10 music-related observations from a trip to Asia
I returned recently from a nearly six-week trip to southeast Asia: Thailand, Cambodia, Vietnam. While I heard plenty of the native music from those countries themselves, I couldn’t help but be captivated by the little bits of Western pop music, more familiar to me, that I noticed along the way. Here are 10 observations/memories.
“Don’t Worry Be Happy”
The first day of the trip, the first song I heard of any sort was a man whistling “Don’t Worry Be Happy” at the Skytrain station in Bangkok.
Chatuchak Weekend Market, Bangkok, has a Country & Bluegrass booth
Bluejeans, boots, and bootleg CDs for sale. Two men in full Western attire playing banjo to a ‘how to play banjo’ instruction tape.
Cocktail-jazz cover of Village People
At a (really good) restaurant in Bangkok, they were playing a CD of cocktail-jazz covers of “YMCA,” Cyndi Lauper songs, Madonna songs and more. Madonna’s “Material Girl” was pronounced “Math-erial Girl”.
“Take Me Home Country Roads”
One week in Bangkok I heard John Denver‘s “Take Me Home Country Roads” three times, including once during the banjo performance mentioned above.
HOSO Festival, Chiang Mai, Thailand
Went to this University arts festival, which reminded me in spirit of similar events in the US. Watched a few enjoyable Thai college-rock bands. I swear, one sounded a lot like The Wedding Present and one sounded a lot like Charming – or what those bands might sound like if they were Thai.
“My Heart Will Go On”
I heard this song a lot across the trip, often in Muzak instrumental format, but also sung or played by street musicians. Same goes for a lot of other Western soft-pop ballads.
Vietnamese MTV plays a ton of Whitney Houston videos
A TON. Everything from the hits to the non-hits.
Karoake music videos on bus
Twice when we took bus-trips across country (once from Siem Reap to Phnom Penh, Cambodia; once from Chau Doc to Can Tho, Vientam), they played music videos, with karoake subtitles, most of the way.
Keith Urban – Be Here
In the hotel bar at a fancy hotel in Can Tho, Vietnam, they were playing this album, though no one was in the bar except for about five workers. Were they playing this album to attract Western tourists, or was this music they actually picked out themselves, because they like to listen to it? I couldn’t tell.
Norfolk & Western – “Hiding Home”
Partway through the trip, I turned on my ipod for the first time and hit ‘shuffle’ to see what would come up. This was the first song that came up, and it felt weirdly appropriate somehow for a trip to unfamiliar places – “oh we know / there is no hiding home”.
