2015 must be a blessing for The Executive Student Board (BEM) of the Law Faculty of Padjadjaran University because this year fortunately they could held their annual jazz event, the biggest in Bandung, The 7th International Kampoeng Jazz, without any postponed agenda like previous year. Located at their own campus, Universitas Padjadjaran Dipati Ukur, for about twelve hours in last Saturday, the visitors were spoiled by various artists, lots of food booth, and bazaar. Couple of hours before the show the committee held Press Conference for all media partners at Sheraton Bandung Hotel & Towers. Jizue, Syaharani, G-Pluck Beatles, and Beben Jazz were some musicians who met us there. Back to the main event, at the punctual time as scheduled, Kampoeng Jazz Project Officer, Frero, gave his speech as the event was officially begun. After that, Kama Soekarno, Chief of BEM Fakultas Hukum UNPAD, and the Chief of P2K2M also welcomed the visitors and finally the fun had begun.
With a lot of musicians to perform, Kampoeng Jazz got two stages for them to explore, Main Stage and Lounge Stage which was sponsored by Nescafe Coffee. Just like before, Kampoeng Jazz always gives the chance for amateur/newborn bands to participate via auditions. For this year, three bands were selected by the judge. One, Chakraborty delivered a tight package in the name of jazz. The band was established a little bit more than a year ago but they have played hundreds of times in front of public. They have played in prestigious festivals like JakJazz, they have bagged quite many achievements too. “Kepahitan Termanis”, “Soul Shadows”, and “Sabda Alam” were their creation specially delivered to us. Then, a trio from Jakarta named MEP Trio was really solid in exploring the funky jazz terrain. These guys played like a pro, sharp but smooth. MEP stands for Madra, Eky, and Pandu. For this event the drum position was given to Afi because Pandu couldn’t make it. That was from Lounge Stage, while for Main Stage, Salty Sugar was the first who tasted it. This band is a large ensemble consists of young guns who have been friends since junior high school. They served funky party that would fit everyone. Knowing how today hits could easily attract the crowd, the band closed their performance with upbeat “Get Lucky” by Daft Punk ft. Pharrell Williams and Coldplay’s “A Sky Full of Stars”. So there, three audition winners did very well in setting up the fire early.
Bell Bottom Blues Trio consists of Ruzan as singer and guitar player, Fahmi as bass player, Dhana as drum n percussion player. Starting the journey worked on Jimi Hendrix’s songs three fellows from different genres fuse under blues and epically entertained us with their skills and shared their souls. Hope their motto, “kami akan bermain di mana saja dan kapan saja dengan 200% effort dan soul” goes well with their musical journey. Continued with Dadung and Friends played today’s hits “Love Never Felt So Good” by Michael Jackson and Justin Timberlake. Then, Russel and Electric Band (REB) came up and hit the stage with “Leaving on the Jet Plane”.
Beben Jazz and Friends made a visit to this fest. As you probably know, Beben Supendi Mulyana – better known as Beben Jazz- is an important figure in Indonesian jazz. His community, Komunitas Jazz Kemayoran has performed hundreds of regular gigs and still running well until now. It’s always interesting to see how he introduces jazz to the society. He knows how to make it acceptable to all segments in the society without having to lose the jazz traditions. Jamming mode, improvisations, call and response, all that jazz, plus communicative as Beben likes to share knowledge during his show. A joyful treat full of lessons, that’s what it was. Not only beautifully entertained us with Ella Fitzgerald’s “Summertime”, Duke Ellington’s “Take the A Train”, “Just the Two of Us”, Beben also got a Hall of Fame achievement by Kampoeng Jazz Project Officer.
One of many things we like about Mocca and Friends is how their melodious tunes never get us bored, both live and recorded. Charmed and swept everyone with Arina’s soft voice and the beat from all band players really couldn’t stop us from singing along with them. Greeted their listeners with “Secret Admirer”, continued with Frank Sinatra’s “My Way”, “Bandung”, and then Yura joined the gig in “Balada Sirkus” and “Butterfly in My Tummy”.
