A day after returning to Jakarta from the Laneway Festival in Singapore, I went to Bandung to see The Horrors again. Nuts, I know. But I had time, so why not? Besides, going to see a band is as good excuse as any to go to Bandung. The original plan was to go with whoever sometime in the afternoon, get there in time for the show that night, then go straight back to Jakarta. As usual, that’s not how it turned out.

11:30 While at work I get a call out of the blue from Hendra “Pisang” Tanusaputra at Warner Music Indonesia. “Can you interview The Horrors at the venue in Bandung at 5 pm?” he says. Well that makes things interesting, not to mention confusing as I wasn’t expecting it. Pisang explains that he’s just helping out Sammy Shirra-Moore, who was the media coordinator at Laneway and had been trying to set up this interview for the past few weeks for XL Recordings, The Horrors label. If I’m not mistaken Sammy used to work for Warner Singapore, and XL is distributed by Warner, at least in this part of the world. So it makes sense that someone from Warner Indonesia gets involved to some degree. I tell Pisang I’ll try to make it but I can’t guarantee because it’s on such short notice. I have done interviews on even shorter notice before, but those were at a festival where I was already in attendance. Getting asked to do an interview in another city only a few hours beforehand? Now that’s new. First time for everything, eh?

So I ask around to see if anyone’s going to Bandung early, and if I can hitch a ride. Failing that, I’ll have to travel by minibus and make my own way to the venue. As luck has it, frequent contributing photographer Muhammad Asranur sends a message asking if I’m going to Bandung. I tell him I am indeed, and manage to convince him to leave soon so we can get there in time for the interview. I also tell him I’ll sort out a media pass for him, so he can take photos at the gig.

14:30 And we’re off to Bandung. While Asra drives I get some sleep in the passenger seat. Well I hadn’t had much sleep over the past week in Singapore, and less than 24 hours after returning to Jakarta I’m already on another trip out of town. I pay for the toll road and doze off.

17:00 We arrive in Bandung, and after a brief encounter with someone in a civil servant uniform who tells us to pull over and fight after Asra gets mad at him for not giving way at a junction (after he pulls over I just give him the middle finger and we drive off), we get to Dago Tea House where The Horrors are soundchecking.

17:45 While waiting near The Horrors’ dressing room for the interview, various members go back and forth between there and the stage. Guitarist Josh Hayward steps out for a cigarette break, and I go up and say hello, having met him two days earlier at Laneway. Not long after, dapper-dressed keyboardist Tom Cowan steps out and goes over to some fans who have been waiting outside. As he walks back in, I amuse him with a photo of his younger brother strangling me - his younger brother being Freddie Cowan, guitarist of The Vaccines, whom I met in Singapore almost a week earlier.

18:15 Soundcheck over, The Horrors’ tour manager splits up the four journalists here to interview the band and assigns each one a different member. I get vocalist Faris Badwan, who’s been sitting on the dressing room’s tiny couch with a tattered copy of J.G. Ballard’s Crash in his hand. I sit on the couch next to him and offer to immediately start the interview, but he asks to wait until everyone has left the room so there won’t be any distractions. Then the interview begins: we talk about the band’s latest album, how he juggles The Horrors with his other project Cat’s Eyes, how Josh built some of the equipment for their studio (he majored in Physics). Faris mentions Leonard Cohen and ESG and says “natural” many times during our 15 minutes. At one point bassist Rhys Webb enters the room and this amusing exchange happens:

“Rhys!”

“What?”

“Out!”

Interview over, I ask Faris to sign my Skying CD and get a picture with him. He seems perplexed at first when I ask him to strangle me - well actually they all do, as normal human beings should. Frankly I’d be worried if any of them instantly clenched their hands around my throat, no questions asked - and then I show him the photo with Freddie, like I showed Tom earlier. Works like a charm, and Faris gets the tour manager to take the photo. He grabs my BlackBerry, aims the camera, and tells Faris, “Harder.” Faris obliges, probably a bit too eagerly as you can see from the photo. That expression I’m making, of someone who can’t breathe? No acting necessary.

After regaining some oxygen, I get the rest of the band to sign my CD, then ask drummer Joe Spurgeon to record a little voice note for Sarah Deshita, his biggest fan who was bummed out at not meeting him at Laneway and couldn’t come to Bandung. Press chores over, the band resume soundcheck while I hang out at the venue. No time to go anywhere because the band will perform in a couple of hours, and it’s raining heavily anyway.

19:30 Two guys who interviewed Rhys earlier - one of whom is my friend Ananda Surio Anindyo - come in out of the rain with a couple of old Panbers LPs with them. During their interview with Rhys, he mentioned a Panbers track that he likes to play during his DJ sets. One thing led to another, and the next thing you know, they’re off to the used record store where they leave their ID cards as collateral because they don’t have enough cash on them to pay for the LPs, which cost IDR 150,000 each. When they get back to the venue, Rhys emerges from the dressing room and looks very pleased. He promises to figure out how to pay them back, because he doesn’t have any rupiahs on him. Tom posts a photo of one of the album covers with the words “Indonesian dudes” on his Instagram account, which is linked to The Horrors’ Twitter account.

20:30 It’s show time. Dago Tea House is just over half-full, in spite of tickets being IDR 150,000, a very cheap price for a band of their stature. Maybe it’s because the show was only officially announced and promoted two weeks earlier, maybe it’s because many people who might have wanted to see them already saw them at Laneway, though there were quite a few people who ended up going to both shows, even making the trip from Jakarta. Which is a shame, because Dago Tea House is a small, intimate venue, ideally suited to seeing a band up close and personal as they melt your face off. And though they still use that murky lighting scheme, at least you can still get a better look at them.

21:30 An hour later, it’s over. Ten songs, which means a headline show by The Horrors doesn’t last for much longer than a festival set (they played seven songs at Laneway Singapore), and they didn’t play “Dive In” like they usually do in their own shows. Also not played: anything off their first album, Strange House. I asked Faris earlier about why they haven’t been playing any of those songs. His reply was that they were excited about the new songs from Skying, and how well they fit together with the songs from their second album, Primary Colours. Faris said that they’ll eventually play the old songs again at some point. “But not tonight?” I asked. “Not tonight,” he said. Well, I guess you have to respect them for following their artistic impulses instead of going for the easy crowd-pleasing route. Not a recommended route if you’re not prepared for blank expressions from the crowd. But if your songs are as strong as The Horrors’, you can get away with it.

22:00 After the show, fans are gathered outside The Horrors’ dressing room, waiting for photos and autographs. Faris emerges, but is ushered without a word to a waiting car that will take him back to the hotel. He probably needs some rest. I don’t stick around, but I assume the rest of the band are still around and more than happy to do the meet and greet thing. A meal later, because we hadn’t eaten anything since arriving in Bandung, Asra and I head back to Jakarta. We have another gig to catch tomorrow. Oh, this life…

I was going to post a video of something other than what I embedded in my Laneway post, but I can only find two videos from the Bandung gig. The other people in the crowd were probably not the video recording type, or just haven’t been bothered to upload. So here’s The Horrors with “Still Life” again, this time from Bandung:

In my previous Laneway-related post, I talked about the festival based on my experience last year as one of the crowd. This time around, I was there to work. No, really. Well, actually I wanted to save money on a ticket, especially as I was going to be in Singapore for almost a week due to the Kasabian and The Vaccines show a few days earlier. For this assignment I took on the role of photographer, since my fellow editor and Laneway veteran Wening Gitomartoyo also wanted to go and cover the festival. At a glance being the photographer might seem simple - take pictures from the photo pit for each performance’s first three songs, but as you’ll read below, it ended up being a bit more complicated than that. 

11:30 I meet up with Wening at Fort Canning Park to pick up our media passes. Though the first band set starts at 13:50, we are told that the mini press conferences taking place in the backstage media tent will start at 12:00. We decide to skip the first few press conferences and go get lunch. It’s going to be a long day, and the festival food might not be enough to sustain us, especially if it turns out to be a bit pricey. We walk for 10 minutes to The Cathay shopping mall, and choose Popeyes as our dining destination. Mostly because it’s affordable and more or less vanished from Jakarta. The Singapore Popeyes menu is superior, though. We end up ordering more than we can eat, even though it’s supposed to be a meal for two for only SGD 13. In the photo below you can see fried chicken, a biscuit, fries covered in cheese. Very delicious, but too much. Next time I’m in Singapore, I’m going to have my revenge.

12:30 We drag our stuffed selves back to Fort Canning Park, where I notice that the clouds have taken an ominous turn. A friend tells me via BlackBerry Messenger that they’re trapped by rain somewhere else in the city. It hasn’t rained over us at Fort Canning Park just yet, but it looks like it will. If it does, I am prepared for it, based on last year’s experience. I’m wearing boots! But I hope that it doesn’t turn out to be as bad as last year.

13:00 The rain has not fallen yet. In fact, it’s still scorching. Despite the heat, people have already queued since we arrived earlier and rush to find good spots as soon as the gates open. I head to the merchandise booth and buy a hat.

13:30 Before Cults kick off the festival, there’s still time to catch Chairlift’s press conference in the media tent, which is basically a tiny room with lots of journalists in it, interrogating each artist. I just take a few photos from the back, ask them about how the festival’s been so far (“It’s like a summer camp!” says Patrick Wimberley, the Brooklyn, New York band’s bassist), then head back outside. Caroline Polachek is gorgeous, by the way.

13:50 Speaking of gorgeous ladies, here’s Madeline Follin heating things up with Manhattan, New York’s Cults on Stage One. As if it weren’t hot enough already out there.

A big crowd has already gathered, including Goodnight Electric frontman Henry Foundation, front and centre. It’s more crowded than it was at the same time last year.

Here’s Cults performing “Go Outside”:

14:15 Back in the media tent, it’s Austra’s turn to face the press, with drummer Maya Popstepski and singer Katie Stelmanis representing the Toronto, Canada band.

