They call it the Golden Era, the halcyon days before the Khmer Rouge smashed the country. Norodom Sihanouk was king, arts and filmmaking flourished and the upper middles rocked to an acid-washed hybrid of traditional Khmer music and 1960s Western rock ‘n’ roll.
The pop stars of the era – Sinn Sisamouth, Ros Sereysothea, Phan Ron, Huy Meas – often played live at the National Radio station, their music beamed across the airwaves and blasted into the street with bullhorns like a modern-day wedding party.
Pol Pot silenced them all. And by the time he was finished, the music, the players and the history had all but vanished.
Hollywood cameraman John Pirozzi first discovered Cambodia’s lost rock ‘n’ roll while working on Matt Dillon’s film, City Of Ghosts. Over the last decade, the native New Yorker has interviewed more than 70 survivors: former musicians, friends, family, fans. He has amassed nearly 150 hours of video and collected more than 200 record covers, 50 of which comprise the exhibition Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Every Album Cover Tells a Story, on display at the White Rose Art Gallery until January 10.
Few full-length LPs were produced at the time. The covers, each scanned from the original and digitally retouched, were created for 7-inch vinyl. They came from around the planet, one or two here, a couple more there. The designs are as diverse as the music inside them. Stylistically the cover art exemplifies the quirky, ’60s-era designs that modern-day retro tries to imitate. Portraits are most often black and white, but the graphics around them are rich with primary colours. Names and titles are occasionally translated into French, the style of music printed below in questionable English – calypse, blue, jerk.
The exhibition is a prelude to the screening of Pirozzi’s heavily anticipated documentary film Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock ‘n’ Roll, premiering Saturday at Chaktomuk Theatre, a ’60s-era building designed by Vann Molyvann.
The screening will be followed by live music: musicians from the film will play live and Chhom Nimol, lead singer of Dengue Fever, is scheduled to perform four songs. The screening is invitation only, but the theatre holds 600 and there are lots of tickets around, Pirozzi says.
WHO: John Pirozzi
WHAT: Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Every Album Cover Tells a Story art exhibition
WHERE: Kolab Sar Hotel, #436 Street 310
WHEN: Until January 10
WHY: Album art from the Golden Era