This very interesting article was provided by Metal Postcards Rec‘s Sean Hockings. With Thanks To the author Julien Poulson of The Cambodian Space Project and Phnom Penh’s entertainment and listings website Leng Pleng
Photo courtesy of Leng Pleng
Lately, I’ve been on the receiving end of some interesting and inquisitive emails from musicians and filmmakers around the planet who are writing to ask about Cambodia’s music scene. They want to come here – they’re ready to get on the plane – tomorrow! They say and they tell me it’s because they sense there’s ‘something in the water’ there’s something going out there… or at least that’s what they’ve heard from others and hell… it sounds like a great place… Sure it is, and if this week’s gig guide is anything to go by, it seems more and more musicians and artists are traveling all this way out here just to get a taste of the action.So, here’s an attempt at some sort of summation of what I thinks been going on ‘out here’ and I’ll begin by borrowing the lyrics ‘from hooker bars to opera houses’ penned back in the early ‘70’s by ‘lost’ and recently ‘found’ rocker Sixto Rodriguez. The sentiment of Rodriguez’s storytelling song “A Most Disgusting Song” easily fit with describing the deep, eclectic, electric, beautiful, beguiling, often haunting, tragic and intensely vibrant story of Cambodia’s strange but virile music scene…
