Nhạc hải ngoại ('overseas music') is the umbrella term for the music industry that exiled Vietnamese communities built in the United States and elsewhere after 1975. It carries on the repertoire of nhạc vàng and nhạc trẻ — banned at home — in the form of lavish variety shows such as Paris By Night. The sound leans on synth-heavy 1980s-90s arrangements and the emotive singing of veteran stars.

After the fall of Saigon, refugees who settled in places like Little Saigon in California built a music industry around production houses such as Thúy Nga (Paris By Night) and Asia Entertainment. Their large-scale video shows preserved the erased musical heritage of the South as a pillar of diaspora cultural identity, and the videos even circulated back into Vietnam as bootlegs.

Compare a song's diaspora version with its old recording from Vietnam. Notice how the nostalgia of an exile community is staged through opulent production and the singing of seasoned veterans.

Như Quỳnh's 'Người Tình Mùa Đông' (1994) is a defining overseas-pop hit of the 1990s.

Paris By Night began, as its name says, in Paris, but soon moved its base to California and grew into the largest entertainment brand in the global Vietnamese diaspora.