Customer Reviews

Cambodian Rocks Volume 2

5 star:		(5)
4 star:		(2)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(0)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

This album is a great follow-up to Volume 1. It has a better mix of artists. Personally, I like the songs on Vol. 1 better, but you can't go wrong with this one either. The sound quality is similar to Vol. 1 - it sounds like a vinyl record. If you liked Vol. 1 or Parallel World's Cambodian Rocks, then this is a good choice. If you're looking for more music from this genre, check out khmerrocks.com. They produced both of these albums and offer Best Of albums for several artists featured on these compilations.

I love listening to Cambodian oldies, especially the first track, a remake of the Beatles "Hey Jude"! So catchy and beautifully written. Sin Sisamouth vocals is also great in this one. I listened to that track like a hundred times within the first few days of hearing it. Music is about a man longing and hoping to be with his love again. Basically there are a lot of analogies and metaphors used to describe his emotions and feelings. He's comparing his feelings like a bee without honey and flowers drying out and decaying. Mainly expressing hope that love will blossom again soon. His choice of lyrics are so well composed that ordinary young Cambodians don't really understand it because of the depth of poetic wordings. I really had to listen to it carefully many times before actually understanding what he's really saying and trying to express. It's ashamed he and many other great singers didn't survive during the Pol Pot regime, otherwise there would have been so much more great music produced. Overall, great stuff for those fans of 60's and 70's rock and roll with Asian flare.

The other three volumes of CAMBODIAN ROCKS are interesting, but this one is far and away the best, and if you buy only one CD of Cambodian music, this should be the one. All of the songs are excellant, including Sinn Sisamouth's Spaghetti Western-ish "Beloved Girlfriend", Ros Sereysothea's bouncy "If You Wish To Love Me" (a song that would fit right in a Quentin Tarantino movie), Pan Ron's delerious and infectous "Monkey Dancing Monkey" (once heard, it will never leave your head. NEVER.) and Sisamouth's "Tender Hands", a strangely eerie cover of the AM radio standard "Streets of San Francisco". A haunting, hypnotic, and strange collection, made even more poignant by the fact that none of the major performers featured here made it out of Khmer Rouge regime alive, all of them murdered by the state for the "crime" of playing pop music.

I love this style of music. I'm still waiting for the documentary, "Don't Think I've Forgotten"(Cambodia's Lost Rock and Roll) to come out. You can watch the trailer at [...]. It's about this music and is very sad, showing how the Khmer Rouge changed Cambodia's musical Cambodian Rocks Volume 2Cambodian Rocks Volume 4Dengue Feverhistory.

This collection is mostly pop, the first album was way better. If you like pop, then this collection is for you. I'd much prefer the rock n' roll side.

I love the music on this album. I never in a million years would think of listening to this type of music, but it is very catchy. My favorites are "Hippie Men" aka "Ya Ya Men" and "Sweet Sixteen". The only thing I think is sad is that most of these people on this album were probably killed just because of their talents. If you have an open mind and a thirst to try different things, then this album is for you.

A trip to Cambodia and the sound track for City of Ghosts turned me on to groups like Dengue Fever and the Cambodian Rocks Vol. 1. Vol. 2 doesnt disappoint. It conjures up a time and place that was then wiped out by Pol Pot. There are some great vibes here and anyone who likes the slightly offbeat but great tunes will love this.

Some of the very best rocknroll from outside Britain and the United States. Amazingly vibrant musicianship and singing. Not only does this disc get me nodding along (if not dancing!), but the blending of more traditional Cambodian popular music with rocknroll is so unique as to be breath taking. I get chills thinking about how incredible it is that only in recent years have non-Cambodians had the chance to get to know and love the music of the pre-Khmer Rouge Cambodian scene. and how close the world came to losing all touch with this music due to the insanity of the Communists who murderd as many of the musicians, singers and scenesters as they could because they were too "Westernized". And while Ros SereiSothea (known as the Queen of the Cambodian Rock/Pop scene) and Sinn SiSamuth (the King of the scene) are the stars of this disc, all the singers are incredibly talented. This disc totally rocks, and it is a great way to start your day or surprise your jaded rock scene friends. It blows alot of todays bads right out the water.