Philippine jailbirds perform ‘Gangnam Style’

Screen grab of the latest performance of Cebu’s dancing inmates, from YouTube

MANILA, Philippines—Philippine convicts who became famous for dancing to Michael Jackson’s hits have added South Korean spice to their repertoire, with a performance of the popular “Gangnam Style” rap.

A video posted by prison authorities in the central city of Cebu on YouTube showed about 1,000 inmates clad in orange uniforms doing the horse-riding dance made famous by South Korean rapper Psy.

The lead dancers in the center wore black shirts and mimicked the artist, whose recent appearances at the MTV awards in Los Angeles and on other US talk shows have lifted his song into the top 10 of the US charts.

The inmates performed in the prison court yard for visitors at the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center amid heavy rain, and the four-minute clip was uploaded to Youtube Saturday.

GMA television said more than 1,000 visitors watched the dance, the inmates’ first public performance since February when authorities stopped the shows due to violence at the jail.

The convicts became an Internet sensation in 2007 after jail authorities posted a recording of them doing the zombie dance from Jackson’s “Thriller” music video, which registered more than 42 million hits on YouTube.

The video of their “Gangnam Style” performance can be watched at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o1AGTGLL_wg