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Among international oldies, the Bee Gees¡¯ ¡°How Deep Is Your Love¡± is far and away the favorite; among Korean evergreens, it¡¯s Roh Sa-yeon¡¯s ¡°Your Shadow.¡± And the conspicuous CD vendors who sell these records in Seoul subway stations still seem to make a living from them.
They appear on subways at around 10 a.m. and sell records of old pop songs and Korean popular songs, carrying a big CD player on a cart. Some 100 songs are in a collection of eight CDs, which costs only W10,000 (US$1=W944). And surprisingly, they are the original versions.
On the No. 3 and 7 subway lines, vendors named Anne Murray¡¯s ¡°You Needed Me¡± and Baeddaraki¡¯s ¡°Do You Love Spring Rain?¡± as the second favorites. In third place were Harry Nilsson¡¯s ¡°Without You¡±, Smokie¡¯s ¡°Living Next Door to Alice¡± and, among Korean songs, SandPebbles¡¯ ¡°What Shall I Do?¡±, Kim Youn-sook¡¯s ¡°That Day¡± and Kang Eun-chul¡¯s ¡°The Way to Sampo.¡±
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From left, Bee Gees, Roh Sa-yeon, and Anne Murray
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A CD vendor in his 40s said ¡°How Deep is Your Love¡± is a favorite of all age groups from people in their 20s to elderly listeners in their 60s. ¡°Some people complain about the music I turn on, saying it¡¯s annoying. But many people like the good old songs I sell,¡± he says. He plays Roh Sa-yeon¡¯s ¡°Your Shadow¡± when a majority of passengers are in their 40s and 60s.
There are about 40 vendors and three companies that produce CDs sold on subways. The vendors work between 10 a.m. and 5:30 p.m. CD manufacturers claim that they purchased the copyright of the songs through legal procedures. One CD maker in Jongno says it renews a contract with recording companies every year and discards albums older than one year because it releases new versions of the albums. But mainstream record companies said subway CDs are typically pirated. A Universal Music spokesman said, ¡°You can¡¯t make a profit if you sell a collection of 100 original hit songs for W10,000. The songs are stolen.¡±
Thus an eight-volume CD collection named ¡°The New Original Hit Pops¡± contains a hologram mark of the Korea Music Copyright Association. But the certificate serial number C6-00028279 on the sticker was given to a soap opera starring Choi Ji-woo, the association said.
(englishnews@chosun.com )
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