Where Are You From?

“Where are you from?” the woman hosting the concert asked, right after she announced I was “Ariel Bui, a singer-songwriter from Nashville, Tennessee.” I looked at the audience, looked at her clutching her microphone, and answered into mine, “Nashville.” So, of course, she asked again,“But where are you from?”

Born and raised in the American South, I knew what she was asking. Yet, to be asked like this in front of an audience, in an art gallery in Louisville, Kentucky, on my DIY house show tour celebrating the 10th anniversary of my first album, Disguised As Fate, I felt taken aback. At the end of the show, the other Asian in the room gave me a knowing nod to acknowledge she had witnessed and understood the awkward exchange.

Just a year prior, you-know-who had taken office, and my activism led me into a lion’s den of pink pussy hats, community organizing, and complicated race relations. While my white allies were trying to understand the complexities of questions like “Where are you from,” we were all trying to understand how to be better allies to Black Lives. Now, I found myself wondering more than ever, how could I show up fully to any racial justice movement if I did not understand my own identity and place in the world. This led me to finding a community of Asian American women and social justice activists via NAPAWF (National Asian Pacific American Women’s Forum) and The Slants Foundation, a non-profit supporting API artists and activists. I also started reading books about Vietnam’s history and stories as written from the perspective of Vietnamese writers.

So much of my life, I wanted to assimilate into White American culture. I always felt the need to prove that I was American enough, cool enough, punk enough, and that I was just like everyone else, except somehow unique. As a teenager, I resented my Ông Nội’s old-school traditional thinking that girls couldn’t grow up and do whatever they wanted–that they had to focus on a career which would allow them to be mothers and wives and, therefore, I didn’t have the luxury to pursue my passions, like music. I rebelled against the all-boys club that was the Florida rock’n’roll music scene and worked really hard to get my acoustic guitarist-singer-songwriter sets booked in between punk, noise, indie and hardcore bands. When I was recruited as a music major at Rollins College as a self-taught pianist, I felt intimidated by the fact that I hadn’t been classically trained since I was three-years-old, that I wasn’t competitive and dedicated enough for the classical world, and that I loved other things like community radio and indie music, too. When I moved to New Mexico to pursue off-grid, sustainable building, I felt like I wasn’t as much a hardcore builder as a lifelong musician.

After moving to Nashville in 2011, even as my music gained respect and recognition, I still often felt like I never fully fit in. I was often too folk for the rock scene and too dark and weird for the white-dominated, folk, Americana scene. I found a community at a record store venue called Fond Object, that embraced and recognized that I was endearingly “kind of a weirdo” and not just straight-up Americana. It was also there that I met Vietnamese-American poet and writer Cathy Linh Che on her book tour, which inspired me to tell my stories from a Vietnamese-American perspective, too.

The experiment for my 2016 self-titled album was to address the concept that I was American through and through, from the American South, inspired by the roots music that sprung from the African American communities of U.S. history. The songs interweaved my interpretation of American music–a mixture of different types of folk, country, western, blues, jazz, rock’n’roll, and soul.

Now, I wanted to explore my Vietnamese roots and possibly blend them with my American roots. How could I incorporate that into my music and into my sound? I always felt like early folk music from different countries had underlying similarities. Maybe I could learn some Vietnamese folk instruments like the đàn tranh zither and make some kind of Vietnamese American folk fusion? Yet, that was clearly a whole ethnomusicological study that would perhaps take years of immersing in Vietnam or even a new music degree.

My journey to learn about my identity as a Vietnamese American activist and musician and the history and heritage of Vietnam, led me to understand that my family is my most direct link to my history, ancestry, and heritage. I had done enough research and therapy up until this point. Maybe I could have greater compassion for their histories and traumas, establish healthier boundaries so I could spend more time with them, connect to a deeper part of who we are, while honoring our collective triggers and traumas. They were survivors of war after all, no matter how well-assimilated and financially successful many of them have become.

