Saturday, May 30, 2015

Don't Think I've Forgotten: Cambodia's Lost Rock and Roll

Music has always been a part of the Khmer culture as attested in the carvings of their ancient temples.  In the 1950s, Cambodian leader Norodom Sihanouk encouraged music and was known for his voice (he was also somewhat of a royal playboy).   During this time, the cities of Cambodia developed an interest in western music.  First, they drew on music from France (who until 1953 was the colonial protectorate of Cambodia) as well Cuba and Latin America.  Cambodian musicians adopted these western styles as well as blending western music with traditional Khmer music.  Men and woman duos as well as co-ed bands popped in night clubs.  In the early sixties, Cambodian bands began mimicking the Beatles and Rolling Stones (three guitars and drums).  In 1965, after the American troop buildup in Vietnam which came with radio stations that could be picked up in Cambodia, Cambodian artists began to draw on rock music that was poplar in America.  Often, these musicians would borrow the tune from western bands, such as Santana, and put Cambodian words to the music. 

“Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock and Roll” is an hour and forty-five minute documentary on the Cambodian rock and roll scene from its beginnings to the country’s fall into the hands of the Khmer Rouge in April 1975.  When the government fell, many in Cambodia were glad that the war was finally over.  But quickly, any idea that things would return to normal was squashed as Pol Pot, the leader of the Khmer Rouge, sought to do away with anything Western.  Musicians (along with the educated, business owners, doctors and lawyers) were rounded up and many killed.  Others tried to save themselves.  Men with long hair cut it in an attempt not to look Western.  Musicians lied about their past jobs in an attempt to keep from being singled-out and most likely killed.  This horror continued until January 1979, when Vietnam stepped in and overthrew the Khmer Rouge and deposed Pol Pot.  By then, only a handful of the musicians remained (much of the records and recordings of Cambodian rock and roll was also destroyed during this reign of terror). 

John Pirozzi spent ten years making this film and released it last month on the 40th anniversary of the fall of Cambodia.  He tracked down surviving artists and family members of artists that didn’t survive to recreate the music culture in Cambodia during this era.  Thankfully, the movie does not go into the horrors of what the musicians faced at the hands of the Khmer Rouge (if you want to see this, watch "The Killing Fields"), but it does impress upon the viewer that it was terrible.  The film does show clippings of the Khmer Rouge prisons and torture centers on the outskirts of Phnom Penh that I visited when I was there in 2011.   What the movie does very effectively is to tell some of the history of Cambodia and its music through contemporary events in Southeast Asia.  Sihanouk’s attempts to keep the country neutral failed as North Vietnam used the porous border to bring supplies to the south, leading to American bombings which led to those in the countryside (who were also being bombed along with North Vietnamese soldiers) to join with the communist.   In 1970, a military coup removed Sihanouk from power and the new rulers were even more aggressive against the communist which only increased the opposition to the government in Phnom Penh. 


Stupa filled with skulls
A memorial to the dead
This is a powerful movie.  By looking at one section of Cambodian life, it shows the horrors of what happened to Cambodia.  This nation lost almost 1/4 of its population during the killings that took place in the war’s aftermath.  The movie is being shown in selected locations around the nation.  I caught it at the Savannah's Muse Art Warehouse.  Unfortunately, it was only there for two showings on the night of May 28, 2015.

I took the photo on the right when in Cambodia in 2011.  This site is haunting and a reminder of how inhuman humanity can be.  We should never forget!

43 comments:

  1. I would certainly never think of Cambodia as a place for good ol' rock and roll. I see you grew up in Wilmington and now live in Savannah. How lucky can ya be?

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    1. I left Wilmington after college moved to Savannah last August, in between I lived in PA, NY, UT and MI and spent a number of summers in CA and ID!

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  2. Wow, perhaps they will bring it back for more showings for those that missed it! Your Muse Art Warehouse sounds very interesting!

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    1. This was my first time at the Muse--but I'm sure I'll try it out. SCAD (Savannah College of Arts and Design) is a boost to the area's culture diversity.

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  3. What a cool place indeed, I just checked out your link and I just love the next showing cost is $5.00 or (what you can) like for those who could afford more and are thankful to keep the place going you could offer more, or those less fortunate can still go too! I do love your city.

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  4. I know so very little about this kind of scene in other countries. Just fascinating

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    1. Sadly, the Khmer Rouge was a lot like ISIS and the scene whipped out.

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  5. I spent some time in Cambodia in '68, and one thing that relates somewhat was in villages they would get films, some Hollywood ripoffs, that had no sound. They would have someone make up dialogue as the film cranked along. Hearing John Wayne's figure speaking in the voice of the village chief was pretty funny.

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    1. I'd love to hear about your time in Cambodia!

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  6. I had no idea this happened, although I've heard a ban on Western style in other places. I'll keep my eye out for this documentary since I'd like to see it.

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    1. The genocide that occurred in Cambodia may not have been as great as Hitler or Stalin, but 2 million people killed in a country of 8 million is a horrible atrocity that ranks up with the inhumane deeds of humanity.

