Music from Northeast Thailand carries a distinctive energy. It’s raw, hypnotic and often built on instruments that sound very different from what we usually hear in European electronic music. This is the tradition the TONTRAKUL project grows out of – but instead of leaving it in a museum of folklore, it moves it into clubs and festivals. The bamboo mouth organ khaen, the Thai lute phin and rhythms inspired by the mor lam style meet electronica, nu-jazz, house and worldbeat.
Behind the project is musician Tontrakul Kaewyong, who grew up in the Isan region – a place where this style is part of everyday culture. Today he belongs among the distinctive voices of the new Thai music scene: alongside his own projects he collaborates with orchestras, teaches at a music university in Bangkok and performs internationally from Japan to Europe. On stage, however, this is not a folkloric reconstruction. It’s the moment when you realise that a sound hundreds of years old can still feel surprisingly contemporary.