For years, I had been largely estranged from my family and extended family. The trauma I had experienced there was immense. From my mother’s schizophrenia, to my father’s addiction and neglect, from childhood sexual abuse, to the expectations that I dutifully be my mother’s and brother’s caretakers, I endured years of extreme criticism from family. Of course, my Ông Bà Nội and Côs had made sure I was housed, showing love by making sure I was kept alive. For years, many of them also showed their love by severely criticizing nearly everything about me, especially my calling to be a musician.

“Why do you do that, con?” “How are you going to eat?” “I told you you shouldn’t have studied music.” “Why didn’t you go to law school?” “You used to be so smart. What happened to you?” For years, my Ông Nội wouldn’t speak to me. Yet, every year that I did not attend the annual reunions, or go on epic family reunions to Vietnam with my grandparents, people would ask me why and tell me I was making my Bà Nội so sad.

When we knew my grandfather’s days were numbered, our relationship changed. He and I let go of our old resentments, the cultural gaps that led to major misunderstandings. He, formerly a well-respected professor in Vietnam, inquired about all of my piano students and my growing music school Melodia Studio. He applauded my attempts to speak Vietnamese to him, saying it had improved while I was waitressing at a Vietnamese restaurant while growing my small business and music career. He apologized for not understanding my music. I forgave him. We forgave each other.

I regretted not going to Vietnam with him while he was still alive, while my Bà Ngoại in Vietnam was still alive, and while my Bà Nội was still strong enough to travel more easily. I did some safety planning with the help of my therapist and started going to family reunions again, because I realized that we only have this one life to spend with the ones we love, no matter how difficult.

In the Summer of 2019, I went on a pilgrimage to Vietnam, hoping to connect to the country of my heritage, my family, culture, food, language…and music. I had only been one other time, when I was in 4th grade and the country had just reopened to American travelers. I hoped to delve into an ethnomusicological understanding of my ancestors and somehow incorporate it into my own sound. I hoped to document the trip and possibly create a documentary, something I learned many people with bicultural identities attempt to do–go on an epic trip to their foreign motherlands and somehow connect to and find themselves. What I found was that there was an entire complex history and musical history, but even more so, a common canon of culture and musical repertoire that I was completely unfamiliar with which would take an entire lifetime or at least a very long period of intensive study to even begin to scratch the surface of. The trip was at once profound and anticlimactic. I felt truly like a Việt Kiều, a foreign-born Vietnamese–both at home AND a perpetual foreigner, in both places. And then, like that, I was back in America. The, anticlimactic, End.

What I realized then was that the music I had been raised listening to, the music of the Vietnam War era, the music that bridged American and Vietnamese culture most authentically to me was Rock’n’Roll.  I had seen Don’t Think I’ve Forgotten: Cambodia’s Lost Rock’n’Roll chronicling the rise of psychedelic rock’n’roll in Cambodia and the brutal erasure of musicians and artists when the Khmer Rouge took over. I wondered what I could find of the history of rock’n’roll music in Vietnam. My fellow community radio DJs at WXNA burned me CDs and recommended records–Saigon Supersounds Vol. 1 and 2, Saigon Rock and Soul, and more recently, Magical Nights: Saigon Surf, Twist and Soul. These records made it clear to me that there was a long era of Western influence in Vietnam, and a lot of the influential music was already music I had been listening to my whole life from the record collections of my parents, aunts, and grandparents and just from the American canon of folk and rock’n’roll.

In the Fall of 2019, I was approached by record label Audio Network to make a Female Alt Indie Rock record for song placements in TV and film. This was an exciting prospect. I had been wanting to get more into the rock scene and out of the Americana pigeonhole. I had also been wondering how to get into writing music for TV and film for many reasons. The best indie music has migrated away from the worlds of MTV, mainstream radio and record sales and into the backgrounds of shows, films and commercials. The money has followed suit.

Most of all, if being Asian American was unspokenly not as marketable, I felt like I could potentially have more musical success in a space where I didn’t have to optically represent myself. Maybe in a setting where I didn’t need to be displayed front and center as my brand, my music could speak for itself and be successful in the background. I also might not have to have the pressure of constant touring and selling records to maybe just break even in music.

