed by Mia \u201cHadid\u201d Khalifa) you get to live in the modern science district, which unlike the city center isn\u2019t just patel pillars of oppression. Concentric rings of an atom\u2019s orbit criss-cross one another up 70 floors, but it\u2019s purely metaphorical – there isn\u2019t a single electron flowing inside. Your apartment is a satellite in disguise, you\u2019re not 100% sure on that one, the metal plate on the roof could just be \u201cArt Deco\u201d. Tourists think they\u2019re hot shit when they remark that the pastel commie blocks of centre Pyongyang are a thin veneer over mere figuratively oppressive rectangles, wrong again. 20% of those \u201cmonoliths\u201d are 3d printed with styrofoam to give the illusion of population. They house one Juche-idea monitor for 2 days, a styrofoam penthouse apartment blending in with the real deal by virtue of it’s darkness. Three days and the building’s gone, the styro melts in the summer and shatters in the winter. The iconic Pyongyang pastel isn’t a distraction, not an ethereal veil of childish delight over run of the mill brutality, it’s retardation plain and simple. That’s all. Back in the day, when electricity was scarce, the best way they could make a building look lived in was to make it colorful. If you’re distracted by a rip off of patented barbie pink maybe you won’t notice that all the windows are dark. Science district fixes that doomed strategy: constantly powered LEDs line each level, you gotta see it kiddo, it\u2019s like Vegas over here. Look real close and you\u2019ll see the house-lights are still off, but you can\u2019t look close! Gaze tracking intelligence follows your every movement. You ever read academic articles about the perception of the common western Jackdaw? Crazy shit, you can turn your head profile style, but orient your eyes on a piece of food, and they\u2019ll move towards the food slower than if you were just doing profile head eyes forward. If Pyongyang zoo can train an ape to smoke some fat darts, you bet your ass Eastern Jackdaws of superior IQ are reporting you to the Juche monitor if you gaze into the abyss too long. So you know who you are now, you\u2019re a North Korean lass, real cute lil thing, you\u2019re being humanised, I\u2019m humanising \u201cyou\u201d to you, indoctrinating you to the only ideology that reliably creates tomboys, understand yet? Simple stuff really, I may be the last Irish follower of the Juche ideal left – am I the final synthesis of the IRA and all it\u2019s splinter groups? Possibly. I figured it out guys, I really did, but let\u2019s get back to the point. GOD I want to fuck the Moranbong band cellist. 2013 cellist, google this shit on youtube, those fucking military pants got her looking like a more commie Oswald Mosley. Are unfinished monuments to financial ruin that weren\u2019t originally intended to be brutalist, brutalist? Yes, they are, brutalism is when you\u2019re meant to be cool and efficient, but you\u2019re boring and poor instead.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
~~<\/p>\n\n\n\n
You\u2019re a French born businessman. 30 year partner at Bain & Company in Los Angeles (you are French by blood, but university graduate you just couldn\u2019t ignore the fact that US consultants at the same company get 30% higher pays than their European counterparts, so you left Europe, you soulless bastard). The phone rings, it\u2019s the year 2048 and the phone keeps ringing. Pick it up: Pyongyang calling, new world towers on lonesome street (Blur\u2019s best album, notably featuring no brutalism. I know you think ol\u2019 commie North Korea is brutalist paradise, but does the man on the street really think so? Damon Albarn certainly doesn\u2019t, seriously, where the fuck is the percussion? Where the fuck are noises that don\u2019t sound like they came out of a Nokia? Brutalism is clearly a contentious matter, perhaps a matter of salience? Consider the following: Brutalism in Bristol – you\u2019re in Bristol, brutalist theatre in London – out of place and disturbing since no one ever suffered in London, brutalist commie block in Pyongyang – it\u2019s exactly what the Westerner expects, therefore they don\u2019t really notice it. If you follow my reasoning here, this begs the question, is brutalism only possible and effective when the surrounding ideology and atmosphere isn\u2019t brutalist? You\u2019re tired of this, you\u2019re French and you have things to do) needs a big man with a big capacity to organise along geopolitical lines – that\u2019s you. The private jet crosses the electromagnetic firmament over the DMZ, complete silence for the first time in anyone\u2019s life. Ryugyong Hotel sits lame in the distance – \u201cLooks kinda like an untopped bic pen in a pyramid\u201d you muse. Touch down, meet Corporal Lim Koo-Yin, minister of infrastructure.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cListen, you\u2019re organising your workflow along manufacturing lines, you need to organise it along geopolitical lines\u201d. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cG\u2019ne c\u2019est qua brutaliste, comprendre?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
\u201cMister, we try geopolitical in 2003, no good. We tell Queen Elizabeth \u201cEight of Pyongyang\u2019s best architecture students for eight of yours, good deal, yes?\u201d, but Britain tell us \u201cNo. We want agricultural science\u201d.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The conspiracy against North Korea to stop them building buildings that aren\u2019t commie blocks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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