From Australia to Yangon to a tropical island in Thailand. Music has been important throughout my life but I did lose my way for nearly half my life,

This post is a little light and dark, some light warm and also some cold heavy observations all first hand.

A little like a great song.

Thiri has started playing the Ukulele again. Playing something about Michelle Pfeiffer going to the dentist. I love her creativity, playfulness, persistence, intelligence and innocence. I am also very proud of her and grateful for having such a unicorn in my life.

It has been around four years since I bought The Uke for her in Yangon in the well worn and locally loved Hledan Centre where families hangout across generations exploring this weird new fad of western style shopping which is decades old where I come from but relatively new there. in Myanmar.

I don’t think the world should compete on retailing, it seems so superficial but it is obviously practical when you are buying a present for someone you love.

I think we should compete on the best shared experiences like music and co-creation.

To this day I still don’t understand why I let music fall out of my life, three decades of one previous relationship was a big part of it. Rear rations of ABBA and Paul; Taylor when my exe’s moods permitted, otherwise headphones for the kids and I.

Since moving to Yangon and particularly since falling in love with Thiri in a fresh new long term relationship, it was only after music became a huge part of my life (again) for a full year or two that it had been so sorely missing for so long.

As a child and young teenager I was constantly in the lounge room surrounded by albums on the floor reading lyrics and trying to decypher album covers.

Electric Light Orchestra (ELO), The Angels, Midnight Oil, Blondie, Queen, Meatloaf, ACDC, Adam Ant, Pink Floyd, so many.

It was a big part of my life. I tried learning instruments too, piano, guitar, sax. All a bit lame in terms of results. Our music teach at school used to hit us on the thumb with a steel ruler if our thumb came over the top of the neck of the guitar. Mum was kind about piano but it was a pianola and she was busy with 4-5 children. Dad ended up making me do elocution instead.

CDs, LPs and Casettes

The music playing formats transitioned quickly it seemed. Vinyl and Plastic, so very 60s, 70s and 80s.

From cassette tapes with little plastic boxes where I hid weed and cigarettes from parents and begged my Dad who owned a pharmacy to give me a cassette player for Xmas.

To the earlier vinyl records, singles and long play (LP) which I had a few and loved the large colourful covers, but that was really the domain of my old brother who was a lifetime away born seven years earlier. 10CC Deceptive Bends was an evocative memory. Along with that was his ‘ownership’ of the family record player and hence all records in the house. It was fun to explore the collection when he was not around and learn from friends how to change needles and wire the speakers and add extras even exploring plugging in my radio shack and Dick Smith home made radio circuitboards.

The day our Compact Disc (CD) player arrived is forever etched in my memory, the quality of the sound was so incredibly remarkable. You could jump directly to your favourite track. Everything digital, shiny, futuristic.

It wasn’t so long before that we had seen a man had land on the moon on TV. You can’t get more futuristic.

We even had Molly Meldrum on TV teaching us what was the latest cool band. Wow. Skyhooks huh? Oh Kiss really? If you are not Australian of a certain age you will need to google that, prepare for a giggle. He interviewed Madonna, Oliva Newton John, Freddie Mercury from Queen, Kylie Minogue and all the big names from Australia and around the world.

It all seemed part of a wonderful time. Especially ELO for some reason. Futuristic sounds on a futuristic rainbow optical disc coming out of mysterious black cubes with one wire each to a bigger box and one wire to the power. We were living in a marvellous time. And I took stuff apart from older systems to understand how it ALL worked.

So after many years in a music desert it has been incredibly refreshing to see live music often a few times a week and almost always free. This continues at a slightly less frenetic pace here in Thailand.

Yangon was great because of the mix of communities, local and international with different life paths all smashed together in a limited number of venues. CEOs and students. Gun runners and chauffeurs. Geeks and cool kids. Advanced linguists and lazy bums. Often retiring to a roof top chilling and someone picking up a guitar. Sometimes annoying neighbours in dense areas with a DJ deck until the early hours before leaving the host to apologise the next day. Sometimes wild sometimes refined. Always fun and safe and inclusive.

