Weekend Confidential: April 29, 2024
Farewell to the old Mooneys, on to the bigger and better Mooneys!
Weekend Confidential is a weekly post for paid subscribers to DWBAbroad, where I address more personal matters than in the free posts that appear during the week. If you like it, please consider a monthly subscription of $5 ($50 for the year), which gets you access to everything.
I had so much fun last night that I forgot to take pictures. But I don’t regret it, because the Last Call at Mooneys Saigon was unforgettable.
Liam Mooneys saloon was the first place I was brought by “Saigon Jack” Briggs (pictured above left, with Mooney and meself) only a year and change ago, on my first return visit to Saigon after some years’ absence. He got me at the airport on his ‘74 Honda Cub, took me to have some sidewalk phô, and then to Mooney’s.
And my life changed.
I kinda even knew it at the time, but not like I know it now: Mooney’s introduced me to a group of people who combine all the things I like: They’re musicians from everywhere, who took a chance on moving away from home, love to laugh, tell travel stories, and aren’t averse to the occasional drink and a smoke.
And they have welcomed me in like nowhere before, and as I wrote last week, it really feels more like home than anywhere else now (other than the old hometown, of course).
Last night drew a crowd because it was a grand closing, and I was not the only one who wanted to experience Old Mooneys one last time. But it was also, in fact, a party to celebrate Mooney’s impending move, just 10 storefronts down his alley. A reopening party revs up in the bigger, better New Mooneys Saigon on Friday. Sadly, I will be back in Japan when that reopening occurs.
But I was there last night (and this morning) for last hurrah of the tiny old space, so beloved by so many - and there were so many of them there last night, so many people I have gotten to know over the last 15 months, since that fateful night in January 2023.
My assimilation into this town’s social life is largely because of Mooneys, and of course, Saigon Jack. It’s a city of nearly 10 million, but I was lucky enough to find a menagerie of talented young ex-pats who left their homes – in Serbia, Ireland, Russia, Italy, Kosovo, South Africa, Australia, India, France, Germany, Finland, and from all over the United Kingdom (and States) – all here to try their luck in a chaotic, hot and for most, inspiring new city. Others came from Hanoi, or the Mekong Delta, or Da Lat, or Da Nang, or Mui Ne, to do much the same.
Last night drew together all these folks and more, along with the usual handful of passing tourists and travelers who are drawn into the musical maelstrom of this unassuming dive.
Many of them I have now known for a considerable period of time, and gotten to know well, in the manner of those thrown together in unfamiliar surroundings, bound by their mutual stranger-ness (there’s some strangeness in there, too). I wish I could convey all the interesting conversations we’ve had, but you know how that is…
Together, we drink serviceable Saigon beer (its strongest suit being its $2 per bottle price, served ice cold and with a lime if desired), smoke cigarettes, and yell above the music, which nearly everyone plays. I lost count of how many people played last night, but it was a lot, and the lot were led by my extremely talented buddy Calum Read (who, I must digress, lent me his just-purchased Taylor guitar, a prize in any country and a treasure here, for a couple of days, a couple of months ago, to make a video. Even delivered it on his bike. A real gent!)
I digress because that’s the community here: We help each other out. As soon as I get to town, Liam Mooney lets me borrow a guitar; another friend helped me with the videos. In the last week, I’ve played six times in four different places, beginning and ending with Mooney’s.
The community feeling is even more practical than that: Last night, I showed up with a friend who had owed the bar 200,000 Dong for some time; when he paid it back, it was all good. And for the first time ever, I left later owing 190,000 Dong myself - but the bar-keep Lam didn’t hesitate to wave me off with a gracious “don’t worry, you pay later.” And I will.
Musically, open mic at Mooney’s is a shambles, and I say that with affection, and as a participant who has been fairly shambolic myself. The performers are right on the floor, right in front of the bar, and right on the path to the bathroom; this is about as unpretentious and close-quarters as it gets.
And that’s matched by the music. Very few people play their own songs (I’m one of the few), and only a couple are proper professional musicians. Several are quite good, on a par with some of my friends in Sacramento, and others have one thing that they do really well, and leave it at that.
And amateur does not mean bad, and in the right setting, even bad itself isn’t necessarily bad. Amateur means for the love it something, and the love for music here is something to behold. Watching someone belt out an old Irish ballad, or roll through Biggie Smalls’ “Gimme the Loot” with everyone rapping along, or nail yet another version of “The House of the Rising Sun,” builds a momentum and energy that feels like what music should always be: Amateur, passionate, non-competitive, communal, and all-in-good-fun joyous.
As a fairly discerning music listener, I have long held certain ideas about music. But this more amateur approach has really opened my eyes. In fact, Saigon, and Mooneys in particular, has made me rethink music in a number of ways. But mostly, it’s given me a place to finally, FINALLY, become a proper player, a “real” musician. Still nothing fancy, still basically amateur, mind you, but more comfortable, and thus, better.
After all, despite the fact that I’ve made two albums of originals, and written a number more unrecorded songs, I’ve never had that frequent, intense experience of actually just getting up, off-the-cuff, to play in front of people. For some reason, it rarely happened with my friends in Sacramento, despite many of them being stellar musicians, far better than myself.
Perhaps they just didn’t want to pay with me? Here, they do. They encourage me, and I encourage them, and if there’s a better definition of community, I don’t know what it is.
It may be lame to say, but better late than never.
So, Mooneys (with a big nod to Jack Briggs!) has given me a lot: Friends, a community, a ton of laughs, countless nights of fun and conversation and music, and a newfound comfort with live performing. It has introduced me to the people who are the core of my community here, and I wish Liam Mooney, and Han Han, and Lam, and Mimi all the best in the new location.
And I’ll be back soon enough, to rock the house again!
But in the meantime, I soon head to the airport once again, moving on!
And no, I don’t want to leave.
Keep reading with a 7-day free trial
Subscribe to David Watts Barton Abroad to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives.