SAWASDEE krap!

I am writing from the sofa of the hotel room – the sofa as my table, mind you. I checked in late yesterday after arriving in Bangkok on a rainy night for my four-day Bangkok Metropolitan Tour.

I booked a hotel away from the usual touristy districts where most Malaysians would usually park themselves at and enjoyed a stroll through the local wet market and street vendors after knocking down a friendly-priced cup of Americano at a cafe-cum-hostel nearby, breaking the ice with the Pinoy cafe manager who had just relocated here seeking greener pastures from her hometown of Bacolod.

We Malaysians sometimes just don’t realise how good we’ve got it until we connect with our Asean brethren.

Anyway, I’m here to play two shows with my band Azmyl & the Truly Asia – last night and today – and three solo shows on Saturday and Sunday.

This round of the tour is rather interesting compared to the last time I toured Thailand in December 2019, just before the pandemic shut us touring musicians down for a good two years.

It’s interesting because of the different types of venues I’ll be performing at – Thursday night was at a “semi-legal” underground venue-cum-hostel called The Overstay, which used to be a brothel (according to its website; I suppose to add some street cred).

We had originally been scheduled to play at a venue I’d played at before in 2019 called JAM, which is owned and run by a Malaysian who had settled in Bangkok. I got to know about the venue when he messaged me on Facebook and we have kept in touch since.

JAM was interesting because it’s not in the usual Bangkok tourist trap area but that also posed some tricky circumstances in the long run as was proven this year.

The organiser – a friend from a local noise rock band called Krthkkk whom I kept in touch with after we shared the stage when I last performed at JAM in 2019 – had to change locations after the immediate neighbour next to the venue complained about the noise level from their events to the authorities and the gig we were supposed to play happened to be the final straw. 

Hence, sometimes being a non-tourist trap area also poses some challenges, which some of our more interesting local live music venues in Malaysia have been facing recently.

It’s apparently a common blues a lot of grassroots and community-run live music venues face.

Commercial districts are often expensive in terms of rent and will naturally favour those with connections and big money to burn – or “wash” their money, if you get my drift. Why do you think they call it “money laundering”?

Just take a look at Kuala Lumpur’s ridiculous entertainment tax – it’s a solid way of shutting out any community-based endeavour and favours those who have big-time “cables”. Larger entertainment clubs reflect nothing of the unique local voices and flavours that our tourism ads often flaunt – as though you’d effortless stumble upon those on a Friday night out painting the town red.

Let’s face it: we’re already losing out to our Asean neighbours as a tourist destination, in spite of all the sweet and nice Youtube videos depicting how wonderful Malaysia is.

In fact, why we’re “wonderful” is because a lot of tourists probably would not have us as their first choice but when they arrive, they are pleasantly surprised how warm and welcoming we are.

So, it’s not something to wear proudly on our sleeves because the “wonderful” reputation is based on our rather spotty reputation in the tourist circuit and that doesn’t bode well for us in the long run.

Anyway, aside from The Overstay, I’ll be performing today with the band at the BSRU College of Music to also discuss about Malaysian popular music between my songs – my banter can also be classified as a “lecture performance” given the right circumstances like this – with a special guest – my Thai guitarist-academic friend Paul (who plays in an excellent Thai metal band called Naraka) who will also play bass with The Truly Asia since Krist our bassist couldn’t make it.

Paul also played bass with me when I played for the first time as a band with him in 2019.

I formed an ad hoc trio with him and drummer Ken – Paul’s ex-student – and christened the band Azmyl & the Land of Smiles. 

The trio’s name began my idea to name Azmyl & the Truly Asia for ad hoc band projects based on national tourism slogans.

On Saturday I will be playing at a Peasant Market at noon and evening at an art space called Hope Space with a local folk singer and ethnomusicologist. 

On Sunday, it will be what looks like a regular venue on their Facebook but we’ll see once I get there!

Wish me luck, kap khun krap! – September 29, 2023.

* Azmyl Yunor is a touring underground recording artiste, and an academic in media and cultural studies. He has published articles on pop culture, subcultures and Malaysian cultural politics. He adheres to the three-chords-and-the-truth school of songwriting, and Woody Guthrie’s maxim “All you can write is what you see”. He is @azmyl on Twitter.

* This is the opinion of the writer or publication and does not necessarily represent the views of The Malaysian Insight. Article may be edited for brevity and clarity.