14:30 It’s time for Yuck to get the party started on Stage Two. Though they dress like rednecks, they’re actually from London, England.

Here’s Yuck performing “Get Away”:

15:00 It’s Christopher Owens and Chet “JR” White representing Girls in the media tent. Boy, do they look tired.

15:15 Back on Stage One, it’s Chairlift. Caroline Polachek is still gorgeous. And check out the batik shirt on guitarist Jason McMahon.

Here’s Chairlift with “Bruises”:

And I got Chairlift’s setlist at the end of their performance, but somehow I lost it. Here’s a picture before it vanished. If anyone has it, feel free to send it to me haha.

16:00 I skip The Drums’ press conference and get in position for Austra on Stage Two. I am baffled by what I see, as I imagine many others are. Fun, though.

Here’s Austra with “Lose It”:

16:45 This is one of the most spine-tingling moments at Laneway. At the start of Girls’ set, Christopher Owens walks onto Stage One alone with his guitar.

Here’s his version of “I Will Always Love You”, in tribute to Whitney Houston who was reported deceased just a few hours earlier:

17:15 Back in the media tent again, this time for Twin Shadow’s press conference. This is what it looks like from the side.

I ask Twin Shadow alias George Lewis, Jr. how he keeps his hair in such spectacular shape. He laughs and says he goes to two salons, but at the moment he’s having a bad hair day, which is why he’s wearing a hat. I’m pretty sure that his worst hair day is still better than my best hair day.

17:30 It’s The Drums from Brooklyn, New York on Stage Two. Already saw them last year in Jakarta, but this time around feels more fun. I’m not aware they hadn’t been playing “Let’s Go Surfing” around the time their new album came out, but they do play it here, and it’s awesome.

Here’s The Drums with “Forever And Ever Amen”:

18:20 On Stage One, it’s Twickenham, England-born Anna Calvi with her booming voice and dexterous guitar playing. “The best guitar player at the festival,” says Faris Badwan of The Horrors later. I certainly feel like giving up when watching her play.

Here’s Anna Calvi with “Jezebel”:

18:50 In the media tent it’s Alex Naidus, Kip Berman and Peggy Wang representing New York’s The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart. I’m wearing a White Shoes & The Couples Company t-shirt, so that’s something to talk about with them, as both bands recently played and hung out together at the same festival in Hong Kong. We also talk about The Pains’ Jakarta show on March 2nd, where White Shoes will open for them.

19:10 Twin Shadow takes over Stage Two.

Here’s Twin Shadow with “Shadows”, the last song of his set. You can’t see it here, and I’m not even sure it happens here because I’m not there, but he throws his guitar into the crowd. Whoever gets the guitar is one lucky bastard:

19:20 Jordan Blackmon, Chaz Bundick, Patrick Jeffords and Andy Woodard are all present for Toro Y Moi’s press conference.

Near the end I somehow end up trying to trade t-shirts with Chaz, who is a huge Weezer fan like myself. He asks if he can have my Pinkerton t-shirt, to which I say sure, as long as I can have his.

Eventually we decide to keep our own shirts.

19:50 Anna Calvi enters the media tent. The dude in the front tries hard not to drool.

Here’s Anna Calvi’s setlist, which I manage to hang on to and even get signed.

19:55 From one gorgeous singer and guitar player on Stage One to another, here’s Laura Marling from Hampshire, England.

While Laura is performing on Stage One, the members of The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart are setting up on Stage Two. Quite a few bands at the festival do their own setting up, presumably to cut down on costs. As it turns out, Peggy is standing over me as I’m taking pictures of Laura. I ask her if there are any setlists on the stage, and she gives me Twin Shadow’s setlist. Sweet.

Here’s Laura Marling with “Ghosts”:

21:15 Josh Hayward, Faris Badwan and a few beers represent Southend on Sea, England’s The Horrors in the media tent.

20:45 The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart perform on Stage Two, and encounter some technical problems that lead to a lengthy delay.

But they get it together eventually. Here they are with “Young Adult Fiction”:

21:35 Time for South Carolina’s Toro Y Moi on Stage One.

Lots of girls in the front row. Girls dig nerds. Hey, I’m a nerd! Dig me!

Here’s Toro Y Moi with “Low Shoulder”:

After Toro Y Moi’s set, I call Jordan and ask him for the setlist. He gets a piece of paper from the floor, folds it and has the security guard pass it over. I receive it, but when I unfold it, I shout, “Hey, Jordan! This is Laura Marling’s setlist!”

Jordan just shrugs and packs up his equipment. I am a bit bummed. But later on while I’m looking at the setlist, I flip it over and discover Toro Y Moi’s on the reverse. Recycling!

22:00 Anthony Gonzalez of Antibes, France’s M83 in the media tent. I ask him what makes Laneway special, and he says, “It’s just small enough for the bands to share memories.” That also applies to the fans, actually. Especially if you’re from Indonesia and find lots of your friends are also there.

22:20 Feist takes over Stage Two. Photographers aren’t supposed to be in the pit, but there is a mix-up and they get in there anyway. I just take this photo on my BlackBerry.

Here’s Feist with “So Sorry”:

23:15 The confusion continues when I try to enter the photo pit for The Horrors’ set on Stage One. Security won’t let us in, even though I don’t recall anyone from the organisers forbidding us beforehand, like they did with Feist. I say, “Screw it,” and try to take photos from the crowd. But it turns out The Horrors’ lighting set-up isn’t very photographer-friendly, at least to an amateur like me.

Here’s The Horrors with “Still Life”:

00:05 M83 brings the festival to a close on Stage Two. At this point I just can’t be arsed to make my way to the photo pit, because I’m with some excellent company in the middle of the crowd, and the thought of making my way out and back in again makes me want to pass out. So I stay in the middle, take some photos and just go nuts with everyone else.

Here’s M83 with “Midnight City”:

00:55 And with that, Laneway Festival 2012 comes to an end. My feet are killing me from all the walking back and forth between the crowd, the photo pit and media tent that results in blisters, and I’m also sunburnt. But at least it didn’t rain, beyond a brief drizzle. And there was barely a moment that wasn’t spent with people whose company I enjoy, so that definitely more than made up for all the exhaustion. Probably one of my most favourite gig experiences ever. Looking forward to next year!

(Thanks to the various uploaders of the YouTube videos I, uh, borrowed. No animals were harmed in the making of this blog.)

Here’s how my day went when I interviewed Kasabian and The Vaccines and covered their concert at Fort Canning Park, Singapore. It’s not necessarily representative of all the interviews and concert reportage I do, but it should give you a rough idea of what this particular aspect of my job is like.

11:30 Arrive at Plaza Singapura because I am craving Subway and that particular branch is close to where my first interview is going to be. Then I discover that Subway is no longer at Plaza Singapura. After a minute of cursing, I consult the Subway Singapore website and conclude that the easiest one to find is at 313@Somerset. Which takes me further away from the interview location, but I have to have Subway, damn it!

11:57 Subway!

Last time I had Subway was back in August, but I couldn’t eat immediately after buying because it was Ramadan and I had to wait to break my fasting. So it’s nice to eat a sandwich fresh from the oven. I have a Meatball Marinara and it is goooood.

13:00 After leaving Subway, I take another subway (get it?) and arrive at the Rendezvous Hotel, where I am told to stand by for my interview with The Vaccines at 13:30. I get acquainted with the nice folks at Sony Music Singapore, who tell me to wait my turn in the lobby.

13:20 I am joined in the lobby Icha Rahmanti, a writer who lives in Singapore with her husband and child and does freelance coverage for Indonesian publications. In this particular case, she is reporting for Aneka.

13:50 Other reporters from Indonesia arrive and hang out in the lobby. At one point I briefly see Freddie Cowan and Arni Arnason, respectively lead guitarist and bassist of The Vaccines, before the Sony people usher them off to the interview room.

14:20 Icha and I get our turn. The two of us are supposed to be in a roundtable with one other reporter from Indonesia, who doesn’t show up. For those who don’t know, a roundtable interview consists of several reporters taking turns to field questions to a subject within a limited amount of time. Obviously the more reporters in a roundtable means you have less time devoted to your own questions, so you have to keep things moving along as quickly as possible. But in this particular case, there’s only two of us and we get 20 minutes with Freddie and Arni. The other two band members are doing their interviews in another room, and this is usually how it goes during these media sessions. We don’t usually get to choose which members we interview. Freddie talks excitedly about getting the VIP treatment at Universal Studios the day before, and Arni shows us a photo of the band wearing their own kits for playing football with Foster The People and Cage The Elephant at Big Day Out in Australia a few days earlier.

14:43 Interview’s over, and I get a little souvenir photo with Freddie and Arni.

14:50 Icha and I follow Freddie and Arni to the other interview room where the other band members and reporters are, for a quick photo session with the whole band. We take out and cameras, Arni and Vaccines lead singer Justin Young get out their phones, and we all shoot each other. When it’s over, I walk up to Justin.

14:54 I apologise to Vaccines drummer Pete Robertson for the amount of CD and 7” sleeves I’ve pressed into his hands for him to sign. “Oh, don’t apologise!” he laughs. He also doesn’t have to apologise for wearing a Vaccines tour t-shirt inside out.

14:55 This is what I don’t have to apologise for.

15:00 Icha and I, plus Rara Putri from Cleo and her boyfriend Rangga get on a taxi and head to our next destination, where we must standby at 16:15 to interview Kasabian.

15:15 We arrive at the Ritz-Carlton Millennia, site of the Kasabian interview, way too early. To kill time, we walk over to the nearby Marina Square, where I nearly kill myself by eating Long John Silver’s fish fingers. Not because they’re bad; on the contrary, they’re quite tasty. But I realise I’m still full from eating Subway, and I’d rather eat on the spot while it’s still hot rather than take home the leftovers.

