Rocking out with the youth of Saigon

I finally got a chance to experience a little live music and youth culture. I kept putting word out there, and finally some people in the English Club who are interested in rock music arranged a night out.

This video is at a place called Cafe Yoko, well-known here I think, in District 3, near Tao Dan park. It, and all the other places I've heard about with live music at night, are called "coffee shops." There is a bar, but juice and soft drinks are the norm, at about four times the usual price, and the under-aged are welcome.

The band behind the singer is the house band, I think, and stayed up through a set of about 90 minutes while the singers rotated. First up was an older woman who seemed like a den mother to the regulars. She sang jazzy/swing versions of Beatles songs. When the woman in the video came in the door, the first singer made way and left, to another coffee shop, I suspect. This singer focused on ABBA and Alanis Morissette songs, including "Ironic," which . . . . oh, don't get me started. They layers of annoyance with that song go down forever.

After her the main act came on, and he worked through a list of rock classics--All Along the Watchtower, Little Wing, Sultans of Swing, more Beatles--and it got progressively louder and more rocking as it went along. I enjoyed it a lot, and the band was really good. When they were done, a three-piece blues rock combo came on while most people payed their tabs and left.

Most of the people there were in their 20s and a few had just a little more edge to them than anyone else I've met. I saw one tattoo, one piercing, one ponytail, one beard, and lots more cigarette smoking. And as you can see, they sit politely throughout--no dancing and no fists raised in the air. We were out the door and heading home by 10:45.

-Robert