Kitiphan Punkabutra
alias “Zupermoo”
Born: Bangkok, 1959

      I have been playing guitar since I was 10 years old, which is since 1969.  I started by learning the songs that I loved liked Carlos Santana, Eric Clapton and the Beatles songs, at least the best that I could play them.  Those were some of my inspirations.  My friends and I started a band called CityZu.  It should have been called City Zoo but Thai people like to have fun with English.  After all, we have to study it in school starting at the fifth grade.  I was only thirteen at the time and CityZu was together for 6 years. Then It fell apart.

      The next bands name was the Mummies but it only lasted for a couple of months.  I quit because I felt I wasn't good enough.  They were a professional band giging around Bangkok, Singapore, and Kuala Lumpur.  I didn't feel good enough to stay with them, so I stayed in school.  After this, I joined a Ramkhamhang College band and played in a Thai country music band called Luk Tung Sukho Thai.  Luk Tung is best translated as country music, but it doesn't sound anything like American country music.  Anyway, in Thai language luk tung means a child of the fields, hence a farmer or a country boy of Thailand.  When that job was finished, I played with the Thamasat University band called Luk Tung Ta-Pra-Jan.  Ta-Pra-Jan literally means, “port of the moon” but in actuality it's a place in Bangkok.  It's quite near Kao Sarn Road; in case you've ever been there.  I played there for two years and then I started playing with a band called Macintosh.  That’s how I got recognized.

      My old stuff with that band is available on Nit-Ti-Tat Records.  After two years of this I was chosen to be an actor in a couple of Thai films.  The first one was Won Wan Yong Wan You.  The second, Won Nee Yong Mee Ter, followed by Tawan Yim Chaeng.  But I was more popular in Thailand as an arranger.

      When I was twenty-three, Macintosh had five albums with me as the lead guitar.  After Macintosh, I established another band named Wong Ta Wan.  They played progressive rock, a little something like Genesis.  The first album was Hoon Gra Bok which is a type of puppet.  The album was about a guy who had to leave becasue his woman for treated him like a puppet on a string.

      After this I went to work for Butterfly Sound and Film.  I changed into more of a composer and wrote jingles for advertisements for a living.  I wanted to be a song-writer instead of a pop star.

      I loved to play and write songs more that being an actor.  I knew that if I wanted to be a really good musician, I should learn a lot of theory.  So I studied Classical and Jazz.  The Luk Tung I had been playing was mainly in the minor scale so I learned a lot new chords.  Then I practiced conducting.  I spent four years writing and arranging at Butterfly.  From here, I went on to be a studio musician.  I worked in studios in Bangkok and I worked in Carabao's studio for a while.  The band had just broken up, and the new band leader asked me to be a permanent member.  The first time I played with them was a challenge because they were so famous, still are.  Most foreigners don't know them, but all of the Thai's do.  It felt great to be on stage again.  I toured the whole country for three years.

      After Carabao, I worked with my own band of four called Wong Ta Wan.  I really concentrated on making a group that got along well with no outstanding egos.  Wong Ta Wan released the album Hoon Gra Bak, Mop, Sip Song Ra Si (12 fortune tellers), The Promise and Autography.  If you want to hear these, they are available from Warner Music.

      Eventually, I even got bored of this because I had a contrasting vision with the group.  That band loved the lyrics more than the music, but I was interesting in fusing music towards a new phenomenon.  I wanted to make original music.  So, finally, I created The Zansab Philharmonic Orchestra and that’s where we are today.