Leng Pleng

On a good day, the trip to Phnom Penh’s fancy new airport takes about 45 minutes. This was not a good day. It was the Friday before Slam City IV, we needed multiple pickups, and some genius had decided Friday peak hour was the perfect time to dig up the busiest road in the city, which is pretty much the only road to the airport.

The first trip was slow. The return was a map-app adventure through the backstreets. The second was slower, complete with a near-death encounter involving a garbage truck. By the third, midnight had arrived and the city was tucked up in bed. Somewhere between the traffic, the wrong turns and the multiple airport arrivals, the introductions happened: names, hometowns, stories, and the revelation that Fang’s drummer Leo was celebrating his birthday. His 22nd.

F#@k, I’m old.

Slam City is in its fourth incarnation, hence the IV. It’s a bare-bones DIY heavy music festival held together by Mia Priest, Chihiro, Paulo and a few other diehards whose tentacles stretch across oceans and borders. This year they dragged in Sammytown and his 2026 incarnation of Fang: Justin, Tony, Kara and 22-year-old Leo, whose Chinese mum apparently required a note from Sammytown promising her boy would be looked after.

Then there’s Round Eye, originally American punks in Shanghai although now an ever-morphing outfit of internationals, made up this time of the ever-present Chachy, plus Jack, Loïce, Larry and James. They’re provocateurs who enjoy poking bears and pricking ears. Loïce’s introduction to Cambodia was memorable for all the wrong reasons.

Locally, After God, the only all-Cambodian outfit on the bill, are no strangers to this circus. Summer Soselo and newcomers JŌHATSU share frontman Ronan, the latter preferring red-hot pokers to gentle prodding. JŌHATSU are about to drop their debut album, I Was Never Here. Summer Soselo, meanwhile, have regrouped after tragedy. RIP Ned Kelly.

Saturday night, Aaron’s experimental guitar project Mazama opened proceedings. He arrived armed with an electric guitar, a chair and enough pedals to confuse an electrician. At times he looked like something had gone horribly wrong, like a lead had come unplugged or he’d forgotten to plug it all in. Occasionally that’s exactly how it sounded. By the end, though, waves of looping noise had built, roared and crashed onto Slam City’s metaphorical beach.

After God threw down the gauntlet with the first of two sets that evening, a loud, guttural assault, as per trademark. Always loud, and always Alain on the drums.

Summer Soselo upped the stage presence with their melodic alternative rock. Multiple thundering guitars and Ronan’s roaming vocals (Roaming Ronan? Nah), pulled in a growing crowd, and hair, sweat and beer went everywhere.

Round Eye hit the stage with Chachy leading the charge, delivering their particular brand of Shanghai-based punk mayhem. Jagged guitars, unpredictable rhythms and enough musical left turns to give our map app a nervous breakdown.

Formed in Shanghai in 2012, Round Eye have spent years working Asia’s underground circuit, building connections and occasionally pissing off the authorities. Their third album, 2021’s Culture Shock Treatment, tackles some of China’s political and social issues head on. Their sound is an unruly collision of punk, experimental rock and saxophone-driven madness, although this time the madness was missing its sax, which was left stranded in Taiwan. They have a healthy disregard for musical convention, and there’s nothing nostalgic about them.

Then JŌHATSU, a band whose riffs and lyrics haunt my sleep, probably because I’ve spent far too much time around them. Their track “Zionist” was the first of several moments that night when the politics came out swinging. There was no ambiguity about where they stand on Palestine.

Then came Fang. Forty-odd years of punk rock bad behaviour rolled into one sweaty Phnom Penh bar. Fronted by Sammytown, they emerged from California’s East Bay hardcore scene in the early 1980s, leaving a trail of records, controversy and influence that reached all the way to Nirvana, who covered “The Money Will Roll Right In.”

This wasn’t 1982, but Sammytown’s 2026 touring lineup brought that grubby legacy to Noisy Chili all the same. In a reversal of musical history, Fang threw in covers of the Beastie Boys and Nirvana. Between the noise, Sammytown made one thing clear: “… we also stand with Palestine.” A sentiment heard throughout the night.

Step away from the stage and Slam City looks less like a festival and more like an improbable family reunion. Musicians watched other musicians, old mates caught up, newcomers figured out what they’d stumbled into, and a few had just come for a quiet beer and ended up joining in. Behind it all, Mia, Chihiro and Paulo kept the wheels turning. I’m not sure who was running the sound desk, but they generally made sense of six very different approaches to making noise.

Cambodia’s underground scene isn’t swimming in cash. Audiences are small, gear costs money, venues are limited, and getting international bands into Phnom Penh involves a ridiculous amount of unpaid legwork. Still, Slam City IV’s DIY ethos rubbed its hands together and pulled off the most successful show yet.

The connections now stretch well beyond Cambodia. These bands share stages, contacts, gig routes and possibilities, plus probably a few questionable decisions. Nobody’s getting rich. Most are lucky to break even. Yet they keep organising, playing and turning up.

Eventually the amps went quiet. Ears ringing, shirt stuck to my back, I found myself outside Noisy Chili, where the conversations carried on long after the music stopped. Inside there were cables to coil, gear to shift and the usual collection of half-finished beers. Tomorrow there’d be hangovers, airport runs and the everyday business of getting by in Phnom Penh.

I’d spent the evening watching people from different countries, generations and musical backgrounds make a spectacular racket together. Most had probably lost money doing it. And somehow, after all the traffic, noise, sweat and questionable decisions, I was already wondering when we’d do it again.

Preferably without the fucking garbage truck.