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  7. That sounds like a really interesting movie. Even though I am a musician, I really don't know much about the Cambodia rock scene.

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  8. I didn't even know Cambodia had a rock scene. Very interesting.

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    1. it's rock scene was mostly wiped out by the Khmer Rouge

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  9. I never ventured into Cambodia from Laos even though the train was supposed to be fairly good. The problem was it was always peppered with bullet holes. Not my idea of a safe trip. Must go back and see it. The horror that was Pol Pot should never be forgotten. He was right up there with Herr Hitler in his atrocities.

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    1. There is a train that runs from Laos to Cambodia? I didn't think Cambodia had any rail that connected to another country--it main line that doesn't operate that often--is from the coast inland. I would love to hear more about your Laos adventures.

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  10. That sounds like an interesting documentary. I'll have to see where i can buy a copy. April 1975 and Cambodia are still vivid in my mind, I was just starting my 4th year in the navy and there was no way to not be aware of SE Asia. I still shake my head when I think of the Vietnamese going in and restoring order. I guess that's what 35 years of combat experience will do for an army eh?

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    1. You might find a showing in the Detroit area on their website.

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  11. I will look out for that documentary on one of cable channels. Cambodia has a fascinating but also tragic history. Pol Pot did so much harm to such a beautiful nation.

    Greetings from London.

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    1. I found it interesting the Cuban influence in their early western music era!

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  12. That looks like a very interesting film.

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  13. I recently heard that the Khmer Rouge killed so many people, they realized they wouldn't have enough workers, so they forced prisoners in the death camps to marry and have children.

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    1. I haven't heard that, but if you can imagine a 1/4 of the population dying, that is a staggering loss, especially since so many were in their prime working years.

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  14. I've never heard of Cambodian rock and roll. That was fascinating! :)

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    1. I hadn't heard of it until there was a NPR segment about this movie...

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  15. I've never heard of Cambodian rock and roll. That was fascinating! :)

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  16. I had no idea about Cambodian rock and the horrors surrounding it. How terrifying...and when you mentioned the mid 70s, although I know rock hasn't been around THAT long, up until then I had pictured this all taking place in the 40s.

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    1. The movie goes back into the mid-50s which is about the time R&R started here. From what I've been told, there were many rock groups throughout Southeast Asia, many playing for US military

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  17. This just made me realize how little I know about Cambodia. Sounds like a very essential documentary.

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    1. It is an old and proud country that was caught between forces that tore it apart.

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  18. Sounds amazing! In college, I took a course on Asian music. Unfortunately, partly because of the Khmer Rouge, there wasn't as much material available for Cambodia as for other Southeast Asian countries. We certainly didn't get to study Cambodian rock.

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    1. I don't think my college offered such a class-at least not in the late 70s

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  19. No, we should never forget. But first we need to learn, and you've educated me, Sage. I had no idea that musicians (and many others) were targeted this way. It's horrifying. Thank you for the information. It makes me feel all the more lucky to be able to express myself creatively.

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    1. Yes, there is much we can be thankful for and much we should learn about how our policies and activities have impacted others.

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  20. Sage: This post caught me completely off guard.Like others who have commented here, I too was unaware of Cambodian rock n' roll music. I am familiar to a degree with the horrors of Pol Pot, and always amazed at the vast travel experiences you've shared here!

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    1. Michael, you were the one (with your interest in musicians) that I thought might have heard of this movie. You should try to see if there is a showing close to you.

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  21. What's forgotten about that area was that a section of the society was quite wealthy in a global sense, and accessed to all that the upper middle classes of Europe and the Americas could. What we also miss was the French viewed it as a colonie d'exploitation économique (economic colony) with less than French 50,000 people taxing the place.
    A few years ago I was building a garden near Carcassonne and at a market I found paintings from Tonkin and Cochin-china from 1890's done by the wife of a colonial administrator. The administrator worked in Indochina for seven years and had a pension out of it from 1906 until 1937.

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  22. Vince, the movie does attempt to impress that the lives of those in the cities were different from the rural--and the rural brought into the Khmer Rouge ideology and took it out on those in the city when they took control of the country. That painting sounds interesting--I am curious as to why France was willing to hand over Cambodia without a war while they fought in Vietnam.

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    1. You need to think of it in terms of exploitation. Once the costs to hold went above a certain amount they simply withdrew. Plus, France was fighting in Algeria and they saw that as part of metropolitan France, much like you see Hawaii or Alaska. And of course they were still trying to recover from the occupation of WW2.
      I think for the historians in 10 or 20 years, they will begin to diminish the communist aspect and start to really draw the threads of republican democracy. Or to put it another way, the conditions that saw John Calvin appear in the 1530's. You tend to see these in east Asian colonies from 1900 on, and for that matter in Russia in the 30 years prior to 1914.

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  23. I have to add as well that I had no idea the Cambodian rock and roll scene was like that. On a somewhat off topic note I get cold chills whenever I read history about how an otherwise sane country goes off the rails and become a place of unspeakable terrors. To think that some people believe the United States could never stumble down a similar route is a dangerous assumption.

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