INSIGHTS ON CONSUMPTION COLLECTIVES PERSPECTIVES Thai Popular Music and Its Unsatisfied (Popular) Tastes in the 1960s and the 1970s VIRIYA SAWANGCHOT T his commentary aims to discuss Thai popular music and the context of popular tastes among musical genres, media platforms, and the identity politics of artists during the 1960s–70s. This time represented the birth of the “authoritarian rule” imposed in 1957 with the passing of the democratic rule. It was a period marked by in- creasing modernization and westernization under the influ- ence of Thanarat and Kittikojon’ s governments and America’ s cold war entrainment; the intensification of social/cultural movements, such as the popular uprising of pro-democracy protesters led by Thammasat students in Bangkok in 1973; and a beginning modernization of the culture industries. Dur- ing this time, popular music was central to the formation of collective identities and the articulation of new subjectivi- ties and lines of struggle—from the evolution of new “mod- ern” middle-class tastes in the 1960s, and the emergence of radical student movements in the early 1970s, to the consol- idation of a Thai pop scene toward the second half of that decade. Rather than considering popular music as simply mean- ing “light music” or “easy listening” deemed to be not only con- servative but also unable to produce social criticism, I follow the approach proposed by scholars like Peterson and Anand (2004) and Rojek (2011), who emphasize the social and con- tested nature of pop music. They highlight how popular mu- sic is shaped by collective conflict, as different social forces must struggle for media spaces in order to set their musical tastes and impose their class aesthetics. At the same time they show how popular music is constitutive to the formation of such collective identities, in this case related to controver- sial issues of “Thai-ness,” de-Americanization, and class for- mation in Thai society. Relating Rojeck’s argument to the question of pop/pop- ular music in Thailand, I want to highlight historical social contexts that contribute to articulate the meaning of musi- cal genres. Rather than considering how Thai popular music has reproduced the distinction of popular and elite tastes al- ways discussed by Thai music commentators and scholars, this commentary will illustrate the complex articulation of Thai musical genres. The commentary begins with the discussion of the birth of pleng lukgrung and pleang lukthung and its crit- ical relationship to the American pop culture of the 1950–60s. The next section then presents the relationship of popular music to a new generation, focusing on the making of pleng string and pleng pua ciwit that linked politics and consump- tion in the 1960s–70s. The final section discusses a useful way to understand the significant roles of the culture of mu- sic production/consumption and the making of popular taste in Thailand of the 1960s–70s. PLENG LUKGRUNG AND PLENG LUKTHUNG : URBAN AND RURAL CULTURE IN QUESTION Although western music such as marching band and jazz mu- sic had influenced Thai music culture since the early 1900s, pleng Thai saa kon (international Thai music) and pleng samai mai (modern music) was initially developed in hybrid styles, mixing Thai traditional and western music in the 1930s (Amar- tayakul 1986, 16–18). The new Thai music style known as lakhon phanthan (Thai opera) or lakhon rong (Thai musical) hired Thai musicians and songwriters to compose and perform for shows that helped to boost pleng Thai saa kon popular- ity among people who lived in urban areas (Kusalasai 1992, 32–33). At the same time, hotel nightclubs and cafes also emerged in Bangkok, the capital city of Thailand for 150 years Viriya Sawangchot (tvsawang@gmail.com) is a coordinator of the Inter-Asia School Bangkok, Bangkok, Thailand. He is adjunct lecturer in cultural studies of music (2020–21) at the Research Institute of Cultures and Languages of Asia, Mahidol University, and previously was a senior fellow (2017–19) at Social Enterprise Leadership Center, Kasetsart University, Bangkok, Thailand. His research interests are Thai popular music industry, alternative culture/spaces, and creative industries in Southeast Asia. Issue Editors: Eric Arnould, Adam Arvidsson, and Giana M. Eckhardt Published online September 2, 2021. Journal of the Association for Consumer Research, volume 6, number 4, October 2021. © 2021 Association for Consumer Research. All rights reserved. Published by The University of Chicago Press for the Association for Consumer Research. https://doi.org/10.1086/716071