16:40 Back at the Ritz, we are given a quick photo session with Kasabian’s lead singer Tom Meighan and guitarist-songwriter Serge Pizzorno. It seems the other two members - bassist Chris Edwards and drummer Ian Matthews - don’t do press unless “you ask nicely,” says Serge later on. Oh well, at least we have the two main men of Kasabian. As I enter the room, I find them joking around. As the shoot starts and they pull out their rock star faces, I tell them to make like Noel and Liam. They stop and look at me, slightly bewildered. I add, “Well, back in the day.” Then they loosen up and smile more.

16:50: Icha and I interview Serge, whose laidback speaking voice reminds me of Russell Brand, as does his beanpole physique. His hair’s tidier, though. As we enter the room, he is not wearing any shoes, just socks. And when he walks past us to return to his room after the interview, he’s still not wearing shoes. Since Icha is writing for Aneka’s Valentine’s issue, she asks a number of love-related questions, including one about complicated relationships, to which Serge gamely admits he’s had a few, and adds, “When it starts getting complicated, it’s time to press the ejector seat.” It’s not a question I’d ask in an interview, but I nod in agreement at his answer anyway and take mental notes. And then I let him strangle me.

17:17 While hanging out in the hallway after the interview, Tom emerges on the way back to his room. I ask for a quick picture, to which he happily obliges while saying, “I don’t know you want to take a picture with me, mate” in a “Chill out, man, I’m just a regular bloke like you” kind of way. Be that as it may, this regular bloke is the lead singer of one of the biggest bands in the UK, so I tell him, “You’re Tom from Kasabian. How could I not take a picture with you?” He doesn’t question me asking him to sign my Velociraptor! CD sleeve, though.

18:20 We head over to Fort Canning Park by MRT, getting off at Dhoby Ghaut station and walking up a hall. Ah, exercise! There’s already a long queue when we arrive, but we bypass the queue and head straight to the media registration desk to pick up passes. I say hi to Andre Alabons, the dude from promoters LAMC Productions who has set things up for me covering the gig.

18:31 The gate opens, fans run to get spots at the very front, whereas I head over to the merchandise booth to get each band’s tour t-shirts and a Kasabian tour book. A shirt costs SGD45, the book 30. Do the math. Yes, yikes. I opt not to get the 80-buck Kasabian hoodie, because unlike Tom Meighan, I am just a regular guy with regular wages. I just happen to have a job that enables me to meet interesting people.

20:10 Besides interviewing the bands and writing about the show, I also have to take photographs. Well actually I could ask for the promoters to send me photos from their official photographer, but there’s something fun about being in the pit between the stage and a steel barricade that’s preventing fans from climbing up there and going nuts.

20:15 To the sounds of the Ramones’ “Do You Remember Rock ‘N’ Roll Radio?” over the PA, IT’S THE VACCINES!!! I rarely stand at the very front of gigs nowadays, but I get an adrenaline rush from taking photos and shouting “PRETTY GIRL, WRECKIN’ BAR, RA RA RA YEAH YOU ARE!” as the band are rocking out just a few inches above my head. Below is not one of the photos I took from the pit, because I’m too busy working with an actual camera and a time limit of the first three songs. And The Vaccines’ songs are short, so I don’t have the luxury of pulling out my BlackBerry.

20:22 Three songs later, I’m out of the pit and watching the rest of the show from my usual spot just in front of the sound engineer. His name is James Gebhard, and he has previously worked for The Killers. Needless to say, the sound is awesome. I put on my “this gig is awesome” face.

20:55 Less than 40 minutes later, The Vaccines are done after playing 13 songs. Ten from What Did You Expect From The Vaccines?, two new ones that might make it onto their second album that they plan to start recording next month, plus “Tiger Blood”, the single they recorded with The Strokes’ Albert Hammond, Jr. as producer. All in all, a very big bang for your buck.

21:30 And I’m back in the photo pit. Same drill as before, except it’s Kasabian’s turn this time.

21:35 KASABIAN!!! It’s Serge and Tom and the other two and the other other two (touring lead guitarist Jay Mehler on the far left and keyboardist Ben Kealey second from right). They have not brought trumpet player Gary Alesbrook. He was probably busy. Or they figured they don’t really need a trumpet player.

23:10 An hour and a half later it’s all over, after 17 songs that span the length of Kasabian’s discography and includes shout-outs by Tom to The Vaccines and his mother’s family because they used to live in Singapore. My personal favourites are “Club Foot” with its killer riff, and the way the crowd chants the wordless hooks of “L.S.F. (Lost Souls Forever)” and “Fire” like they’re at a football match. Mesmerised by the lights and sound, I grab the setlist and discover whoever types it keeps spelling “segue” as “segway”.

23:40 After chatting with some friends from Indonesia who also flew to Singapore for the gig, we finally make our way back home. I don’t remember much because I was practically half-asleep, but I do know that I had a very productive day and achieved everything I set out to. Not every gig coverage trip goes as smoothly as this, so when it does happen, you feel very fortunate indeed. I certainly do.

Thanks to Titaz and Pondra at Sony Music Indonesia, Ai Vy, Lisa and Fiona at Sony Music Singapore, Andre at LAMC Productions and Icha my impromptu partner-in-crime for all the help. Rock on, good people!

Two nights ago was Sir Dandy And The Boys In The Band’s first gig of 2012, for yet another relatively high-profile event. This time it was for Love Garage, with a line-up of international names and local live acts and DJs. Considering we hadn’t played together since late December, we figured it might be a good idea to rehearse before the show.

You see, this is a band that rarely rehearses. Most of the live arrangements were sorted out in the early days of the band - Dandi Achmad Ramdhani alias Acong alias Sir Dandy, Widi Puradiredja, Ade Paloh, Ildo Hasman and me - and since the songs are quite easy to play, for most gigs we just show up and perform. Whenever we do rehearse, it’s usually because someone other than Widi can’t make it and we have to get someone else in. If Widi can’t make it, the rest of us usually just play as a four-piece. It still works without keyboards, it’s not as if we’re Yes playing without Rick Wakeman. Lack of rehearsals means the arrangements are pretty much the same in every show, but that doesn’t make it predictable because somehow Acong always finds a way to throw a curve ball at the band and the audience. It takes a lot of concentration to not crack up when he starts changing the lyrics in the middle of a song.

Anyway, this was the first time we rehearsed since late October 2011, when we had a couple of upcoming gigs where we needed keyboards, and Widi wasn’t going to make it due to other live engagements with his main band, Maliq & D’essentials. So we asked Rendy Surindrapati to fill in, since his band Hightime Rebellion were on the same bill as us at one of those gigs (opening for Tame Impala and !!!), and he was available for our show the week before that at Djakarta Artmosphere.

So we gathered a few days before the Djakarta Artmosphere gig at the Maliq-owned Organic Studio (also home of Organic Records, who put out Sir Dandy’s album) to rehearse with Rendy. As luck, or misfortune, would have it, Ade couldn’t make it, and so we got Widi - who was at the studio - to play bass during rehearsal. At the end of practice, Widi checked Maliq’s schedule, discovered it did not conflict, and decided he was going to play with us after all, on synth. And so the six of us played on that stage without all six of us ever being in rehearsal together. At the Tame Impala and !!! gig, Widi was definitely unavailable, and the five of us (with Rendy) found that the only time we had to practice together was during soundcheck. As misfortune would have it, technical problems meant that things were running late, and so our soundcheck was cut short without having time to even play a single song.

On a side note, if you think that’s nuts, that’s nothing compared to a gig we played in early October at Institut Teknologi Bandung. Ildo couldn’t make it, so Widi was going to play drums, his usual role in Maliq. Then Widi couldn’t make it, so we asked Twentyfirst Night drummer Aryo Pradana. And then Aji Anindito, Organic Records’ promotions and media relations guy, told me that Aryo couldn’t make it either.

“So who’s playing drums?” I asked.

“Me,” said Aji.

“Don’t you usually play bass in your metal band?” I asked again.

“Yeah, but don’t worry about it,” said Aji.

At that point he was always present at Sir Dandy’s shows, so I guess he could figure out the drums. You don’t have to be Neil Peart to play drums with us. And then the day before the show, Grahadea Kusuf of Bandung electronic pop group Homogenic tweeted Acong to ask what time we’d be playing. Of course, Acong told him he should play with us. And of course I butted in and told Dea I’d e-mail him live versions of the songs so he’d have a better idea of what to play on his synth. Dea said he’d think about it and would let us know as soon as possible. He finally said yes while the rest of us were en route to Bandung. A few hours later the five of us were onstage, only three of whom had actually played those songs together before, one guy who just agreed to play with us that morning, and one guy whom we didn’t even know could play drums. Needless to say, it wasn’t our tightest show ever, and on top of that my guitar seemed to be out of tune without me realising it or knowing how to fix it even if I did realise it. Well at least some special guests from the Bandung scene came to see us, and we got a nice hotel to stay at.

And so on to yesterday’s rehearsal. Nothing too crazy, except that Ildo couldn’t come to practice because he had prior engagements with his band L’alphalpha. So Acong, Widi, Ade and I rehearsed without drums, so Widi could come up with parts beforehand. Then in the middle of rehearsal, Widi switched to drums and we decided we’d play “Kebakaran Hutan”, a Sir Dandy song left out from the Lesson #1 album sessions and will be included in Organic Records’ upcoming compilation Radio Killed The TV Star Vol. 1 along with new songs by Maliq & D’essentials, The Upstairs, Rock N Roll Mafia, Sore, Homogenic, Swimming Elephants, Twentyfirst Night, Endah N Rhesa and more. After trying out a few arrangements - one of which would have included a snippet of Sherina’s “Geregetan” - we decided to do a punkier version that would segue straight into “Juara Dunia”, which you may consider Sir Dandy’s hit song, though I’ve discovered each song gets a great reception at shows. During rehearsal, we even managed to end up with the skeleton of a new song based on some chords Widi pounded out on his synth, then switched to drums and played a disco beat while the rest of us played along and Acong came up with lyrics off the top of his head. At the moment the song’s called “Ketagihan”, but it’s too early to say how it’ll turn out. As we left it, I think it sounds like a cross between The Upstairs and Hightime Rebellion, with The Rentals’ “Friends Of P” thrown in for the chorus.