Dried Cassava started their musical journey since high school at South Jakarta. Baskoro Adhi Juwono as vocalist and one of the guitarists, Nandie Daniel Febryan as lead guitarist, Bana Drestanta as bassist and Kago Mahardono as drummer, these talented fellow gave us another experience in jazz event with their alternative funk rock and blues. “Paradox” was one of many songs they brought up on stage and you can get this song from their debut album ‘Mind Thieves’.
As rain was pouring, Adhitia Sofyan just came on very proper time, marking his second participation in this event after last year. His voice blended with his guitar produced perfect ambience. “Adelaide Sky”, “The Stalker”, “Tik Tik Tik Bunyi Hujan”, “Blue Sky Collapse”, “After the Rain”, and “Tokyo Lights Fade Away”, a song from ‘How to Stop Time’ album were the list at that noon.
A university as big as UNPAD surely has many talented people within. Surprisingly, not only the students made this event as medium for their musical needs, but their lecturers also have that craving. The Bandos is the proof. It is a band consists of Fakultas Hukum UNPAD’s lecturers and they didn’t want to throw away the opportunity to get along with their students and have fun on stage. Blotymama contains high dose of funk. As they said earlier, “our mission is actually simple. We only want to give you some fun”. Absolutely they already checked that mission. Teddy Adithya on vocal, Ade Avery on guitar, Rendi Raditya on bass, and Rio Agung on drum are people behind this band with rock and R n’B touch. ‘Bloty Time’ is an album full of creation from the heart. These four fellows, who already spread their marks in many other musicians’ work, a hundred percent stole the night as many people looked for their album right after watching their show.
Babendjo Saung Mang Udjo is what really represents Bandung as a city full of artsy people. This group with a male vocalist wonderfully sang Chrisye’s hits “Untukku” and “Cintaku”, covered “Hey Jude”, and played Sundanese song “Manuk Dadali”.
Then we found the band we always consider as friend, Syaharani and the QueenFireworks a.k.a ESQI:EF. The year 2015 seems to be a good year for the band as the name has been listed in numerous festivals across the nation. We haven’t cross path with each other for quite some times especially since they launched the latest album ‘Disini Ada Cinta’, so for us this was the chance to check what they currently have in store. The core members were all here. The jazz songstress Syaharani, guitar master Donny Suhendra and the creative head and multi-instrumentalist Didit Saad, along with the team mates including. They played Answering some requests from twitter, the songs including “Arisan Hujan” and “Merah Kuning Jingga”, both taken from the third and latest album, “Selalu Ada Cinta”. Not only jazz, she brought blues too as the roots of all modern musics. As a band that stands above genre with personnel that share the same point of view ‘music to share’, once again ESQI:EF brought pleasure and joy to the audience, interactively. No boundaries, no gap, all connected. Other than the ability to make many different arrangements on the songs, the happy way of performing always makes their show loveable.
If we have Tulus in male side, Yura definitely rules the female corner. Her unique gesture while singing is really something. This talented young woman made a sundanese song called “Kataji” and you could taste a spoon of jazz right there. “Berawal dari Tatap”, “Cinta dan Rahasia”, and a covered song from Ellie Goulding’s“Love Me like You Do” were a complete eargasm for us.
It felt like going back to the 60’s, smelling the music scene in England. Yes, the Genuine Pluck loves to play The Beatles; simply called G-Pluck Beatles brought that kind of atmosphere to the youngsters. Awan Garnida (vocals/bass) role as James Paul McCartney, Adnan Sigit (vocals/rhythm) role as John Lennon, Wawan HID on (lead guitar/vocal) role as George Harrison and Beni Pratama (vocals/drums & percussion) role as Ringo Starr not only played the way the original did, but they also dressed themselves alike (hair style, clothing, shoes etc). Mimic, dialects and the gestures really resemblence the Beatles too. For almost an hour they made the audience went crazy rockin’ and rollin’ along the performance with Beatles’ and John Lennon evergreens including “Imagine”, “Hey Jude”, “Ticket to Ride”, “Here Comes the Sun”, and “I Saw Her Standing There”. The Beatles’ music is ageless and amazingly still relevant today. Thanks to G-Pluck Beatles, the youngsters who haven’t born during The Beatles’ golden era could taste how it was.
