12.12.2005
Mysteries of the Orient
Four Thai Songs
A few years ago, a friend of mine saw a box of records through the window of a dusty shop. The place didn't sell records, but had them left over from a juke box they sold. He asked if he could dig through the boxes. It was mostly country western and bad pop. Among the dreck he found about five mystery records. They were mystery records because at the time he did not know what script the words on the record label were written in. He paid the guy one dollar for the records, went home and listened to them. A few weeks later he paid me a visit and brought the records.
By the time I got to hear them, he had figured out that they were from Thailand. However neither one of us know Thai. We did go out for Thai food that night and were going to bring the records along but when we got to the restaurant, we discovered we forgot the records. So the mystery records remained a mystery.
When he got home, he went back to the shop where he found them. He asked if he could look at the records, hoping he would find more Thai mystery 45s. The person in the store told him to come back tomorrow and talk to the owner. He returned the next day and got a come back next week. Weeks past and he still could not get to the records. He gave up, so I started bugging the place. "No. Talk to owner. He be back soon." When? "I don't know. Tomorrow. Try then." And so it went. It has been three years since my friend found the records and three years since we have traded the duty of getting back at those boxes. It has also been three years since the owner has shown up at the store, or so it seems.
The delight of Thai pop is nothing new (but neither is all the other stuff that appears here). There are now a handful of good comps of Thai songs from the 60s and few of them have info on the artists who appear on them. Many don't have song titles. Consider this post in the spirit of the mystery track. These come from a cassette of the Thai songs that my friend found. Thanks friend!
# posted by Scott Soriano : 09:00
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The first song is a cover of "Chirpy Chirpy Cheep Cheep" by Harold Stott. Here's an audio clip of the Mac And Katie Kissoon 1971 bubblegum pop hit. The Originals website has more info on other covers. My favorite cover to date is the Cambodian version by Ros Sereysothea.
A friend wrote: "I recognize the first tune from that Cambodian Rocks comp Vol.1 (the newer one - from '03) - by Ros Sereysothea - though there they call it 'Pink Night'"
When I went to play the last song, it came up on my computer with all the information included. Apparently its funeral music. I found it ("Mon Yok Sop") and a bunch of other songs at this website: http://www.asianclassicalmp3.org/haesop.htm
# posted by 
: 13:15
: 13:15
Whoa...totally disregard that last comment. Im a huge idiot and will never show my face here again...although I like the mp3s a lot. I ended up opening some totally random other file instead, and was very confused. Not sleeping in 48 hours leads to this kind of confusion. My apologies again I thought I was doing something good.
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# posted by : 13:23
: 13:23<< Home