50th Street. Sayasan. 7th Joint. Pioneer. Karaoke. House parties. Atlas. Sanchaung. Radio Bar. Old Skool. Vista Bar. Penthouse. Rangoon Tea house. Solo Guitar. Bands. Pros and Amateurs. Famous and Yangon Famous and Newbies. Live. Blues. Soul. Indie. Rock. Folk. Electronic Dance Music. Hip Hop. Even Jazz. Later pubs like Harrys and restaurants like L’Opera, Le Planteur, Seeds, Babett, Pansuriya, Strand Hotel, Yangong Yangon Rooftop, O’Thentic, Union Bar, Pansodan, Burbrit and Shwe Sa Bwe sometimes had light live music like a solo singer songwriter guitarist. Even the beer halls like Sanchaung Winstar had buskers outside.

That time in Yangon Burma and also visiting Singapore (historically not known for live music) in recent years helped me realise how some of the developed cities like Sydney and Melbourne even London and New York have truly lost their way, over regulating and killing grass roots community scene with so few music venues in the 2010s compared to the 1970s and 80s when Australia was a major world contributor.

Maybe it is all part of a plan to destroy fun and remove shared experiences. After all music was always one of the most effective form of protest to galvanise and educate against the supposedly more powerful forces in the world.

But I digress.

We weren’t majorly in the Yangon underground hip hop scene but did know some people and stumble on it from time to time and had overlapping friends. Fascinated by the impact of the Myanmar (Burmese) language having a limited number of syllables to end a sentence (meh, deh, la, bah etc ) so rhymes were easier and hence other beats were introduced for additional ties across lyrics and flow.

When the national military coup happened in Nay Pyi Daw Feb 1, 2021 the music died in Yangon and nationally. The military killed music, democracy and hope. All three had already been injured and delayed developed by Covid curfews but we got around that with 4am/5am lock ins and dark curtains. Some of the same strategies worked but it is hard to stop a bullet with a curtain or a song. The military junta continue to kill a lot of people.

Driving the music underground might actually end up being the undoing of the unethical junta in Myanmar. Young protestors have been galvanised by music. United across ethnic and generational boundaries.

One night not long after the coup we played quietly and (mainly) serenely on a Sanchaung roof top overlooking the pro-democracy anti-junta protest areas nearby. And tried to have something similar in friends place in Yankin. It was eery, depressing and dangerous to draw attention to yourself in anyway. There is a recording of some of us (!) singing and another rapping drifting around the internet in Myanmar somewhere. A least when the military don’t turn the internet off as happens often still even years later.

Whole back streets held candle light vigils asking for peace and normality to be restored. The banging of kitchen cooking pots in protest early evening every single night was a strong and remarkable experience as literally everyone protested loudly until the crack downs where protestors were shot at indiscriminately. From babies to grand parents. It was brutal suppression and just getting started.

Only months earlier on November 8, 2020 83% of people had voted for democracy. The next day soldiers were randomly grabbing people out of cars putting them to work as slave labour removing barricades each neighbour hood had erected to protect themselves from night time military raids.

Music, democracy and hope had faded. Discussions during the curfew lockins were ‘which suburbs are safer’. Which had fewer bombings. It was during one of these debating nights we realised we were all boiling frogs.

Time to flee! Where? Maybe to Thailand. But it has to be now. Neither of us has ever lived there, we did not spoke the language nor had any real knowledge other than a perception of low cost of living, peace and quite, good weather and freedom. That has proved largely true over three years later.

The borders were closed by the military. All flights were cancelled. We were already prisoners. Fortunately a friend saved us. A story for another time. Thanks mate you know who you are. Back to the music…

Probably most enjoyable simple music experience has been having friends over with guitars just goofing around, there is something about it that is hard to describe. Bonding, respect for skills, sharing, eating, drinking, experimentation, people singing and trying percussion on anything that will make a sound. Being there – with and for one another. I miss you guys in the Yangon music scene – so many good people.

Thiri often sang on stage and was welcome in every venue. There is no faster way to know a city or a community than music. And hard to imagine a more welcoming and genuine crowd.