On to the gig. It took place in the parking lot of eX Plaza, also the site of last year’s Love Garage featuring Two Door Cinema Club. But while last year’s Love Garage took place in one public holiday, this one has been split over two non-consecutive days with Day 2 taking place this Wednesday with - it has to be said - a more prestigious line-up including Royksopp and Erol Alkan. Not that Day 1 - featuring James Yuill and Canyons - was deserted, but it took a while for people to gather. A gradually-increasing handful of people stood in front of the stage to see Angsa & Serigala, Hightime Rebellion, Sir Dandy and Bayu Risa up close, while everyone else were content to watch the show from the benches and picnic tables on the sides of the venue.

We got onstage at 18:30, 50 minutes later than originally scheduled. Our set length was also reduced from 40 minutes to 30, so we decided to drop one of the eight songs originally planned. Ironically for someone obsessed by setlists, we actually rarely use them. There’s only one 10-song album (plus one compilation song) to draw from, so it’s usually the same set of songs from gig to gig. Before the gig we discuss what order the songs are going to be in, and during the gig Acong usually asks me which song we’re going to play next. I give one or two suggestions, then when Acong does his pre-song introduction - which he makes up on the spot - we pay attention for clues or keywords regarding what he’s decided to play.

After “Jakarta Motor City” had a long run as our show opener, recently it has been replaced by “Gibson Atau Epiphone”, which was also going to be the opening song for our Love Garage set. Then Acong started talking about transportation, and instantly we knew that we weren’t going to start with “Gibson Atau Epiphone”. I said that wasn’t what we originally planned, but I should know better by now. Just roll with it.

After a version of “Jakarta Motor City” that was more truncated than the usual live arrangement - there was supposed to be one more chorus but Acong went straight to the ending. And then on to “Gibson Atau Epiphone” and “Anggur Merah”, then the return of “Ode To Antruefunk” after a few months’ absence - it’s Ade’s favourite song to play, but its frantic pace gets Acong tired and he tends to skip it.

Then it was time for “Kebakaran Hutan“‘s live debut. Ildo had heard the studio version on my iPod and the recording of the live version from our rehearsal without him earlier in the day, but this was going to be the first time he actually played the song. No pressure there, then. All things considered, I think it went pretty well - apart from a bit near the end when Acong’s vocals lingered just before entering the last chorus, causing a brief mess-up on the drums, followed by a quick recovery. The segue into “Juara Dunia” wasn’t too bad, either, though I did have a bit of a struggle to hear Acong talking over the music and waiting for him to say “Sikat!”, which was our cue to start the song’s intro.

As usual, our closing song was “Sekdrag”, and just before Acong was about to start the song, one of his guitar strings snapped. He carried on regardless, and we made it past the first chorus. Then as he started playing the second verse on his own, he decided that the guitar didn’t sound good and asked the crowd if he should just end the show or keep going. They voted for the latter, and Acong told me to play guitar for him. I have to admit I wasn’t prepared, because during that part of the song I usually play a lead guitar line. Now I had to play rhythm, and it started off well, but I messed up near the end because I forgot the chords. I managed to remember them properly on the last verse, though. Overall I’d say this was one of my better shows, not too many major errors.

After the show, Acong asked me how I thought the audience’s reaction was, considering we could only see the handful of people watching from up close, whereas everyone else stood back and watched from a distance. Since this band always stands out when it’s on a bill with other performers that are more polished, I said the crowd’s reaction - especially those who were only seeing us for the first time - would probably be, “Oh my God!” Which can have several meanings, including “Oh my God, this band is so shit! Especially the guitarist!” or “Oh my God, this band is so cool because they mess up but they don’t give a shit!”

Rendy Yusuf from OZ Radio asked if all the mistakes were part of some scenario. I told him that would be too insane, even for this band. We don’t intentionally set out to play awfully, otherwise we wouldn’t bother having any rehearsals at all. On the other hand, there are also people who enjoy the mistakes and tell us not to be too polished. As long as I’m on guitar and Acong keeps changing things up on the fly, I don’t think this band will ever be too polished. I also spoke to Hogi Wirjono from Future 10, the event’s co-organisers, and who also gets namechecked in “Anggur Merah”. He watched us from the front-of-house area and said the crew over there cracked up the whole time. As long as someone finds us entertaining, I consider it a good show. At the moment I don’t know when our next show will be, or if we’ll rehearse. But you can expect it to be unexpected.

Below are some photos from the show, click on the links to see gig reports and more photos.

IRockumentary:

Gigsplay:

Free Magazine:

In a few weeks’ time the Laneway Festival will reach our shores again. Well, not really our shores, more like Singapore’s. But it’ll feel like our shores if last year’s festival was any indication, what with Indonesians travelling in droves to attend and see all those cool bands. Felt like any other gig in Jakarta with many familiar faces, except there were a lot more people speaking in Singlish around us.

And it looks like I’m going back to Fort Canning Park for this year’s festival, like many others. And maybe there’ll be quite a lot of newbies, too. With that in mind, I guess now would be a good time - since last year’s festival was exactly one year ago today - to share some tips on how to get the best out of your Laneway experience. I won’t bother with basic stuff like telling you how to get to Fort Canning, whether or not you should use a local number for your mobile, or that you should conserve your phone battery’s energy. If you’re adult enough to fly to Singapore for a gig, you should be able to figure that stuff out on your own.

1. Know the schedule

There will be 14 acts at this year’s Laneway Festival Singapore, five more than last year’s. But the festival duration is more or less the same, so towards that end, this time around they’re using two stages instead of just one like last year, and those stages will be side by side with only 10 minutes of changeover time between each stage. So as soon as one act finishes their set on one stage, the following act will be ready to go on the other stage, and the audience goes back and forth.

With that in mind, have a look at the schedule below:

STAGE ONE

01:50 pm - 02:20 pm Cults

03:15 pm - 03:55 pm Chairlift

04:45 pm - 05:25 pm Girls

06:15 pm - 07:00 pm Anna Calvi

07:50 pm - 08:35 pm Laura Marling

09:30 pm - 10:15 pm Toro Y Moi

11:15 pm - 12:00 am The Horrors

STAGE TWO

02:30 pm - 03:10 pm Yuck

04:00 pm - 04:40 pm Austra

05:25 pm - 06:10 pm The Drums

07:05 pm - 07:45 pm Twin Shadow

08:40 pm - 09:25 pm The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart

10:20 pm - 11:10 pm Feist

12:05 am - 12:55 am M83 

The festival will start with Cults on Stage One at 13:50, then it’s Yuck on Stage Two at 14:30, then back to Stage One for Chairlift at 15:15, and so on until M83 closes the event.

2. Know what you want to see

If you’re only interested in seeing one or two bands, take note of their stage and time so you don’t miss out, and then you can do whatever you want before and after they perform. Stick around to see the other bands, go and get wasted, or even leave the festival and go somewhere else. I recommend getting to Fort Canning an hour before your favourite band plays, so you’ll have time to get through the queue, check out the merchandise stand if you want, then find a good spot to watch the bands.

Personally, the band I wanted to see the most last year was Warpaint, and it turns out they were the first act onstage. To cut down on costs, I decided I would arrive on the morning of the festival and return to Jakarta the next morning. This meant that while I was in Singapore I did not have any time for any activities other than the festival. So I travelled light, arrived at Changi around 10 am, took the MRT to Bugis because I wanted to visit this comic book shop at Bugis Junction, then took the MRT to Somerset because I wanted to stop by and check out CDs at HMV, then walked over to Plaza Singapura because I was craving Subway (the sandwich chain not the MRT system, though that’s pretty nice too), then walked to Dhoby Ghaut MRT station to meet up with friends on the way to Fort Canning, and got there with plenty of time to spare.

Some other friends of mine took a later flight, spent too much time getting lunch, and - to their eternal regret - ended up missing out on seeing Jenny Lee Lindberg play bass while wearing short denim shorts.

3. Know the weather

Though the ladies of Warpaint looked like they’re dressed for summer and the sky seemed clear, I assure you that was literally the calm before the storm. In fact, it was already raining before the festival started. And if you think you can handle a little rain, here are two things to consider:

1. It’s an outdoor festival that lasts all day.

2. The festival takes place on a hill. With grass. And mud. Add rain, and that becomes a lot of mud.

(Photo from Deathrockstar.)

Needless to say, Laneway ended up like your typical muddy festival, which was a quite amusing sight, given Singapore’s reputation for cleanliness. While I was aware of how it might be - because Jakarta and Singapore’s weather is similar, and a friend who lived there confirmed it had been raining - and had packed accordingly (hat, rain jacket, boots), it ended up raining all day with varying intensity. So no one left there dry, not even with the free rain ponchos they handed out.

With that in mind, my advice is get prepared for a soaking. No need to dress too fancily, as you’ll be covered in rain and mud anyway. And grab those free rain ponchos, because they will be very useful even if they make you look like a giant walking plastic bag. If it doesn’t rain, consider that a bonus. If it does, I’d rather be dressed up as a cumbersome twat that stays dry instead of some wet fancy pants.

