Vietnamese music

[StriderSubzero 53]

Hey all, 

 

I've been learning Vietnamese and after visiting the country I've taken an interest in the culture more. I'm interested in finding more Vietnamese music and I have found some good EDM-style pop music such as Hoàng Thuỳ Linh, but I am curious about the rock scene. Does anyone have some insight on the music scene there? I gather Japanese music is not at all popular in Vietnam, but I am curious if anyone lives there and knows if there's any kind of visual kei-style bands there too.

Edited April 3, 2020 by StriderSubzero

[Himeaimichu 1535]

Rock music is kinda limited in Vietnam. It's weird, Viets almost have no idea Rock music beyond the 60's stuff their parents listened to after Doi Moi reforms in the 1980's. Electric guitar music can be found, but it's usually shoehorned into traditional music performances (sometimes to a really good effect, as in Southern Vietnamese folk music, but a complete mess in Northern Viet folk music). They are well aware of the electric guitar, but they only use it to play traditional music, or really dated sounding pop music, often laden with cheap yamaha synths.

The closest thing we have to Visual Kei here is, and I'm not kidding, musical Shamanism rituals where the Shaman crossdresses. It's a really cool thing though, but I'm guessing that's not why you posted here lol.

 

This is the only Vietnamese Metal band I know about (there are more, but this is the only one I'm familiar with) and they're ok. Nothing too phenomenal. This song though isn't their strong point, since they attempt to mix in traditional Vietnamese instruments... with really bad keyboard samples. Like, you're in Vietnam. You could just get a Dan Tranh (zither) or Sao Truc (flute) player of the street, and even then, I've heard somewhat good samples of these instruments used by other music groups.

The way electric guitars are used in traditional Vietnamese music seem to be influenced by Rock music (or maybe it influenced 60's rock music, knowing how many musicians served in the war. CCR for example), but the style dates back to French colonial times. Other than the 5 popular rock and metal bands that exist, this is the closest to any kind of rock that most people listen to. ESPECIALLY if you're in the areas near Cambodia like Chau Doc.

 

It's safe to say that there are probably no Vietnamese Visual Kei bands. Maybe one or two, but I have no idea about them. There are some Thai Visual Kei bands though, but I don't think they'll inspire their neighbors anytime soon.

[StriderSubzero 53]

Thanks, that's all very cool! As far as traditional metal bands go, there are quite a few listed here and many of them have at least some music on Youtube: https://www.metal-archives.com/lists/VN 

 

It seems like a fair amount of Vietnamese bands try to sing in English, which is cool and I understand they're hoping to reach a wider audience, but it's disappointing for me because I'm interested in learning the language, lol. 

 

As far as modern/indie rock goes, I thought these guys were pretty cool: 

 

 

 

 

On 4/4/2020 at 8:31 AM, Himeaimichu said:

The closest thing we have to Visual Kei here is, and I'm not kidding, musical Shamanism rituals where the Shaman crossdresses. It's a really cool thing though, but I'm guessing that's not why you posted here lol.

 

Do you have any videos etc. of this? Sounds interesting.

[Himeaimichu 1535]

Just now, StriderSubzero said:

Do you have any videos etc. of this? Sounds interesting.

It's the "Lên đồng" Shamanism tradition. Essentially, it's pretty much indigenous spirit mediumship influenced by Taoism and Hinduism. The Shamans can be male or female, and they can envoke spirits of either gender, so it's not uncommon to see a man dressed in women's clothing with makeup. Even then, shamans will pretty much wear feminine makeup no matter the gender of who is being envoked. As well, the outfits worn by the Shamans include dresses that pre-date the modern Áo dài, and is more similar to the clothing of the ethnic minorities. The music it's set to, "Hát chầu văn", is pretty much the most authentic Northern style of traditional Vietnamese music. It takes on elements from all genres of traditional Vietnamese music, and is very improvisational, and can go from sounding very Chinese, to sounding more Indian (Traditional Vietnamese Music historically had a lot of Indian influence composition-wise. Especially in the South.) There is also a whole community dedicated to filming these events, since, I'm not kidding, many of these musicians are famous within the Hat Chau Van "community".

I don't know if this is the case for this, but I know that in Burma, they have a similar Shamanism tradition, with even crazier music, that has actually become a way for Burmese LGBT people to express themselves lol. I don't know if this is the case for Vietnam though.

[Himeaimichu 1535]

To add on, they even have full music videos for some Hat Van songs, although these are condensed to a regular song-length. So if the other two videos have too much microphone feedback, retreat to this one lol

 

[colorful人生 2777]

Hmm... Much of what I've listened to in Vietnamese has been V-pop, which really just feels like K-pop in Vietnamese. 

 

Here's something I found that was pretty decent though:

 

 

 

[StriderSubzero 53]

This is all super fascinating, thanks for sharing!