Such an incredible contrast to the middle of the current civil war where the military are also burning churches. No Sunday hymns for you. I am not really Christian anymore despite being raised a Catholic, I consider myself more of a Theravada Buddhist but still admire many of the good people, music and actions of the community despite some having lost their way.

Xmas in a 95% Buddhist country! One year we went to a bit of trouble and hosted a large long table at Kamayut in Yangon with chickens, turkeys, pudding and roast everything. I even designed and built the fine teak the tables.

I love the phrase lashings of gravy. Thanks also to Aussie musician Paul Kelly. It was sweltering outside like an Australia Christmas but we blasted the aircon, dragged out the guitars, cracked some red wine open and continued until Boxing Day afternoon. Twenty or so friends rolled through over 24 hours with amusing tales and one slightly overcooked turkey because two of the lads started a little too early.

The Dutch have the concept of Nixsen which is deliberately doing nothing, often alone like reading a book but can be with family and friends. I think that is brilliant. It recognises we are human, have had a slow pace of life for millenia and need to spend chilling time with others without the burden of expectations like productivity or over prepared BBQs.

Back to the dentist song. It was a Vance Joy song. Another Aussie musician. But lets backtrack once more for a second.

Thiri has actually put the Ukulele down and not picked it up since we left Myanmar. I learnt ‘the lime in the coconut’ which is good for a laugh but life with less creating live music has seemed just a little hollow. Now we are in Thailand on a tropical island called Koh Samui. We mainly go to live music in Fishermans, Bangrak, Plai Laem, Chaweng and sometimes Mae Nam house parties. Jam sessions are best and we know one couple with their own recording studio at home, very cool.

I think when you hear live music it energises you and connects you with the creators. It also inspiires you to be more creative and to learn and think more openly.

But to play yourself you have to be in the right place, of course for the skill and dedication to learning but also the positive attitude and energy levels and desire to create.

So it is wonderful Thiri is back creating playing and singing and I have been goofing around with percussion on the Cajon and still torturously bad at free style rap but occasionally pull off a good one (like last night). I have been practising a few songs to sing and learning the words. Sheryl Crow classics are the current theme. Indie country rock I think they call it.

I think fleeing the Myanmar civil war, changing country again, changing houses literally ten times, changing communities, languages, towns, careers and more in so few years has really taken a toll. It is stressful. Stress cause cancer and inflammation and those things reduce life quality and life span. So it is nice to be starting to break out of the cycle of pain and pressure. I feel like it is the first time in my life. Ever.

Music has been one of the most positive consistent forces for joy and love. Despite the three decade gap which is literally more than half my life.

We didn’t even see this many live bands in the golden age of late teens and early twenties seeing Hoodoo Gurus, Midnight Oil, Angels and many more live in Sydney pubs and iconic venues. OK maybe the quality was better them in some ways and better now in other ways.

Maybe we are coming to a new phase in life with less stress where we are able to create again. Thiri had lessons on the acoustic guitar yesterday with Greg at a new local music venue for musicians. Early days. Dreams of singer songwriter performer are evident. She also has a natural talent for discovery of new and classic music that real fits our vibe and she and others can play.

The venue is part bar and part stand-up comedy. This ‘new for our tropical island’ concept our friend Nate developed includes a drop-in space for musicians to hangout, all the instruments you could want but don’t want to carry around all the time, draft beer and hipster booze mainly from the region but also globally. You can even carve your name into the timber tables if you want to help shape the place. Visitors are welcome to play (if you are not shite) and music co-creation is the norm. The world can learn a lot from musicians and creators. Music on the water overlooking a huge Buddhist monastery with amazing sunsets.

Having a ‘slow morning’ today with Thiri sitting at my feet ‘playing’ Vance Joy’s Riptide, forgetting the words to that song and loving another recent one by Hozier (links below). A good start to the day.

Makes we realise we might be starting a new life phase and the missing pieces are coming together.

She just came back from the market, fresh mangos and myanmar biriani and hopefully some more music.

Cheers, P.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Riptide_(Vance_Joy_song)

https://wanderlog.com/list/geoCategory/79361/best-rooftop-bars-in-yangon-rangoon