METAL HISTORY: TURBIDITY (Bandung Slamming Death Metal) live @ East Bandung, 9 October 2011

TURBIDITY, February 2011 line-up. Left to Right: Dada (vocals), Iko (drums), Mamay (bass), Daniel (guitar).

At the show with TURBIDITY in Ujung Berung, East Bandung, Sunday 9 October 2011 by Kieran James aka Jack Frost

At 4pm on Sunday, Bobby, Popo, and I headed for East Bandung to attend a rock show to be headlined by the young, first-rate death-slammers TURBIDITY. It was a 45-minute drive from the northern suburbs of Bandung out through to the residential areas near Ujung Berung and then to the border with the countryside. As we headed into the residential or the suburban areas the roads narrowed, buildings became closer together, the graffiti on walls became more prominent, and the traffic began to thin out. Popo told me that this was near to Ujung Berung, that near mythical working-class locality, much like California’s East Bay for legendary punks RANCID, where the first death-metal bands developed and a supportive but demanding death-metal brotherhood emerged. In Ujung Berung the older death-metal bands have always mentored the younger bands and pushed the younger bands towards excellence. Popo states that she knew Man of JASAD within the metal community of Ujung Berung before she even became a death-metal vocalist.

The neighbourhoods we went through were not completely poor – here and there we saw what were obviously higher status houses and apartments but they too lacked arrogance and pretension. The area has a harmony and cohesion, even in the midst of apparent chaos, a statement which could even apply to Indonesia as a whole where everything and everyone appears to be in perpetual motion but where social behaviour still remains highly regulated and controlled.

Kieran and Dada, 9 October 2011, East Bandung

We eventually reached a road where, to cite RANCID again from the 2009 song “Disconnected”, “the city was on the left and the country was on the right”. Heading towards the show this lyric actually reversed itself as the rice-fields, in the shadow of the mountain and perhaps less than a kilometre away and shrouded by eternal grey cloud, were on the left and the houses of East Bandung were on the right. The ancient rice-fields on the left, a sight which must have remained unchanged for generations, were interspersed with modern-looking petrol stations with their MNC brand-name logos prominently displayed. Such are the contradictions of Indonesia.

As soon as we had reached the rice-fields, 500 metres or a kilometre ahead on the right, around a bend in the road as it curve rightwards, was the music venue and its large compound. It was hard to be sure what the music venue was primarily designed for. Certainly the parking area compound was very spacious and there was a long internal entrance road after you entered the front gates.

The music venue was a large hall, much larger than the Cibinong venue and perhaps 50 metres long and fifteen metres wide or even 60 metres long and 20 metres wide. The roof was raised very high and in one corner there was a staircase leading up to a balcony. The balcony stretched along the entire back internal wall and was around ten metres deep. We exited the car to see all of the death-metal community of Bandung, or so it appeared, relaxing on a low brick wall running parallel to a side wall of the building. There was a line of around fifteen metalheads seated on the low brick wall, holding court as it were, with others sitting on the ground and crouching in front of them. The seated metalheads were smoking, passing around bottles of traditional “arak” wine, and staring peacefully out over the sea of parked motorcycles inside the compound to the mist-shrouded mountain beyond. Bobby, Popo, and I (Daniel may have been with us as well) enthusiastically greeted the seated metalheads.

Glenn Bloodgush, Uus Bleeding Corpse, Kieran James

There was a real atmosphere of community and brotherhood which was very obvious to everyone. Although this was just an ordinary rock festival it had also become a death-metal community event because local East Bandung favourite TURBIDITY was the headliner. On closer inspection of the seated people it seemed like some unofficial ranking system was being observed. As my pictures of this show reproduced here in this book reveal, Glenn [the 25-year-old lead vocalist of the emerging death-metal band BLOODGUSH] was seated third or fourth from the left as you approached the group. To his left was the smiling veteran of Ujung Berung death-metal, the BLEEDING CORPSE guitarist Uus Death. Clearly he was the most highly respected metalhead present at the show. He was wearing his denim jacket replete with sew-on metal patches of the type associated with the Western metalheads of the 1980s. Everyone was very relaxed and cheerful. This was a regular Sunday afternoon home gig in East Bandung of the type that Uus and Glenn must have attended hundreds of times before. Dada Rosadeath, vocalist for TURBIDITY, was floating around, wearing a red tee-shirt and cheerfully greeting people. Respect was being shown by younger metalheads and friends to people such as Uus, Bobby Rock, and Dada. I took pictures with two young and attractive teenage fans who were not dressed as metal chicks.