Kahitna, a lot of woman, couples, and romantic songs, is a whole package every time they go for a gig. So did Kampoeng Jazz. A song list contained of “Biar Cinta”, “Andai Ia Tahu”, “Tentang Diriku”, Chrisye’s “Untukku” and Raisa’s “Mantan Terindah” which also are composed by Yovie Widianto really blew the night.
On the other stage, Endah N Rhesa came up with their hits for instance, “Wish You Were Here”, “Someday”, “No Tears from My Eyes”, and “When You Love Someone”. This couple never lost their love power and that what makes them special. Crowd straightly could feel the love they spread via their lyrics and tunes.
Assembled from artists with various kinds of music background including Dewa Budjana from jazz area, pop-rock band Gigi has been ruling the music scene for more than 10 years. The founding members Armand Maulana and Dewa Budjana then Gusti Hendy and Thomas Ramdhan are the pillars who make this band stand tall today. It’s quite a surprise to see Gigi in a jazz event, especially when they go serious by establishing special project called Gigi Jazz Project. Although this wasn’t the first time they went jazzy (they did it at the Java Jazz Festival 2011), it’s still different, knowing that this time they didn’t go with Ron King Big Band like at the Java Jazz back then. Other than the jazz icon Dewa Budjana who’s currently doing very well in the international scene with MoonJune Records, Gusti Hendy is also the drummer of the dare-devil avant band LIGRO. So the band actually has jazz blood too inside the vein. The songs that we really love so much, such as, “Terbang”, “Nirwana”, “Pintu Sorga” were served with more jazzy arrangement. No one denies the greatness of Gigi in the pop/rock scene. But now all should know that with the kind of talents found inside the band, they can deliver madness in just about any genre. As for jazz, having Gigi’s signature certainly offers more varieties and possibilities.
Jizue is the winner. This solid, neat unit of four has unique sound which is high energy, trance-techno jazz with distortive post rock twist found inside. It is composed of Noriyuki Inoue on guitar, Go Yamada on bass, Shin Kokawa on drums, and Kie Katagi on piano. Mogwai, Envy, Strike Anywhere, Brian Blade, Squarepusher, Aphex Twin, The Mars Volta, Incubus, Robert Glasper, Radiohead, and Shingo02 are some examples of other musicians who influence their work. No doubt their plays are so rich, their performances are so full of energy and really proven they always have great times on stage. The personnel themselves are lively and spirited, they are expressive and explosive. Even when they played standards like “When You Wish upon a Star”, they fit it within their style. Not to mention how they really grabbed our attention when playing “Halo-halo Bandung”. Incredibly neat, one high octane action packed show that made us fresh again during the late hours. Arigatou Jizue, love you! What a dynamic group.
Bondax is an electronic music duo consisting of young talented English musicians, Adam Kaye and George Townsend. Since 2011 until now, the pair continually expands their work in music and many stages already tasted. Now, Indonesia, especially Bandung, was the luckiest one to feel their trance house music alive. Just Us Recordings, their own record label is another thing they do release all the creativity in their minds and shape it to tunes. “You’re So”, “Baby I Got That”, “Gold”, “Giving It All”, “Wet Summer”, “Fires”, and “All I See” were the list made people going crazy moved their hips and shook their head as this duo tremendously closed the event.
So pleased to have this kind of big jazz event once again in Bandung and to see many musicians always want to come back having gigs in Bandung. With this range of success, absolutely the expectation will grow bigger for the next Kampoeng Jazz and hopefully the committee can maintain their hard work to serve this annual event. As a media, we hope to see better treatment for photographers who are doing their work. The committee must realize that medias should be considered as partners who give benefit in sending out the news about this event to public, so making them difficult definitely doesn’t give benefit to both sides. Since the regulation is getting worse , we do hope to see a better system next year.
As for the visitors, all jazz lover out there, keep up your supports toward local gigs, especially jazz, so together we can gradually improve the quality of Indonesian music and its festival. Indeed, it was a lovely night in Paris Van Java city and we’ll see you around upcoming jazz events. Cheers!
See more pictures:
Reporter: Melissa Anastasya, Riandy Kurniawan
Photographer: Titus Firmanto, Septian ‘Lardlles’