4. Let’s do lunch elsewhere

I recommend eating a decent meal before you get to Fort Canning Park, no matter what time you go there. Yes, there will be food and beverage stalls at the festival, and the chicken wings I had last year were pretty good, but obviously your choices will be limited and not necessarily as affordable as eating elsewhere. Besides that, it’ll be a 5-10 minute walk to the nearest restaurant, and it’s not as if they’ll have nasi goreng hawkers hanging out by the entrance. This isn’t Tennis Indoor Senayan. So my advice is get a good meal before you get to the festival so you’ll have enough energy while you’re there, and if you feel hungry later on you can get something from the F&B stalls to keep you going.

5. The early bird and full wallet gets the merchandise

It’s highly unlikely that there won’t be a merchandise stall at Laneway, so you’ll have plenty of options to spend your excess money on, at around SGD 35-40 per t-shirt. Again, I recommend getting there early so you don’t miss out on stuff you might want to buy. The merchandise stall was crowded when I first arrived last year, so I decided to go see Warpaint first, then come back later. When I got there, all the Warpaint t-shirts had sold out except for two, and those weren’t even in my size.

Having said that, if you get there early and don’t find what you want, come back later. Going back to my aborted attempt at buying a Warpaint t-shirt, while I was considering buying something for the sake of having it despite how ill-fitting it might have turned out, a young man arrived at the merchandise stall with a box. Turns out the Beach House t-shirts had just arrived, and since they were the other band I was really looking forward to, I ended up buying that instead. So keep checking back, and if you can’t find your favourite artist’s merch at all, then they probably didn’t bring any.

6. Meet the bands

I don’t how much the new set-up will affect things, but last year it was pretty easy to meet the bands even if you didn’t win a meet-and-greet contest. (If you want to try and win a meet-and-greet spot, join the Laneway Festival Singapore Facebook page. Make sure you’ve already bought a ticket.) If you walked to the rear left side of the stage, you could see the backstage area, with bands going back and forth to their dressing rooms and catering. And if you were lucky, they would come over if you called. That’s how I got to meet Jenny Lee Lindberg, the aforementioned Warpaint bassist and wearer of short denim shorts. She was walking backstage, me and some fellow fans called her over, she walked towards us, and she gave me a hug even though she had every right to be creeped out. Especially with my face being as fat as that.

The best time to try this would be just before or after they perform, because obviously that’s when they’ll be there. Which isn’t to say they won’t wander around the festival ground, but unless you want to stick by the beer tent hoping that your favourite band will drop by - even though they have their own beer backstage - the previous option is probably better.

So give it a go, if you want. If they’re not busy or in a hurry, or the rain’s not pissing down, there’s a good chance they’ll come over and say hello, and you’ll have something to tweet about on your Instagram or whatever you crazy kids are into these days.

7. Don’t be an asshole

Unless you’re a weirdo with no friends who just really loves watching bands, chances are you’ll be going to Laneway with your mates. And there really isn’t much better fun than being with your best friends and watching some great bands. Having said that, always remember that you’re not the only ones there to enjoy yourselves. People paid good money to see the bands play, not to see you acting like a douchbag. Actually this is a universal rule for concerts everywhere, and even life in general.

8. How the hell do I get home?

Depending on the destination, the last train home will be between 22:48 and 0:11, according to the Dhoby Ghaut train schedule. So if everything runs on time, you won’t be able to take the MRT if you stay until the end of the festival. If you find taxis waiting near the Fort Canning entrance, they’re there because they’ve already been booked by phone. Booking is quite easy, as long as you have a working phone. Comfort and SMRT taxis even have their own smartphone apps for it. If you don’t book your own, you’ll have to walk down the hill and find a taxi stand, or hope a passing one will stop for you. Good luck with that, soggy pants.

And that’s all I can think of right now. Note that these tips are entirely subjective based on my own experience at the festival last year, so if you want to dress up, get drenched and act like an asshole, go right ahead. I’ll be keeping dry by looking like a giant plastic bag, while taking photos. See you at Laneway!

This next story begins sometime in 2003 with me talking to the new customer service guy at my regular CD shop and ends last night with me helping prevent the Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ drummer getting knocked over by a moshpit the abovementioned customer service guy helped cause. Telling the story won’t take nine years, though it may feel like so if you’re not really interested. And if you’re not really interested, go find someone else’s blog and stare at random photos they swiped from the Internet.

Anyway, to 2003: I was at the CD section of Aksara Bookstore in Kemang, Jakarta, probably ordering something that would help bring me closer to completing my Beach Boys CD collection. It’s quite criminal how you can’t easily find the Beach Boys’ albums in Jakarta. But I digress.

So I placed my order, then engaged in small talk with the laid-back, shaggy-haired customer service guy behind the counter. He wasn’t the usual person I ordered my CDs from, so getting to know each other was inevitable, if only to help ensure that my order went through. At some point in the conversation, he suddenly says, “Have you heard of my band? We’re called The Brandals.”

OK, maybe he didn’t say exactly that. I wouldn’t necessarily remember everything I said nine hours ago, let alone nine years. And we were having a conversation in Indonesian, so obviously the words were different. But the point is the customer service guy told me he had a band called The Brandals, and even pointed to a sticker of their logo in his desk. I made a mental note to check them out.

You probably know The Brandals’ history already, so here are some highlights. When MTV started broadcasting full-time in Indonesia, The Brandals were one of the first bands from Indonesia’s independent scene to break through with videos such as this:

By the way, the customer service guy was rhythm guitarist Tony Dwi Setiaji, playing the green guitar in the above video.

During the following years there have been quite a few highs and lows. One particularly rowdy performance at PL Fair 2004 required quite a bit of image rehabilitation so people would invite them to play at events again. They have released four albums on four different record labels. They replaced their Afro-haired lead guitarist and stick-insect bassist with a different Afro-haired lead guitarist and stick-insect bassist. But the bottom line is, they’ve stuck with it through thick and thin for just over ten years now.

Their most recent album was last year’s DGNR8, which saw them depart from the down and dirty rock & roll of their first three records and introduce more electronic ingredients, while at the same time apparently developing an aversion to vowel letters and calling themselves BRNDLS. I guess this was also to emphasise the new line-up, in which Mulyadi “PM” Natakusumah and Radhit Syaharzam Almatsier have replaced Bayu Indrasoewarman and Doddy Widyono as the band’s resident Afro-haired lead guitarist and stick-insect bassist, respectively.

With such a drastic change, obviously there would be all sorts of reactions. Some liked it, some started liking the band because of it. Then there were people who felt what they already had didn’t need fixing. I even saw a photo of DGNR8 in a trash can, sent to the band by a disgruntled, presumably now-ex fan.

Personally, I’m somewhere in the middle regarding DGNR8. I’m all in favour of musicians doing something radically different, and there’s some great stuff on the album like “Start Bleeding” and “Dryland”. But I’m of the opinion that bands shouldn’t entirely getting rid of what made them great in the first place, however abstract that may seem. Not that The Brandals suck now - in fact, I think “Awas Polizei!” and “Perak” are two of their best songs ever, and further proof of vocalist Eka Annash’s excellence as an Indonesian lyricist.

After the album came out, my main concern was how The Brandals were going to translate their new sound to the stage, because there was no way they were going to replicate it as things were. It took quite a while between the album’s release and the band’s first show, because they did quite a lot of rehearsing to get things right. Their first gig was in June at Jaya Pub for the much-ballyhooed scene event Superbad, where they aired out a handful of DGNR8 tracks in front of a packed house of fans and friends. To perform the new tracks, drummer Rully Annash now operated a laptop containing backing tracks that the band would play along to and thicken their sound, while Eka had a bunch of vocal effects pedals on a stand. Here’s one of the songs from that show:

As you can see, there’s still a sense of nervousness. There really can’t be a bigger baptism of fire than playing in a new way for the first time in front of your peers who can be supportive but also have no qualms about telling you you’re doing something wrong. Then there’s things you have no control over, like the fact that Jaya Pub is more about the vibe than the pristine acoustics or state-of-the-art sound system (neither of which it has), or the possibility that the inhuman new member of your band - the laptop - might die or start skipping (even worse) halfway through the song and you won’t be able to improvise your way out of it.

Having seen The Brandals quite a few times over the years, I felt the new set-up lacked the sense of danger their shows usually had. They seemed stifled by having to play along to the backing tracks and Eka splitting his attention between getting the crowd going and operating his vocal effects. Over the next few shows, the new song they’d seem the most comfortable with was “Awas Polizei!”, which needed no laptop and had already been in their set for almost two years, before Radhit joined the band (though he makes the bass line swing even more).

At one show they had to abandon the laptop due to technical issues, and I have to say they sounded better, like a weight had been lifted off their shoulders. Personally I think a band’s live performance doesn’t have to perfectly replicate the recording, because the recorded version is just a snapshot in time, whereas the live version can keep evolving into whatever the artist wants at any given moment. That’s what makes gigs exciting. And if a band is great, they’ll figure out how to make their songs work not only in the recording studio, but also in front of an audience.

And over the course of the past two nights, I saw how great The Brandals are, in quite different circumstances. On Thursday night at Treehouse they played an acoustic set, and so I was curious as to how the DGNR8 songs would turn out. Quite good, actually. The stripped-down version of “Dryland” was even funkier than the regular one, which was already pretty damn funky. They even did a cover of Manic Street Preachers’ “Motorcycle Emptiness” that they had planned even before I showed up at the gig wearing a Manics t-shirt. They did a couple of older songs to much enthusiasm from the crowd, but for me that night was all about proving that great songs work in any format.

Then last night at Marley Bar, The Brandals went back to their regular format of late, in front of a crazy audience who were more than willing to pay IDR 35,000 for a bill that included other venerable names from the scene: Superglad, Morfem, Fable, The Safari. The place was packed when I got there as Fable were onstage, and so I hung out near the bar. And then things took a turn for the surreal.

