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Saturday Night Classics-Black Magic Woman
It wasn’t until the end of 1989 that I became aware of Black Magic Woman. I only recall the event because our family friends, who lived two houses down, held a wedding for their oldest daughter. It sounded fantastic—a moody, bluesy sound, except that I did not know then that that sound would be something called blues rock.
Anyway, I must have heard this song before. How could I not, as Black Magic Woman dominated wedding receptions in Cambodia throughout the 1980s and 1990s? In the middle of Phnom Penh or some other remote places in one of the provinces, if the wedding parties had money to hire live bands, Black Magic Woman would make an appearance at receptions. There were also two unique covers, one that sounded similar to the Fleetwood Mac original and another that sounded slightly jazzy, with an Afro-Cuban beat.
I once asked one of my father’s chauffeurs, who had managed a band in his former life, and he told me that every guitarist fancied himself to be the next Mok Sivutha, one of the greatest guitarists from the pre-Khmer Rouge era. However, this did not explain the song’s appeal, given there are many fantastic guitar-driven songs in the Khmer repertoire. It is hardly an exaggeration to argue that pre-1975 modern Khmer music can hold its own against any Western rock.
To this day, I have no idea why Black Magic Woman was a staple at Khmer wedding receptions. In the past 20 years, it has gradually faded away; the majority of bands today are composed of people in their 20s and early 30s.
Published in General
I first encountered this song on the sound track to Guitar Hero III. It’s a great song.
Carlos Santana, 1970.
American wedding receptions in the 70’s , 80’s, and 90’s always included Proud Mary by CCR. If the reception did not include Proud Mary, the wedding was declared invalid and the marriage was annulled. The Khmers appear to have had much better taste.
(!!!)
That can’t be good.
Good post, DMak.
Perhaps you could write a future post that includes some samples of this.
Not liking CCR is a crime against humanity. The fact is both of those songs are excellent choices for a wedding or a party or just a Saturday afternoon drinking beer and sitting on the porch
I first heard it when my dad bought Abraxas on cassette when I was middle school age. Still my favorite Santana album (though I haven’t heard all of them).
I’ll go with the Mac version, but not as wedding music.
John McVie looked like he was on some awesome psychedelics. I prefer this version over the Santana version.
Is the other guitarist Danny Kirwan?
Yes.
A long-time friend was standing in the alley outside the Boston Tea Party listening to this performance through a bathroom window. He’s never forgotten it. It truly is a legendary set: Peter Green and Danny Kirwan dueling it out, the student challenging the master, forcing a still healthy Green to absolute peaks of his genius — those fills! And, as a bonus, we get to hear the legendary “Greenie” ’59 Les Paul (now owned by Metallica’s Kirk Hammet), arguably the most famous rock guitar of them all.