Rockin Blues'd: Rockin Blues'd Malaysian Edition

"Tan Sri Datuk Amar Dr. P. Ramlee, (March 22, 1929 – May 29, 1973), born Teuku Zakaria bin Teuku Nyak Puteh; was a Malaysian film actor, director, singer, songwriter, composer, and producer. Due to his contributions to the movie and music industry and his literary work, he is often considered the icon of Malay entertainment in Malaysia, Singapore, and Sumatra (especially in Aceh due to his ancestry)."wikipedia

I had posted about music that fucking matters to me, but mostly stuff from Japan and America.. I dont think I posted much Brit bands here, I'll look into that matter in a bit. But now I wanna talk about the musics from MY country..which is a small country called Malaysia, in case you dont know.

Sure, most of the newer bands somewhat failed to ermm...grab my attention(or the world, for that matter) by the fucking balls, that's why I hunt for stuff outside see...But there is no denying that there are some persons throughout the history that had produced such work of arts of the highest quality here. One of the prime example is P. Ramlee- the pride and honour, I must add, of Malaysian cinematic and musical scene- who had directed over 60 movies and wrote over 390 songs.

To give you a glimpse of his talent, here is two clips from the 1962's Ibu Mertuaku(My Mother in-law), in which P. Ramlee directed, play the lead actor(a famous saxophonist turn blind), wrote the songs and sang them. And the film won him a specially created award just for him, The Most Versatile Talent award; on the 10th Asian Film Festival (Tokyo,1963). He cant even play the saxophone, but he acted so damn well that after this movie was released everybody, even nowadays, thought he was an expert saxophonist.

Jeritan Batinku

Jangan Tinggal Daku

P. Ramlee started humbly as a worker at the Malay Film Production(MFP) in Singapore, doing general chores like moving the camera, as the clipper boy and sometimes as extra in the movies. He got his major break when a newly employed Indian director L. Krishnan want P Ramlee to play as the lead on his 1950's Bakti. The movie was a hit and the audience started to take notice of the young P Ramlee. P Ramlee then starred on a couple more successful movies, growing more famous as an actor, singer and songwriter. At that time every directors on MFP want P Ramlee on their movie because it will be a guaranteed hit. At the height of his popularity he was given the trust to direct his first movie, the 1955 big hit Penarek Becha (Trishaw Driver), making him the second Malay to ever become a director.

The Malaya movie scene at that time was really dominated by Hindustan movies from India. Indian movie was really in at that time that even most of the directors in MFP was brought from India. But P Ramlee's second movie Semerah Padi(1956) is the only local movie that manage to topple the Indian movies box-office at that time. For his third film Pancha Delima, he took on the scripts written by one of the Shaw Brothers(the big bosses of MFP) that no other directors want to take and turned it into a cinematic gold. On the preview of that movie-attended by the Shaw Brothers and all MFP directors (including P. Ramlee)-Run Run Shaw suddenly stopped the movie midway, demanding they turn on the lights in the preview room. Facing every directors under his employment he began to scold all the other established directors. Quoting on Ramli Kecik(P Ramlee's assistant), Run Run Shaw was so angry he said " You're all pussy directors...this young man could make such a good film, but you more experienced directors dare not to take on this script!"

That remark however, sown the seed of discontent among the other directors that would become one of the factors that ultimately being the demise of P. Ramlee. I suggested everybody to watched this brilliant documentary of P Ramlee on the History Channel, a classic story actually, of the rise of an unnamed boy to an idol, the fall of a genius by his own people, and the death of a broke and broken man that finally immortalized him, all in one man's lifetime.

A full english subbed movie of his last film Laxmana Do Re Mi( Warriors Do Re Mi) on Youtube..not the greatest piece from him, but this is the only one with eng sub on the 'tube I could find.