VIETNAM VINYLS part 17

(unknown artists) - (unknown) 7"  (Hong Hoa)

OK, here is a trashy vinyl with equally destroyed labels. A-side female singer and B-side male singer.
Forget the scratchy sound because the A-side is truly entertaining piece with so many unexpected changes it makes the listener asking him/herself what the hell is going on.
A-side starts with lounge mood and turns into minimal trad after 1½ mins. Then at 3 mins the singer for some curious reason steps into echo chamber for a minute, then steps back at the un-reverbed state singing her trad tune. At 5 mins she changes into lounge for a half minute only to return back to trad for the last half mins.
B-side is slightly more coherent piece but still having a fair amount of changes for a six-minute song. It starts with a lounge feel, at 1:15 turns into trad. At 3½ mins it sounds like the track is changing even though the label (as much as I can see from it) states it having only one song. When there's one minute left, the style changes suddenly into latin exotica for half minute after which it suddenly turns back into trad mood.
'Divertissement par excellance'.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 16

Anh-Hong, Ngoc-Huong, Thanh-Hai - Ni co va kiem khach 7"  (Hong Hoa)

Shifting now from Viet Nam label to Hong Hoa. Traditional dialog musical piece.
This is propably the most trashed record of the whole 'viet vinyls' -series. First of all, the surface noise on the first couple minutes of each side is so overwhelming it is in places louder than music (and believe me - this is the cleaned version!). And secondly, if you look at the pictures above, you can see that someone has tried to carve the center hole bigger - for whatever reason, (s)he hadn't done a very good job. Therefore a bit wowing sound especially on side A. You can sure live without this one but for archival reasons I put it online anyway. Not a very strong beginning for my Hong Hoa label uploads, but fear not... there are better things coming up.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 15

Che Linh - Khung troi ky niem 7" EP  (Viet Nam, M.3679-3680)

Male crooner with four tracks of excellent melancholic soft pop/lounge. Vinyl once again in very bad condition.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 14

Various Artists - Khuc ca duyen lanh / Noi buon dem bong 7"  (Viet Nam, M. 7057-7058)

Charming lounge-trad -combination.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 13

Various Artists - 7"  (Viet Nam, M. 3443-3444)

Three singers and four songs. One of my favorites. Great smooth lounge pop - song descriptions are on A-side 'bolero' and on B-side 'slow rock'. Unfortunately this is one of those records where surface noise is unbearably loud compared to music itself (plus five times needle gets stuck) so I had to do some serious editing and cleaning on this one.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 12

Le Thuy & Ming Phung & Tan Tai - Ngay buon / Ao trang ngay xua 7"  (Viet Nam, M. 6979-6980)

Le Thuy singing duets with different male companions. Typical mixture, except this time lounge parts being in the beginning and in the middle of each song (instead of starting with and ending to lounge parts). A-side lounge parts are quite good smooth pieces. Dirty vinyl.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 11

My Chau with Minh Canh & Minh Phung - Boan cuoi tinh yeu / Thoi boi 7" (Viet Nam, M.6937-38)

This a change of label from Continental to Viet Nam. Both sides are male/female -duets, in a sense of exchanging vocal turns instead of singing together or to each other. Musically it is the good old mixture of lounge elements, Mekong-delta-blues & traditional which we have heard many times already. Very often the transitions between different styles sound quite strange and unexpected, but here in the end of side A this sounds even more 'out of place' than usual. I would appreciate if someone with a knowledge of Vietnamese popular music would explain this sort of musical expression to me. I have heard a fair amount of vintage Asian popular and traditional music but this is something I have heard only in Vietnamese records.

VIETNAM VINYLS part 10

Bach-Tuyet & Hoai Vinh Phuc / Ngoc-Giau - Nhac ru'ng dem / San khau ve khuya 7" (Continental, C.167-566)

Here is some more lounge-traditional-lounge -formula on A-side with female & male alternating vocal duties. B-side being musically more minimal with female singing, talking and something in-between. As I mentioned before, Vietnamese singles seem to be quite long in duration but this one makes a record so far, lasting 16½ minutes!

I noticed that there exists also another 7" with the same catalogue number on same label (which I'll digitize later). That makes documenting Viet vinyls even more confusing, good luck to anyone who makes an effort.

Vietnam field recording mix

This time something different: a collage of recordings I made in Vietnam recently. There's street sounds, announcements, radio & tv, park karaoke, music shows etc.

Enjoy

VIETNAM VINYLS part 9

Various Artists - Hai moi oan tinh 7"  (Continental, C.167-666-51 / C.167-666-54)

This seems to be a one track spread on two sides. Mostly female singing, occasionally with a male crooner. Collection of lounge, trad & talking stuffed in one track - so it is propably some musical theater piece.