Khmer is surely the most unusual album ever released by ECM -- unusual because the label, which is best known for elevated chamber jazz, presents the solo debut of trumpeter Nils Petter Molvaer as a production that plays with modern electronica methods while not eschewing the well-known ECM aesthetic. Molvaer's music is somewhere between scary and majestic, and changes between ominous ambient sounds and hard breakbeats, along which atonal screeching guitars combined with melancholic melodies, create a fascinating mélange. Above all this thrones Molvaer's trumpet: lyrical, hectic, calm and sad, trembling and screaming. Molvaer is one of the most progressive and intelligent voices in jazz today, and with Khmer he's recorded one of the best jazz albums of the '90s. Two CD singles were released in addition to this album. The first, "Khmer: The Remixes," contains three remixes of Khmer songs (an ECM novum, too), from Rockers Hi-Fi among others; the second, "Ligotage," offers a new track and another remix. The first CD single was included in the U.S. release of Khmer. ~ Chris Genzel, All Music Guide
Political terms coined by Norodom Sihanouk based on the word 'Khmer':
Khmer Rouge, a Cambodian Communist political group and guerrilla movement
Khmer Viet Minh Cambodian communists who lived in exile in North Vietnam after the 1954 Geneva Conference.
Khmer Bleu, Sihanouk's domestic opponents on the right, whom he so named to distinguish them from his domestic opponents on the left, the 'Khmer Rouge'
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