While hanging out at the bar and cracking jokes with Tony as Morfem were playing, suddenly Eka came up to me and said, “The drummer from Yeah Yeah Yeahs is here.” Now if I were someone else, I would’ve said, “No way! You’re kidding!” But the thing is, I’d already met Brian Chase - the aforementioned drummer from Yeah Yeah Yeahs - almost two years ago when he suddenly showed up at the launch of Level One at Grand Indonesia and hung out backstage with Monkey To Millionaire and White Shoes & The Couples Company. So it wasn’t all that shocking to see him show up last night. He was with Sulung Putra, former bassist of C’mon Lennon. And when Sulung introduced us, I told Brian that we had already met “at that mall”, and he remembered. Like he was back then, he was on vacation. Below is a fish-eye paparazzi shot by Aloysius Nitia of Brian, with me in the same frame. If you’re wondering who’s who, we’re the ones without the nice-looking legs. Well I don’t know about Brian, but my legs definitely aren’t that smooth.

Here’s Brian and his band, in case you need reminding. (Take note of the now-famous “50 Tahun Indonesia Merdeka” sticker on Nick Zinner’s guitar from when he lived here for a spell.)

Anyway, it was time for The Brandals’ set, and I went over to find a good spot to watch. Sulung, Brian and company had the same idea, and they stood just behind me. The Brandals kicked off with DGNR8’s instrumental title track, and the sound was just horrible, the sequencer backing tracks drowning out everything else. But eventually the sound engineer sorted things out, and the crowd were soon singing along to “Start Bleeding” and “The Last Laugh”. In between songs, Eka and Tony were on fine form as a stand-up comedy duo, cracking jokes about their Ambonese roadie David Saiya not living up to Ambonese stereotypes and Radhit’s penis taking two hours to crawl back inside once you unleashed it from his pants. Tony also mentioned the special guest in our midst as “the guy from Good Charlotte”, without revealing who it really was so as not to draw too much attention to Brian. Not that you’d know who he was if you didn’t have the Yeah Yeah Yeahs imprinted in your memory, because he’s a fairly regular guy with glasses. Sulung did his best to translate the jokes to Brian, but I guess you just had to be there to get the full effect.

Then The Brandals pulled out “Lingkar Labirin” from their debut album and the crowd instantly exploded into a mosh pit, with Morfem guitarist Pandu Fathoni surfing the crowd and hitting the overhead speaker hanging from the low ceiling with his leg. This different reaction prompted me to point out to Brian that this was an old song, which was something he managed to figure out from the differing styles. He also seemed impressed by the fact that The Brandals have been around for 10 years.

And then The Brandals played “Perak” from the new album, and once again the mosh pit erupted, with Eka getting in on the act and doing some crowd-surfing of his own. I told Brian to guess if that was a new or old song. He thought it was an old song, probably based on the crowd’s reaction, or because this is the sequencer-based song that The Brandals have played the most, so it’s become second nature by now. When I told him it was a new song, Brian said, “Really? Wow, that’s awesome.” This was followed by more pandemonium as they played “Awas Polizei!” with Brian nodding along as I pointed out the Fugazi vibe of the song. Then as it reached the end, Eka whispered to each of his fellow bandmates, Rully did a drum fill, and they suddenly roared into “100 Km/Jam”. Again, the mosh pit went nuts, to the point where I ended up turning into a human shield with my elbows raised to my chest. Not that Brian needed protection, as he’s a big guy and he’s probably seen crazier moshing back in New York. If you look closely you can see him in the black shirt somewhere in the back just under the light, with me next to him (photo from The Brandals’ Facebook):

After The Brandals’ set, they hung around by the exit while Superglad closed the show. Brian and company made their way out, but not before Eka handed him a copy of DGNR8, Brian told Rully that he “killed it”, and I told Brian to come back soon with the rest of Yeah Yeah Yeahs. “We gotta,” he said. They’ll be recording a new album this year, so maybe some forward-thinking promoter can bring them over once the album’s done. Or maybe even sooner.

Impressing the drummer from one of the 21st century’s coolest bands and almost getting him swallowed up by a rowdy mosh pit? Not bad for that customer service guy, who probably helped sell a few copies of Yeah Yeah Yeahs’ first EP back in the day. Not bad at all.

I wasn’t always like this. There was a time when I was just like any ordinary concertgoer, assuming that at any gig I went to, the artist would play all the hits, and even do them on demand if I stood near the stage and shouted loudly enough. That assumption was only strengthened when I went to the Hootie & The Blowfish gig at Jakarta’s old Hard Rock Cafe on March 19, 1997, with them playing “I Go Blind” just after I shouted it, making me feel like that episode of Friends where Monica, Ross and Chandler go to a Hootie & The Blowfish gig and the (off-screen) band kicks off the gig with that very same song. Apparently I had a lot to learn about TV show and soundtrack synergy as well.

And then I discovered the concept of the setlist.

What is a setlist? Basically it’s the opposite of what you may have thought happens at a show. In most cases, musicians don’t play onstage entirely based on the audience’s whims or even their own spontaneity. What usually happens is they decide before showtime which songs they are going to play, and then write the chosen songs and their order down on a piece of paper as easy reference for everyone involved with the show - musicians, technicians, sound engineers, lighting directors, etc.

In a lot of cases, they don’t even discuss song choices before every show, especially if it’s a tour with elaborate production values. The songs have already been chosen while the tour concept is being planned, then the show director or whoever helps the band work out gimmicks and set ups. Last week’s Katy Perry show at Sentul was a great example of that, in which it felt more like a musical and every song had its own place and specific gimmick that made the whole show flow nicely. But even though the show was pretty much set in stone, they still needed setlists to help keep track of everything.

Meanwhile, artists with less rigid stage production and an ample discography are more likely to shake things up with each show. It’s just a matter of whether or not the artist is willing to make the effort to do so, especially if it’s a song they haven’t played in a while. Being on tour means the only time an artist might have for practice is during soundcheck, and not every artist does their own soundcheck, as they leave it to their crew.

And then there are artists who don’t use a setlist, preferring to maintain spontaneity and believe in their own abilities as musicians. These are mostly new artists with a limited repertoire to choose from, or jazz and other improvisation-heavy artists - James Brown, Jamie Cullum and George Clinton at the Java Jazz Festival come to mind - but Cake also didn’t use a setlist at their Jakarta gig, and neither did Kings Of Convenience.

But beyond those special cases, it’s more likely than not that an artist will use a setlist at their show, if only to make sure everyone involved knows where they are and what to do at any given moment. And they’ll most likely stick to the setlist, unless you somehow manage to convince them to play something that’s not on it. And if you’re standing near the front and the song you want them to play is one of their big hits, you might as well save your breath, as they’ll get around to it eventually. Unless your name is Ben Folds and you opt not to play “Brick”.

I can’t quite remember when I first became aware of the setlist’s existence, but it must have been sometime in the late ’90s - maybe as early as 1996, which makes my Hootie & The Blowfish ignorance slightly more embarrassing -  when looking at concert reports in Hai or Q, when they’d photograph a piece of paper containing song titles. So by then I had put two and two together regarding the fact that artists had already chosen which songs they were going to play before the show even started, but it took me a while to figure out that I could own that list myself.

Until September 24, 2001, to be precise.

Ash came to Jakarta, and I was excited because I was finally going to see a band I actually liked. Not that there were many concerts to go to - according to my Songkick page, in between Hootie & The Blowfish in 1997 and Ash in 2001, I only went to four concerts, and two of those were Arkarna gigs.

So for once I got to a concert early, in order to get a spot near the front. Earlier in the day I had attended the press conference and got to ask a lot of questions because most of the other music journalists (I use the term loosely) had no clue as to who they were and what to ask, and I got the band to sign my Free All Angels CD. Then I managed to get into the meet and greet at the venue (thank you, Mr. Adrie Subono) and asked if they were going to play “Angel Interceptor” (sadly no).

Anyway, there I stood, waiting for the band to complete what had been an excellent day so far. This was before the days of setlist.fm, so I had no way to find out what they were going to play. Just about all the hits, it turned out - kicking off with “Burn Baby Burn”, experiencing technical problems, then straight into “A Life Less Ordinary”. They played most of Free All Angels because that was the album they were promoting at the time, though they didn’t forget older classics like “Oh Yeah”, “Girl From Mars” and “Wild Surf”. They even covered Weezer’s “Only In Dreams”, and if there wasn’t anything sexual going in between Tim Wheeler and Charlotte Hatherley, the way they played the dual guitar wailing at the end made you think there was.

At the end of the show, they were joined by Padi - who got equal billing but played first - for a cover of U2’s “With Or Without You”, with everyone onstage playing their respective instruments except for Ash drummer Rick McMurray, who probably left early to go and get drunk backstage (bassist Mark Hamilton took over on Ash’s drumkit). After the bands left the stage and the crowd headed towards the exits, I approached green-haired guitar tech Leif Bodnarchuk and said the magic words:

“Excuse me, may I have the setlist please?”

And this is what I got:

(Turns out they were going to play “Petrol” but didn’t, and the Padi collaboration was a last-minute thing.)

Since then I’ve tried to get the setlist at every show I go to, regardless of whether I like the artist or not. On the surface it just looks like a crappy piece of paper with some song titles written on it, but as a concertgoer it’s a nice souvenir that enhances your memories. Nowadays everybody records everything and puts it on YouTube, but back then after you went home from a gig, all you had to remember it by were your memories and a ticket stub. And if you were me, a setlist. They also come in handy if you have to write about shows, like I do.

As the years have gone by, more and more people have become aware of the setlist and its value, and so competition has heated up quite a bit. I’ve had to come up with new ways to get setlists, which I’m not going to tell you apart from the fact thst it involves a basic understanding of human psychology. Make of that what you will.

I’ve put a lot of my setlists on my Songkick page, but it hasn’t been updated in a while because they removed the media upload feature. But feel free to look around, and maybe in future posts I’ll write about those setlists and the gigs they came from.