It was also an exciting prospect because I had been deep in writer’s block and music industry burnout. The fact that I had a writing prompt, a record deal, and support, reignited my inspiration to write music again. I channeled my female (and male) rock influences, I channeled what I had been watching on TV and in the media, I channeled my life and story. I tried to be more light-hearted than I usually am musically and write songs from the perspective of a young romance growing up, sprinkled with a lot of female sexual empowerment.

Even though the subject matter does not explicitly speak of my Vietnamese American heritage, I think it’s the closest I’m going to get right now at bridging the gap between my Vietnamese and American roots, because it is rock’n’roll. While I was in Vietnam, I had an áo dài tailored for me that I envisioned I’d wear for my Vietnamese American folk fusion concept album. It is black and lacy, more like the classical and rock’n’roll concert attire I am accustomed to, and unlike the bright floral designs that women in Vietnam normally wear. The tailors joked that this dress was more for an old widow.

It is this áo dài I am wearing on the cover of my latest album, Real and Fantasy, which is now done and set to be released in the Fall of 2022 on all streaming platforms, my Bandcamp, and via Audio Network for sync licensing.’

I am proud to be a part of Asian representation in music, because it is a continual journey to truly explore my identity and inspire others. Yet, I am nervous about white industry folks asking me in so many words, “Where are you really from?” I am afraid to be defined as a “Vietnamese-American Singer-Songwriter,” because my white counterparts do not get labeled as “White Musicians”. I want to be known and respected for my music, first and foremost. I am afraid of becoming tokenized as an Asian musician, but at the same time, I believe that Asian representation in the arts is immensely important. I simultaneously do not want my art and music to be defined by my race, but I also want to stand proud in my heritage and identity, because it is a part of who I am that I do not want to be erased or exoticized in ways that colonialism, imperialism, oppression and assimilation would demand. For all these reasons, it is so complicated to simply be asked, “Where are you from?”

And now, the family I am from, are my biggest fans. They see the hard work and dedication that I have put into being a responsible and functional musician, music educator, and owner of music school Melodia Studio. They step up to help cheer me on and fundraise for my various musical and business endeavors. And don’t get me wrong, they still show love by criticizing me, but the critiques sound different these days. “Why do you do this, con? Don’t do it for fame and recognition. Do it because it brings you joy.” “Do you feel like you’ve made it?” “Well, you should.”

Ariel Bui is a musical artist, activist & educator based out of Nashville, TN, where she also runs music school Melodia Studio. The music of Ariel Bui, who Ann Powers of NPR Music once described as “a psychedelic cowgirl cool rockabilly queen” subtly spins classic pop with a variety of American genres – modern indie rock, pop, alt country, 60’s psychedelia, classic soul, and more – all bound together by her unique perspective and songwriting voice.

On her newest record, the forthcoming Real & Fantasy, Bui evocatively frames moments of her days as a teenager through adulthood with a rock sound orchestrated by long-time collaborator, and Grammy-nominated producer, Andrija Tokic (Alabama Shakes, Hurray for the Riff Raff).  In addition to producer Tokic, the album features the work of a number of seasoned Nashville session musicians, including Jack Lawrence (Jack White, The Dead Weather) on Bass, Jo Schornikow (Phosphorescent) on keys & additional vocals, Megan Coleman (Jenny Lewis, Yola) on drums, Ellen Angelico (She’s A Rebel) on guitar & pedal steel.

In addition to her main base of Nashville, Ariel spends a significant portion of her time in her home state of Florida, as well as New Mexico, where she is working to establish an off-grid, self-sustainable, Earthship-inspired retreat. As a result, Bui says this new record reflects the sounds she associates with those different places, “whether surf-y and rock-y like Florida; expansive and spiritually ambient like New Mexico; or polished, professional, and diverse like Nashville.” 

Real & Fantasy will be released in full on October 14th via Audio Network