Bohemian blasphemy

Yamagata Tweakster in the music video for “My Sublime Onanie.” / Courtesy of Cinematic Person

The strange and delightful world of Yamagata Tweakster

By Kim Young-jin

Shortly before 11 p.m. last Friday, the soon-to-be-shuttered Itaewon club and bar Ccot Ddang was lively in the way one would expect of a venue that caters to the indie crowd. Students in black-rimmed glasses leaned against chipped, pastel-colored walls, exhaling plumes of smoke. In a sunken, adjacent room, they swayed to churning guitar rock that’s probably just edgy enough to keep the major labels away.

As much as this bohemian reverie is a rarity in Korea, where music is judged solely on commercial viability, nights there are interesting and evolve in unexpected ways.

Anticipation was high for the evening’s final act, Yamagata Tweakster, a forty-year-old Korean musician and performance artist who, until now, was little known outside Seoul’s indie scene. Most of his notoriety was earned by “My Sublime Onanie,” a song about masturbation that has 10,000 YouTube hits.

Clad in a neon pink suit and matching pants, Tweakster fired up his Macbook, from which he played funky disco-house beats that were all wah-wah pedal and bass grooves. He sang into a headset, freeing him to dance, which he does in a remarkable, fluid fashion.

Most in the small, but enthusiastic crowd of 50 people knew what to expect, and that was the reason they gathered together: Yamagata Tweakster, whose real name is Hahn Vad, has a reputation for his onstage antics and ability to get the crowd grooving. He sometimes cooks instant noodles onstage and later in his act, he abruptly walked out of the door to continue the show outside.

His act could be written off as an absurdity, but it shouldn’t be. Tweakster has gained credibility the hard way, releasing his own albums and taking bold artistic risks. His lyrics, though perhaps uncomfortable to some (they lean to the left politically) provide a voice for the nation’s youth, many of whom are anxious about the stiff social and corporate culture they believe casts a cloud over the future.

He wore dark sunglasses despite the performance space being akin to a garage or basement. A bicycle stood in the corner, as did several oscillating fans. As he began his second song, a young woman in a flannel shirt and bangs that look like they were cut with a ruler, made her way to the stage, closed her eyes and broke out into a dance.

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At the heart of the Yamagata Tweakster experience, Hahn explains a few days later at a cafe near Hongik University, is a concept he calls “Ja-rip,” or the ability to stand on one’s own power. This might be a recognizable credo for do-it-yourself musicians from Seattle to Tokyo, but in the Korean context, it is a rallying cry against an industry and country bent, with seeming disdain against artistic ingenuity, on finding the next big cultural export market to feed “Hallyu,” or the Korean wave.

“Ja-rip does not depend on big capital or the mass media. The source is experience,” he said.

For Hahn, the phrase hits at a much more personal struggle for independence.

A native of Daegu, Hahn aspired to become a filmmaker. Under pressure from his father, he eventually majored in electronic engineering but found university life to be stifling. “A factory for making workers,” he recalled.

Still, Han learned to play guitar in order to write his own soundtracks.

He eventually launched a venture company with his friends in Seoul, but this soon failed and he found himself back in Daegu.

“It was a bad situation. But I could sing with my guitar in my room, and that was healing. That was a starting point.”

He returned to Seoul to work at Korean National University of Arts as a technician. This time, he was determined to establish himself as an artist, performing acoustic music at night near Hongdae, the area around Hongik, under the name Amature Amplifier.

In 2008, his father passed away suddenly, shortly before Hahn was due to be married; the two events prompted a complete artistic transformation.

“Before my father’s death I didn’t have any deep conversations with him. That was so sad. During performances, I thought of my father and my body didn’t move,” he said.

Hahn then conjured up Yamagata Tweakster (deriving the name from a Japanese film festival), placing an emphasis on performance, and released his first full-length album, “Won Vvool,” in 2011.

“Death means the body stops. To resist death, I make my body move. Movement can touch the sky, and maybe my father receives it there,” he said.

The video for “My Sublime Onanie,” Yamagata Tweakster’s most recognizable song, perhaps best showcases this. It also raises the central question raised by his persona ­ㅡ is it substantive performance art, or absurdity for the sake of it?

The video, directed by production firm Cinematic Person, follows him as he dances through an empty street. He then begins to thrust his pelvis at everything from a bridge pillar to a swinging disco ball.

While the song can be interpreted as an ode to slacker-hood, it also points to deeper themes addressed, often obliquely, by Hahn ㅡ namely, the hardships of those disempowered by the country’s top-heavy economic and political culture.

Hahn’s artistic evolution coincided with his political awakening, which focuses on problems faced by non-permanent workers and tenants’ rights. “My Sublime Onanie,” he says, was inspired by a demonstration for rights for disabled people, and a conversation he had with a friend who is physically challenged.

“Masturbation means many things, not just sexual desire. The meaning is wider, a social desire,” he said.

Another song, “Sticky Rice,” at first seems mundane because Hahn drones on about different varieties of the grain, from sticky rice to brown rice to fried rice. The song, however, was inspired by a recent anti-eviction protest in the Seoul shopping district of Myeong-dong, where small business owners were squeezed out due to a redevelopment plan.

“Sticky rice is humid,” Hahn said. “It represents people coming together. Humidity is humanity.”

He also takes independent musicianship to rare levels: Hahn pushes a cart around Hongdae every day, selling his album and others that are independently-produced, sometimes bartering them for rice or other food.

Before Hahn cued up “My Sublime Onanie” at Ccot Ddang, he mumbled an apology, explaining that he would have to do a quick wardrobe change. He proceeded to pull off his pink suit and trousers (under which he wore what appeared to be pajamas) and replaced them with a yellow suit and trousers.

The first, dreamy bars of the song reverberated through the room, and when the drums kicked in, the people danced without reservation with wide smiles on their faces. It was a rare kind of euphoria concocted from a sense of intimacy with the artist and the moment.

Without any notice, Hahn walked through the crowd, up a flight of stairs and outside into the bracing air. Everyone followed him, up toward the main street and gathered around him as he continued to dance. He did a handstand, fell, and rolled down the hill.

Hahn says his performances seek to transform the frustrations of every day into “good positive power.”

“The moment is so precious,” he said later at the cafe. “No one dances in the street in normal life. But we get energy and change the street into a carnival. It’s wonderful.”