By Arturo R. Garcia
While a lot of rock documentaries focus on the “rise and fall” or coming and going of a particular artist or genre, John Pirozzi’s Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock and Roll largely fulfills a more daunting — and ultimately more haunting — assignment: chronicling the blossoming and annihilation of Cambodia’s entire musical identity, all within a 15-year period.
Pirozzi himself is invisible throughout the proceedings; instead, artists and officials who survived the period narrate the tale oral history-style, with film footage and recordings filling in the blanks and showing how vibrant the country’s musical scene became as it adapted not just North American rock but Afro-Cuban influences with its own traditions.
Under the cut, we’ll take a look at some of the more notable acts spotlighted in the documentary.
A substantial portion of the film’s first act is devoted to the country’s first pop star, crooner Sinn Sisamouth. The former medical student is credited with recording more than 1,200 songs, including Khmer versions of US hits, including “I’m Still Waiting for You,” his own take on The Animals’ “House Of The Rising Sun.”
Sisamouth was among the 1.7 million people killed in the onslaught by the Khmer Rouge, and it’s thought that all of his original studio recordings were also casualties of the regime’s purge of virtually all of Cambodia’s artistic output. But compilations of his work have been put together from cassettes and LPs sold during his career. Not only is he still played on the country’s radio stations, but several of them have been posted online in their entirety.
The documentary also takes care to not only highlight, but differentiate several of the country’s top female artists of the era. Among them is Ros Serey Sothea, who frequently collaborated with Sisamouth but also stretched out into other genres, like the go-go banger “Penh Chet Tae Bong Muoy.”
Another prominent singer, Huoy Meas, also doubled as the voice of the country’s national radio station and performed on a radio drama in the 1960s and 70s. Like Sothea, she could do ballads like “Srolahn Thai Bong Mouy”:
And also hold up in an up-tempo number like “Who’s Not Dancing?”:
If the scene had a clown prince, it likely would have been Yol Aularong, who injected jaunty guitar rock with an irreverent eye. It’s speculated in the movie that Aularong was among the first artists executed by the Khmer Rouge, since he made a name for himself playing among his countrymen in city streets, granting him way too much visibility for the regime to accept.
In closing, here’s a taste of one of the most influential groups of the era, the Drakkar Band. The group originally formed following a jam session at a house party, and quickly stood out by being able to bring a Khmer touch to American guitar rock, as it did on “Crazy Loving You.”
Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten is well worth checking out, even if you’re not a music fan. For more of a taste of the project, the trailer can be seen below.
The post A Quick Guide To Five Of The Cambodian Artists Featured In Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten appeared first on Racialicious - the intersection of race and pop culture.