I don’t know if going to my first concert at age 14 can be considered late, but I didn’t really have much choice before that. I was too young to go to gigs when my family lived in the U.K., and then we moved to Saudi Arabia, which is pretty much a hell hole when it comes to popular culture. Though to be fair, popular culture isn’t exactly why people go to Saudi Arabia. There are Islamic rituals to perform, and maybe some shopping.

I haven’t been there in over 13 years, but back then my entertainment choices were limited. There were no cinemas, and even if there were, they’d be subjected to the iron fist of censorship which befell magazines and TV stations. It was a fairly regular occurrence to buy an imported magazine or comic book, only to find pages defaced by a black marker or torn out entirely because of “suggestive” images. And then there were the two local TV stations, which might as well have been just one because I only watched Channel 2 as it was in English. I never bothered with the Arabic-language Channel 1, nor did I bother much with the Arabic language itself. In six years of living there, until now the only Arabic I’m capable of is asking how much something costs when I go to the grocery store. (“Kam hadza?”, in case you were wondering.)

Watching foreign shows on Channel 2 was an interesting experience, again due to the censorship. If there was even a tiny hint of exposed female skin, let alone sexual activity, on the cutting room floor it went. (Though I’m pretty sure there were quite a lot of bare-chested dudes on TV, for some reason.) So a half-hour episode of something like Full House, for example, would end up being 15 minutes with a story that made no sense, because cutting out scenes with a lack of clothing also meant disemboweling the plot. If I ever get around to watching those episodes now, they’ll probably be much more logical.

As for music, well to be honest I don’t know how I listened to the stuff I did. When we moved from the U.K., one of our going-away presents was a cassette of Genesis’ Invisible Touch, and that was all me and my brothers listened to during our first few months in Saudi Arabia, apart from a tape of Minang pop music our dad kept in the car. Eventually, as we enrolled in the Indonesian Embassy school and made new friends, we’d get into more music. Or specifically, my elder brother Hanief got into more music, and I just rode on his coattails. He used to buy issues of Smash Hits - with the pages defaced and torn out, naturally - and we’d learn about the latest music through there. And I guess hanging out with our Indonesian school friends, who probably got their exposure from back home, influenced our tastes as well.

Whatever the reason, Duran Duran became a quite popular band in our household. From one of our Indonesian neighbours, we borrowed a Betamax tape (old school, I know) of Duran Duran’s music videos, but I’m not sure if “Girls On Film” was censored or it all the raunchiness just flew over my 8-year-old head.

Anyway, from then on Duran Duran always kept a place on my radar, even though they weren’t as big as they were before the original line-up split. As big as their hair was at the height of their fame, suddenly this British group were joined by an American guitarist with even bigger hair (and something else even bigger, as Warren Cuccurullo - him with the dashing polka dot shirt below - in his post-Duran Duran days eventually made a line of dildos based on his, uh, cuccurullo. He called it the Rock Rod. If you click on the link, proceed with caution. You have been warned).

Then unexpectedly, Duran Duran enjoyed a comeback in 1993, and I found this out in the most random of fashions. I was in a hotel room in Abu Dhabi, in transit during my move from Jeddah to Jakarta, where I would be continuing my studies and living with Hanief, who had already moved there several years earlier. I turned on the TV, flipped through the channels, and stumbled upon this cool new tune by that old band. It was “Come Undone”.

Arriving in Jakarta, I would later discover that that one song wasn’t a fluke, and that the album it came from had several other hits in heavy rotation, namely “Ordinary World”…

…and “Too Much Information”.

As luck would have it, this resurgent popularity gave some Indonesian concert promoter the motivation to bring them to Jakarta, and Hanief got me a free ticket to go with him and his girlfriend at the time. So off we went to the Jakarta Convention Centre’s Plenary Hall on April 10, 1994 for my first ever concert.

Now that was almost 18 years ago, so obviously my recollections are hazy, to say the least. So here’s a random assortment of things I do remember:

• It wasn’t a sold-out show, probably only two-thirds of the Plenary Hall capacity at most.
• Our seats were the upper left floor, so we saw the band facing right the whole night.
• They had a sexy female backing vocalist called Lamya Al-Mugheiry, who sadly died of a heart attack in 2009 at the tender age of 35.
• They did new arrangements of several classic hits, which led to much confusion for me, and much relief when they finally played “Hungry Like The Wolf” the way I remembered it.
• For some reason there was a large Bart Simpson doll dangling on a string from the rigging above Nick Rhodes’ head.
• They covered Grandmaster Melle Mel’s “White Lines (Don’t Do It)”, which would also appear a year on their covers album Thank You.
• And since Kurt Cobain had just been discovered dead the day before, the encore began with Simon Le Bon and John Taylor playing an acoustic version of Nirvana’s “Lithium” in tribute, with Simon singing the lyrics from a cheat sheet. (Thanks, entulista). Back then I didn’t realise just how big the worldwide impact of Nirvana’s music had been - I was still in Saudi Arabia in 1991, Nevermind fever passed me by - so I thought the “Lithium” cover was just Duran Duran being nice as I couldn’t imagine them having anything in common with Nirvana.
• Near the end of show-closer “Wild Boys”, Simon went into the crowd and got mobbed, and by the time he returned to the stage, he had lost the black t-shirt he was wearing. Which someone threw back at him in tatters. And he put back on. And said, “Thank you for giving me my job back!”
• Based on user input at setlist.fm, it seems Duran Duran’s setlists at the time didn’t change much from show to show, if at all. So it’s quite likely that their Jakarta setlist went something like this:

1. Too Much Information
2. A View To A Kill
3. Hungry Like The Wolf
4. Ordinary World
5. Skin Trade
6. White Lines (Don’t Do It)
7. First Impression
8. Come Undone
9. Love Voodoo
10. Girls On Film
11. Notorious
12. The Reflex
13. Rio
14. Lithium
15. Save A Prayer
16. Wild Boys

So that was my first ever concert. It would be over a year until my next gig, but that first one definitely left a deep impression. Though as deep as that impression was, both my 8-and-14-year-old selves never imagined that - two days short of being exactly 14 years later - I would be talking to Duran Duran and telling them that they were my first ever concert in the very same venue they would also play that night.

The photo below is me with Roger Taylor, Nick Rhodes and John Taylor of Duran Duran in Jakarta, April 8, 2008. Funny how life works out sometimes, isn’t it?

“Go international”. You hear Indonesian artists say that all the time, but how often does it actually happen? And what does it actually mean, anyway? In recent years more and more bands have had the opportunity to perform overseas, but does it really count if the people you’re playing for are Indonesian diplomats, students and labour workers? And if the people who invited you to a different country are actually people from that country, would it be worth the trip and all the time, expense and energy you spent on it just to play in some crappy bar to a small handful of people who don’t give a shit about who you are?

But leaving aside the debate regarding who’s actually made it - as I’m sure everyone has their own opinion - I think anyone who has any common sense would agree that White Shoes & The Couples Company are closer than most to being an internationally-acclaimed Indonesian act. They’ve performed at influential music industry showcases such as SXSW and CMJ in Austin, Texas and New York, had their albums released in the U.S. and Japan, and played at festivals in Singapore and Hong Kong just over a month ago. Their renowned fans include Sondre Lerche, The Pains Of Being Pure At Heart and Kings Of Convenience (Erlend Oye is a huge groupie, and even covered White Shoes’ “Bersandar” when KOC last performed in Bandung and Jakarta).

And now they’re doing it again. This Friday they’ll be leaving for Cannes, France to perform at the first-ever Midem Festival, followed by a short tour of the Netherlands. It’s another opportunity for them to do what they’ve done well so far, which is represent Indonesia as a hotbed of excellent music, just waiting for more exposure to the outside world.

Unfortunately, opportunities like this don’t come cheap. If you’re a relative unknown - and let’s be realistic, that’s what White Shoes are in the overall music world - then you often have to use your own money to take advantage of those opportunities. And not being a band with major funding behind them, White Shoes always have to raise money to help pay for their journey.

Which brings us to earlier this evening, specifically the Tjikini cafe where White Shoes held an intimate show to help raise funds. Over the years, the cafe - formerly known as Cafe Au Lait - has been the site of many memorable White Shoes gigs, and it’s also within walking distance from Institute Kesenian Jakarta, where the band formed as students. So it was an ideal spot to put on a show.

Ideal apart from its capacity, that is. When I arrived, people were already standing on the pavement looking in because there was no room inside, even though it was only the opening band We Love ABC (White Shoes bassist Ricky Surya Virgana with his two children performing cute versions of indie rock songs).

Tickets for the gig were IDR 35,000 each, and I don’t know how much of the proceeds went to the band, but it was encouraging to see the place packed with paying customers.

And I was perfectly willing to pay, but somehow slipped through the door during the changeover between We Love ABC and White Shoes. Oh well. I found a spot just in front of the band and alternately stood and squatted by the piano, which Ricky played during the first part of the show: an acoustic set.

The acoustic set consisted of older songs from their self-titled debut and the Skenario Masa Muda EP, plus “Kapiten Dan Gadis Desa” from Riot: The Thusrday Riot Compilation (don’t look at me that way, that’s how they spelled the title). For “Bersandar”, White Shoes’ contribution to the Berbagi Suami soundtrack, they were joined on cello by Sisi, Ricky and keyboardist Aprimela Prawidiyanti’s daughter, before Sisi’s dad took over the cello for “Sunday Memory Lane”.

After the acoustic set, the band took a break while longtime friends David Tarigan and Ricky Malau hosted the fund-raising auction of White Shoes’ various iconic photos for album covers and other shoots, and a rare print of the original artwork created by vocalist Aprilia Apsari especially for the show. Some fun and furious bidding took place, with some items even reaching millions. Nice to see art being appreciated.

Auction over, the band returned and ripped into an all-electric set mostly consisting of songs from their latest release, Album Vakansi.

They certainly got the crowd going, especially this young lady dancing on the bar. Hopefully her fellow Caucasians in France and the Netherlands will have similar reactions.