Once inside the venue it was apparent, and conversations confirmed it, that this was a mixed show and a mixed crowd. There were some death-metal fans in black death-metal tee-shirts, mostly dancing, slamming, and headbanging in a group of perhaps 100 in the moshpit directly in front of the stage. Others leaned against the side walls and watched proceedings. Other rock fans among the crowd wore tee-shirts and hoodies of a variety of colours and this was clearly a completely different crowd from the 100% death-metal crowd at the previous night’s gig in Cibinong. The senior metalheads outside did not appear to be too interested in going in to watch the bands. Clearly they were all waiting for TURBIDITY and enjoying the cool Bandung breezes, the wine and cigarettes, the companionship, and the mountain views. However, as befitting a non death-metal show, many senior metalheads were missing, including Ferly, Abaz, and Man of JASAD. Man may or may not have by this time returned to Bandung from his trip to visit his mother’s home.

I moved around out in the car park area sitting with different people, chatting with Uus and Glenn, and taking pictures for this book. I met one interesting character, a young man who is a serving but off-duty Indonesian policeman [see picture in this book]. He informed me that he had been part of the death-metal scene before he took up his current job and that he kept up-to-date with developments in the death-metal scene. He had a heavy-metal denim jacket buttoned up over his police uniform and to everyone’s delight he stood up to take off this jacket so he could be photographed with me in his full police gear. Clearly the guy enjoyed juggling and trading off his multiple identities although he wanted to make clear to us that his death-metal scene involvement predated his current job. This statement signalled his authenticity and sub-cultural capital to the death-metal scene. He was keen to make it clear that he was not a police spy or a police plant which was important given the tense relationship presently existing between death-metallers and the police in Bandung due to the eleven deaths at the BESIDE show.

The crowd inside appeared to be mostly teenagers. Due to the vast size of the hall the group of 100 dancers and headbangers right at the front looked somewhat lonely and isolated. The show lacked somewhat in atmosphere due to the large size of the hall and the mixed nature of the crowd and the bands on the bill. This lack of atmosphere was certainly not the fault of TURBIDITY as the band tried their best to perform with total passion and ignore the empty spaces in the venue and the lack of atmosphere. Most of the floor space of the hall was empty with groups leaning against the side walls. The senior metalheads, including Bobby, Popo, and Uus, headed to the raised balcony section at the back of the hall while I chose to stay at the front at ground level to headbang. For a time I leaned against the side wall talking with two teenaged guys who proclaimed to me that they were “death-metal”; asked me if I was “death-metal”; asked me if I spoke Indonesian (“sorry no” was the answer); and also asked me whether TURBIDITY was really going to play or not. Given that TURBIDITY’s name was top of the bill and listed on the giant wall poster behind the drum kit the guys’ faith levels did not appear to be very high. I presumed that they had had negative past experiences with bands not showing up at gigs or showing up but not playing. I told the two teenagers that the TURBIDITY vocalist Dada was already here and I pointed him out to them.

Iko (drums) and Daniel (guitar), 9 October 2011

TURBIDITY finally hit the stage as night fell outside and the headbanging and dancing began in earnest down at the front. Dada moves around a lot on stage and the large stage here suited him. He has the hardcore look of short hair, tattoos, non-black tee-shirt, and cap (featuring the communist hammer-and-sickle logo, a logo which is still illegal in Indonesia). Dada adopts the hardcore genre posturing of arm holding the microphone raised up high, so that the forearm is parallel to the floor and the microphone is very close to the mouth. Dada’s body is in a permanent crouch and he places one foot on the amplifiers. Dada is very unlike Bobby Rock whose style is more that of a classic or traditional metal front-man with very few hardcore genre influences. This is probably to do with the generation gap as Dada is much younger than Bobby and he grew up under the inspiration of the 1990s hardcore genre influenced styles and sounds of bands such as BIOHAZARD, MACHINE HEAD, and PANTERA. There was almost a hardcore genre style of death-scream and the music simply did not slow down or stop at all except for the few seconds of silence between songs. If you go to a TURBIDITY show expecting melodic power-metal or even 1 second of melody in the whole show then you will be disappointed! In complete contrast to Dada, Daniel really looked death-metal style, in black death-metal tee-shirt, baggy shorts, and with a scary and brutal expression! He stood by himself to Dada’s left or to the right of Dada if viewed from the moshpit [see picture in this book]. He indeed looked like a magnificent, solitary death-metal warrior with no-one else coming within two metres of him.

