Apart from a few forays into South America (most notably on last year’s brilliant ‘Palenque Palenque’ comp), Soundway have so far focused on unearthing the rarest nuggets of vintage audio gold lurking in the warehouses of various African cities.

The Sound of Siam finds Soundway swap continents whilst maintaining their impressive strike rate. Music might trail far behind tourist destinations and beaches were things Thailand’s best known for to be listed. These 19 tracks – many of which make it to the CD for the first time – drawn from an era when Bangkok’s independent record shops prospered and production of vinyl skyrocketed prove the country’s hitherto rarely exported musical styles such as Luk Thung, Molam and Luk Krung have what it takes to become the next hot destination for enthusiasts looking for fresh, beguiling sounds.

Focusing on the years when vast numbers of people – including musicians – relocated from the countryside to the Bangkok region in search of a higher standard of living, ‘The Sound of Siam’ takes in a wildly diverse range of styles. Horizontal jazz, fiddle- and accordion-powered folk dances, contemplative laments, horn stab-punctuated dancefloor-fillers, surf guitar show-offs and instrumental stomps that pack reserves of high voltage energy that’ll sound reassuringly familiar to anyone taken with the ‘Nigeria Special’ series…it’s all here. Yet the seemingly disparate musical styles find a compelling theme in the alluring union between the rural and the urban.

For example, the two cuts starring vocalist Chaweewan Dumnern that open the comp weld ancient ‘Luk Thung’ folk song templates to distinctly far-out raw funk. That the centuries-old narrative storytelling traditions (and the impassioned, hugely expressive skills of the singers featured here suggest those not skilled in local languages are missing out quite a treat in the lyrics department) and traditional instruments such as bamboo wind instrument ‘khaen’ can coexist this harmoniously with what were then cutting-edge, guitar-shredding moves and mighty dollops of imported funk swagger is what makes ‘Sound of Siam’ such an unqualified success; less a round-up of vaguely ‘exotic’ curios than a cohesive, compelling listening experience that’ll hopefully be soon followed by further instalments.