이문세! 이문세!

The volleyball folks took me to a concert last night! It was a 이문세 (Lee Moon Sae) concert - apparently he's quite famous here, so one of my Korean friends was very jealous of me going.

Concert review and description after the jump!



I must say that 이문세 (he's the one in the white suit in the video above) can put on quite a show. He started by crooning some ballads accompanied by a small orchestra, which was a bit boring for me, but tugged on the heartstrings of all the middle-aged ladies. It turns out that ballads really aren't as fun when you don't understand the lyrics!

After the first set, the show heated up. 이문세 brought out another band, this time with the usual guitar, drums and keys, and moved into some faster songs. He also had some great chats with the audience... well, the audience sans moi. Later on in the show, he picked a woman from the audience, asked her up to the stage, and made a Asian-kareoke-style music video in front of the audience with her, giving her the tape afterwards. The crowd ate it up.

The show proper ended with some faster, beat-driven numbers punctuated with spasmodic dance moves and fireworks (literally) on stage, though the encore brought the show back to its ballad roots to woo the ladies before closing.

I have to say, that for a show where I understood exactly one lyric (사랑, which means "love") and almost none of the banter, it was quite enjoyable! One more Korean experience for 스티브 (Seu-ti-beu... read it quickly)!