Dada and Bobby Bleeding Corpse (vocals duet)

The death-metal kids at the front were totally enjoying themselves in the presence of TURBIDITY and a group of four girls aged around 15 or 16-years-old were dancing around enthusiastically and just as crazy as anyone at the back of the moshpit. It was hard to be sure whether these four were death-metal chicks but probably they were not. No-one interfered with anyone else and the atmosphere was courteous, cordial, and non-threatening while not losing any of the tough-guy look that is expected from death-metal. For the four girls I think the afternoon was an exciting time of dancing and they were very safe in the crowd. Later I saw them walking away from the show, still together in a group of four, along the internal entrance road of the compound.

To my surprise, Bobby Rock joined Dada on stage, each one giving the other considerable space and respect, and they performed a death-metal duet. There were happy cries of “Bobby!” and many phone cameras were raised above heads as their owners tried to capture a shot of Bobby. On the next day at the band interview, Dada showed me in his shop “Deathstar Tattoo” a video-clip of TURBIDITY playing at Bandung Death Fest 4 (2009) and, on that occasion also, Bobby Rock joined TURBIDITY on stage. I was very surprised later to hear from Popo that Dada has left TURBIDITY. Bobby Rock joining Dada on stage is a warm and fraternal gesture which shows to fans the unity and brotherhood of the Ujung Berung death-metal scene. Just as when Ferly and Man of JASAD invited Popo onstage during JASAD shows in Bandung and Malang [East Java], Bobby’s actions can be seen as an endorsement of TURBIDITY to the crowd. On these occasions, Man, Ferly, and Bobby acted in their accepted roles as elder statesmen of the Ujung Berung death-metal community. The importance of UUs Death (Bleeding Corpse)’s presence at this show should also not be under-estimated.

Tonight was a night when the Ujung Berung death-metal community honoured its own local heroes and enjoyed camaraderie in a very easygoing, home-town atmosphere. It was like probably hundreds of local gigs that the senior metalheads have attended in Bandung over the past years. The atmosphere was not great because the venue was too large for the size of the crowd. However, TURBIDITY played with pride, passion, and professionalism and the 100 teenaged death-metal fans up the front enjoyed the TURBIDITY set tremendously. The enjoyment of the TURBIDITY set was clearly added to by Bobby’s surprise appearance on stage. He has many young male and female fans and the fans saw firsthand the unity, respect, and brotherhood that prevails in the Ujung Berung death-metal scene. This unity and respect has been one factor behind the rapid rise to prominence of TURBIDITY. The unity and camaraderie and mutual support of the Bandung scene has clearly given its members a charm and an easy self-confidence which has allowed Bandung death-metal to occupy a prominent place in the entire Indonesian scene. Bandung death-metal today is a combination of Man of JASAD’s charm and intelligence and Ferly’s analytical and humble nature and sense of fairness, compassion, and integrity.

JASAD’s professionalism has also been a major influence on BLEEDING CORPSE and TURBIDITY. For JASAD, death-metal is a serious business to be approached professionally reflecting Ferly, Man, and Yuli’s decade-plus experience as death-metal musicians. However, their genuine love for death-metal music and for the death-metal scene, still the same as when they were all in junior high-school, shines through on occasions and gives the Ujung Berung movement durability, inner strength, integrity, and simple joy. When Ferly talks about his favourite death-metal guitarist [James Murphy] and album [OBITUARY’s Cause of Death] you are left in no doubt that he genuinely loves this music and its rich global history. There are no Lars Ulrich-type temper tantrums or Gene Simmons-type lawsuits within Ujung Berung death-metal. Man still loves his mother (!) and his community, and Ujung Berung death-metal reaps the benefits of this warm, humble, and very Indonesian approach to life. Yuli’s closing advice to fans at our 10 October 2011 interview was “love your mum!” and while he was smiling and enjoying the humour involved in making such a “non-brutal” statement in a death-metal interview we don’t doubt that he meant it as well! Long live Ujung Berung Death Metal!