At first this was the band’s setlist, but as the night went on, things veered from the script. After “Vakansi”, they added covers of Fariz RM’s “Selangkah Keseberang”, plus Brigitte Bardot’s “Tu Veux Ou Tu Veux Pas”, presumably to help win over the Euro crowds. Then they dropped “Hacienda” in favour of “Topstar”, then played “Senandung Maaf” and “Roman Ketiga” by request, before closing with rousing renditions of their usual final two songs of late, “Aksi Kucing” and “Matahari”. Kudos to Sari, Ricky, Mela, guitarists Rio Farabi and Saleh Husein, and drummer John Navid for going the extra mile and soaking their clothes with sweat in the process.

After the show, everyone headed to the merchandise table to buy limited edition t-shirts, tote bags and posters. Having got in for free, I felt obligated to buy something and help their cause. The tote bags were already sold out, and so were the t-shirts apart from size S. After much consideration, I parted with IDR 100,000 and went home hoping that the t-shirt would fit me, otherwise I’d have to go on a severe diet. The verdict?

Not bad, if I do say so myself. Yes, it’s a bit on the tight side, but at least it’s not as bad as Ross Geller’s “Frankie Say Relax” t-shirt he took back from Rachel Green after they broke up in Friends.

All in all, it was a good day in Cikini. Good luck, White Shoes & The Couples Company! Make Indonesia proud! Again!

Acoustic setlist:

1. Runaway Song
2. Kapiten Dan Gadis Desa
3. Today Is No Sunday
4. Nothing To Fear
5. Bersandar
6. Sunday Memory Lane

Electric setlist:

1. Ye Good Ol’ Days
2. Masa Remadja
3. Senja Menggila
4. Kisah Dari Selatan Jakarta
5. Vakansi
6. Selangkah Keseberang
7. Tu Veux Ou Tu Veux Pas
8. Topstar
9. Senandung Maaf
10. Roman Ketiga
11. Aksi Kucing
12. Matahari

P.S. White Shoes & The Couples Company are still looking for sponsors and donors for their European tour, so if you’re interested in giving financial support, please immediately contact their manager Indra Ameng at +62818817548. To learn more about the band, click here.

I had given up any aspirations of playing in bands by the time I hit my mid-twenties and graduated from university. Not that I seriously pursued music in my teen years. There was that one gig I played at my junior high graduation party, but I suspect I was asked to sing only because I had decent English pronunciation, not because I could sing like I was the second coming of Kurt Cobain. (Though in true Nirvana style I did trash the mic stand, much to the disapproval of the equipment rental company.) Then in high school I formed a band with a friend of similar musical tastes when we were in junior high together, but as it turned his interests had moved on to hardcore, whereas I was still more Billy Corgan than Biohazard. So that didn’t last too long. And you’d think university would be an even better time to find like-minded individuals to start a band with, and you’d be right - if your university was Institut Kesenian Jakarta, birthplace of many fine Indonesian bands. Unfortunately I didn’t attend IKJ, and couldn’t find anyone to regularly play music with at UI. Being useless at music probably didn’t help my cause.

So I ended up becoming a music writer, which is what often happens to frustrated musicians. And it didn’t seem I was likely to become President of Indonesia, so I would have to settle for music journalism. And I was cool with that - besides going to gigs for free and getting lots of complimentary CDs, I also got to meet many of my favourite Indonesian musicians, and in some cases even befriend and influence them.

One of those cases was Ario Hendarwan of The Adams, with whom I bonded with over The Beach Boys and Weezer. He suggested we do something together, and after going through the options, I ended up writing lyrics for a song The Adams contributed to the Quickie Express movie soundtrack in 2007. Below is a video some fans made for the song a few years later as a school assignment.

Around the same time, Ario had also started Monday Math Class, with him providing music for lyrics and vocals by Priscilla Jamail. Some demos they put up on MySpace drew some buzz, followed by their first gig invitation. I just dropped by their rehearsal but ended up being asked by Ario to operate his laptop containing the backing tracks. Since all that involved was pressing the space button, I said yes. Along with Gianni Fajri on backing vocals, this was Monday Math Class’ debut performance.

We only did one song, because it then started to rain heavily and we couldn’t stick around to finish the rest of the set, because Ario had a gig with The Adams afterwards. But from there, Monday Math Class’ line-up evolved to include Ezar Darnadi on bass and Gigih Suryoprayogo on drums, while Gianni also ended up playing acoustic rhythm guitar.

Which left me as the odd one out. Having a drummer meant I was relieved of my laptop duties, so I ended up doing background vocals and blabbering in between songs, because Priscilla was a bit on the shy side. I felt like a useless douchebag just standing up there and yakking, so I figured I had to make a more meaningful contribution. Co-writing some songs helped, but I still felt like a liability onstage.

And then Sir Dandy happened.

Sir Dandy - Dandi Achmad Ramdhani, or Acong to his friends - was previously known in the scene as the frontman of Teenage Death Star, proud proponents of the philosophy “Skill Is Dead”. Their shows were always raucous affairs, with the line between band and audience being obliterated, along with any semblance of musicianship with instruments getting unplugged, players forgetting their parts, and so on. Here’s a video from their album launch show in mid-2008:

Almost a year after that show, Sir Dandy announced he was doing a solo performance at Jaya Pub as part of Superbad, the monthly showcase for emerging bands and old faces from Indonesia’s independent scene. I was there to check out another band, but it was Sir Dandy’s performance that left a lasting impression:

In its own way it was just as chaotic as a Teenage Death Star gig. But just the sheer audacity of being able to write such simple songs and play them with no fear - and making the crowd go wild - despite just starting to learn how to play guitar. It inspired me to go home and pick up the acoustic guitar lying around at home. Lack of progress beyond the C, D, E, G and A chords led to me losing interest - but seeing Sir Dandy made me think those chords were more than enough to do something with.

It was like a door unlocked in my mind. Suddenly I was able to write songs on the guitar on my own, whereas previously I had to rely on others. I also made use of friendships with musicians so I could learn how to play their songs, like Sore’s “Mata Berdebu”. Inevitably, I ended up wanting to play guitar for Monday Math Class too.

Inevitably I’d discover it’s not that easy playing guitar for Monday Math Class with such limited capabilities, and I probably ruined a few shows because of it. But I still wanted to play, so I decided I needed some practice at an easier level, then work my way up. I got in touch with Acong and asked him for the chords to Sir Dandy’s songs, and I learned them at home. I even started coming up with my own lead guitar parts! Eventually Sir Dandy had some gigs, and Acong invited me to join him. Not knowing any better, I said yes. We were a duo probably more like Tenacious D or Flight Of The Conchords rather than The Everly Brothers, and managed to score an opening slot as the launch of Sore’s Sombreros Kiddos EP.

All this gave me more confidence for playing in Monday Math Class, and just in time, too - we got asked to play at the Java Rockin’ Land 2010 festival, in front of our biggest crowd to date.

OK, maybe it wasn’t a vast improvement, but certainly much better than when I started. Save for a show a week or so later, we haven’t played live since then. Call Aldri at +628179847777 if interested. The current line-up of Monday Math Class is Priscilla Jamail (lead vocals), Ario Hendarwan (lead guitar), Ezar Darnadi (bass), Ildo Hasman (drums), Muhammad Asranur (keyboards) and myself.

Meanwhile, Sir Dandy was also evolving. Somehow Acong managed to hook up with Widi Puradiredja of Maliq & D’essentials, who offered to produce his album. We had a show line up and the three of us rehearsed. Then an hour before playing, Ade Paloh from Sore showed up to play bass. Eventually this sort of thing would become the rule rather than the exception.

The current line-up of Sir Dandy And The Boys In The Band - as Acong would eventually call us - started to come together in January 2011. We had a gig at Galeri Nasional on the same day as Widi’s wedding, so I suggested Ildo - whom I was playing with in Monday Math Class - on drums. A day before we were supposed to rehearse, Ade got sick, and rather than look for a replacement bass player, Acong said just the three of us would be fine. We rehearsed in Ildo’s room/home studio, and just as were about to finish, Herald Reynaldo - lead singer of L’alphalpha, Ildo’s other band - dropped by. On a whim, we asked if he was interested in playing bass for the gig, and he said yes. But before we could rehearse again, Acong had to go home and I ended up trying to teach the other two. Plans to rehearse again fell through, and so the first time all four of us played together was at soundcheck for just one song. But I think it went well.

Ade returned and Ildo kept his place for the next Sir Dandy gig at Backyard Coffee, situated on the lower floor of Organic Records’ base of operations. Widi just watched, then decided he wanted to play keyboards at the next show. And so the debut performance of the main Sir Dandy And The Boys In The Band line-up was for Superbad at Jaya Pub, which is also where Sir Dandy’s first ever solo show took place.

Since then Sir Dandy And The Boys In The Band - with the occasional fill-in guest such as Twentyfirst Night’s Dimasz Joy Adithya, Maliq & D’essentials’ Ilman Ibrahim, Homogenic’s Grahadea Kusuf, Hightime Rebellion’s Rendy Surindrapati and more - have played a number of unlikely high-profile gigs, including the Java Soulnation festival, Djakarta Artmosphere, PL Fair at Lebak Bulus Stadium, Terusik Traxkustik All Star Edition (in my office’s backyard, funnily enough), opening for Tame Impala and !!!, and Java Rockin’ Land at the same stage where Ildo and I had played with Monday Math Class a year earlier:

As you can tell, it was a crazy year. Our next gig is on the 5th of February at Love Garage, a two-day event (February 5th and 8th) where a number of acclaimed international acts will also be playing, maybe even on the same day as us and the other local bands, so things could get even crazier. Considering I wasn’t even thinking of playing in a band just a few years ago, I’m just happy to go along for the ride and have fun. I guess it’s never too late to start something.