Thai quintessentials (1): Isaan & Morlum music ...

[Smiles]

Morlam music and dance (Yasathorn: Lao roots). These Thai folks practice en masse for these small festivals all over Thailand, but none more so than out in the country side of north east Thailand.
A very large proportion of the guys in Bangkok and Pattaya (and Hua Hin for that matter) come from Isaan and were bought up with this kind of music. It never leaves.

(These videos best viewed in full screen. Just click the little 'YouTube' button at the bottom right corner of the small screen version)

[youtube:2up6wj0h]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6TCJveaykJg[/youtube:2up6wj0h]


Isaan whiskey, clever skeletons, gay guys, Farang-less sanook in the sun. For the sleleton show, skip ahead to 4:00 minutes. Great old song accompanied by one weird band.

[youtube:2up6wj0h]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lV9ISQ_OrDg[/youtube:2up6wj0h]


South Isaan music (Khymer roots: Surin, Buriram, Si Saket, Ubon). This style and tempo is my favourite for dancing as well as just listening ... if you fail to hear the Inner Muse and commence to toe-tapping and head shaking to the beat to this stuff, you'll never get it anyway.

[youtube:2up6wj0h]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXXK4P2Ogs0[/youtube:2up6wj0h]


When Thai folks flock to places in Bangkok like Tawan Daeng this is what you'll get. The place fills up quickly, and by midnight a thousand people are dancin' in the aisles.
I've been to such places in Bangkok, Pattaya, Ubon, and Surin (Korat and Udon Thani also have Tawan Daeng music halls, and probably other towns) ... sometimes for no particular reason and sometimes for festivals like Loy Kratong and Songkran.

If your guy is from Isaan then I strongly suggest you invite him to go to a Morlum music/dance hall. You'll get a huge number of points for such an offer, and even more if you dance in the aisles with him, but that may be too much to ask :happy7:

[youtube:2up6wj0h]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8e-zzW2VdC0[/youtube:2up6wj0h]

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[newalaan2]

A very large proportion of the guys in Bangkok and Pattaya (and Hua Hin for that matter) come from Isaan and were bought up with this kind of music. It never leaves.

So true, and a great opportunity to find something in common to have with a guy you meet/hook up with in Pattaya/Bkk. Videos as exampled by smiles can be easily found on youtube as can all popular thai music, and playing in the background if you have a laptop/netbook with you or used as a way to strike up some interaction apart from the bed focused stuff, can be a nice relaxing by-product of meeting up with any guy you take a fancy to outside the short time liaisons. I know many just want to get the deed done and boy out of there, but many farang wonder why there is so little in common between westerners and thai boys...this could be a way to help bridge that gap.

If you are in any way interested in music, this 'catchy' form of thai/lao music can be very enjoyable. Excellent post.

[Nirish guy]

Holy shit that was one HELL of a rocket ( firework ?) going up in the first few seconds of the first clip ! I would have loved to have heard the bang it made !

And yes I can concur with the above as any Thai guy I've ever experienced this with has LOVED both his morlam music and also the fact that I actually bothered to spend MY time enjoying and experiencing it and most importantly showing ( sometimes fake) interest in it ( allbeit the sound drives me crazy in a very short space of time but I hide that well usually).

Plus an added bonus if the music is being played back in the room after perhaps a night out where a few drinks have been taken is that I've found it to cause most Thai guys to almost instantly break into a lovely (sexy I think) Thai cultural dance rountine of their own making, complete with nice angled wrists, lovely cute leg movements and lots of hot hip girations which always inevitably then leads to something else equally enjoyable for me too so it turns into a real win win situation.

The only one note of caution I would add when visiting such establishments as Tawan Daeng etc is to bring a pair of blooming ear plugs with you as the volume of the music on the amplifiers (to me anyway) seems to always be set at at least one notch up past the totally deafening mark no matter where we go - and this is from a guy who played in a rock band for ten years ! But aside from that it's always a great nights crack and something different and worthwile to enjoy when in Thailand.

Yeah, great post.

[joe552]

I remember (vaguely, it has to be said) going to an Isaan disco somewhere behind Big C on 2nd road a few years ago with a group of young guys and having a great time. Am I right in thinking, though, that Mor Lam is an outdoor concert thing which isn't on every night, while the Isaan disco is every night? My young friend has only been in Pattaya 2 months so doesn't have many friends his own age, so would this be a good place to take him - maybe expand his circle (and earn some brownie points for me too)

[colmx]

My young friend has only been in Pattaya 2 months so doesn't have many friends his own age, so would this be a good place to take him - maybe expand his circle (and earn some brownie points for me too)

Tum Nan Khon Issan is where you will want to go Joe... most taxi drivers will knwo where it is...
I guess you are not far wrong with your description of location
Its gets going around midnight till 3am
[youtube:13357lq8]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eR6CihggSd0[/youtube:13357lq8]

[Smiles]

" ... Am I right in thinking, though, that Mor Lam is an outdoor concert thing which isn't on every night, while the Isaan disco is every night? ... "

Morlum is a style of music, not a specific type of venue.
Tawan Daeng for instance is open every night, and I'm pretty certain the Pattaya dance bar (Tum Nan Khon Issan) mentioned by Colmx is as well.
Big special concerts are often outdoors, kind of like travelling circuses they travel from town to town on a regular circuit ("if it's Thursday it must be bloody Ubon"). The regular music/dance halls are all over the place and are open like any regular bar. Morlum music is of course ubiquitous in karaoke joints.

[newalaan2]

Tum Nan Khon Issan is where you will want to go Joe..

Yep that's the place!......but it's not all Issan music........there are pop/rock bands/songs as well as western stuff too, and DJ segments through the evening, they have Beer Towers as well as the whiskey sets if you want a beer night, and even though it's peaking 3am-ish it's still just as much fun earlier than that with a good choice of tables. I think we went 1am-ish and it was busy. Excellent snacks too. Also it has 'ordinary/normal' tables as opposed to the high tables at clubs like NAB etc.. Highly recommended.

[joe552]

thanks guys, that's the place - I remember those beer towers - great fun.

[newalaan2]

My young friend has only been in Pattaya 2 months so doesn't have many friends his own age, so would this be a good place to take him - maybe expand his circle (and earn some brownie points for me too)

Joe552, if he likes Issan music it would be a great place to take him. We have gone to the Bkk version of Tam Nan Khon Issan as a couple only and had great fun with the music and taking in the scene around us, but it's also great of course with a few friends.

I'm not sure if you are still in Pattaya when I arrive but we usually go with a couple of close friends, four of us altogether, and we'd be happy to have another couple tag along if you felt unsure about the etiquette and wanted to take a friend to check it out first, we take songtaews so plenty of room on board and you can just go your own way after a while if you wished, or stay in the company. We don't 'do' a comlx or Martin911 and stay till the sun comes up, we usually stay for a couple of hours then head to Wat Chai before retiring at a 'fairly decent' hour.

[joe552]

thanks newalaan, I may take you up on that offer after I've spoken to him about it. I'll be in Pattaya from 7 to 23 June.