[This review is published in my book Struggle Anger Hate in the Indonesian Underground by Jack Frost which you can buy from Sofyan Hadi in Jogjakarta.]

Left to Right: Bobby Bleeding Corpse, Dada Turbidity, Daniel Turbidity, Kieran James, Mamay Turbidity, Casper Hell Turbidity (Manager) @ Bandung, 10 October 2011.

Daniel Turbidity discusses the food order with the waitress while Bobby Bleeding Corpse and Popo Demons Damn look on @ Bandung, 9 October 2011.

METAL HISTORY: BLEEDING CORPSE (Bandung DM) live @ Cibinong, West Java, 8 October 2011

BLEEDING CORPSE Resurrection of Murder line-up. Left to Right: Adrian Luk Luk (bass), Ari Bejo (drums), Uus Death (guitar), and Bob Rockiller (vocals) @ Cibinong, 8 October 2011.

BLEEDING CORPSE concert review – Live in Cibinong, 8 October 2011

By Kieran James, 13 March 2012

With it now dark outside and the time past 7.00pm we headed back to the BLEEDING CORPSE tour bus in order to return from the Event Organizer’s house to the concert venue. As expected the bus driver now seemed to realize the impossible task that now confronted him and darkness made it far worse. He realized he could not reverse uphill all the way up the narrow road (around 100 metres to the main road) so he painstakingly reversed out from under the tree and then headed along the road in forward direction, away from the way we had come in. However, eventually he would have to turn around to come back unless the roads ahead were linked up somehow with those behind. There are no street lights on minor roads such as this one and so the driver was going to be confronted with a difficult task. He decided to reverse within a small T-junction which had buildings close in around it on all sides as well as trees and passers-by. It took an eternity to turn the bus around, and small movements in each direction were all halted abruptly by people inside and outside the bus shouting “hoy!” At one point I had given up hope that we would ever get out but, in Indonesia, generally things work out fine in the end especially when a major metal band is due to headline a nearby show!

The tour bus leaves Bandung 5am

The main street was much more crowded than it had been earlier in the day and much of the traffic heading in our direction was clearly made up of metalheads on motorcycles heading for the show. We made slow progress in the traffic but we eventually reached the venue. At the interview members of BLEEDING CORPSE had said that they wanted me to see how crazy their fans were. I would soon find out. We parked at the back of the compound which was then full of expectant metalheads and hundreds of parked motorcycles. The band went upstairs and walked through the crowd to the backstage area. I was invited to go with them but I decided it was time for the band to be preparing alone.

Popo (vocalist of DEMONS DAMN) and I stood at the back of the crowd next to someone connected to the organization of the show or who was high up in the metal hierarchy in Cibinong. We watched the last three of the support acts. All bands on the bill were death-metal and only BLEEDING CORPSE were from outside the city. There was a blackened thrash band and a band with female vocals. The aggression, speed, and enthusiasm of the music were exactly what the crowd wanted. Popo later estimated the crowd at around 500 inside the building and another 500 outside. Given that this was a death-metal only event in a provincial city, the size of the crowd will give a clear indication of the rising popularity of the death-metal sub-genre in Indonesia. As expected from a death-metal show, as opposed to just a metal show or just a rock show, the entire crowd wore the black death-metal tee-shirts. The vast majority of the crowd were teenagers. Some looked very young, from the westerner’s perspective, but were probably of junior high-school age. As some of the Bandung metalheads pointed out in interviews, death-metal is a trend, in certain circles and up to a certain point, in Bandung to the extent that many high-schoolers are in bands while primary-school children know what death-metal is (see my interview with Glenn of BLOODGUSH, Bandung, 10 October 2011). Glenn of BLOODGUSH says:

“Bandung death-metal is the biggest death-metal scene in Indonesia ... and in the world [laughs]. Now in Bandung the kids in junior high play death-metal and in primary school the kids will know about death-metal. It is most people [who] like death-metal here in Bandung; it’s bigger than in the other cities. Bandung has a slogan ‘Flower City’; we can change it to ‘Bandung Death Metal City’”.

This night in Cibinong girls made up around 5% or 10% of the crowd which is more than might be expected at a western death-metal show. Some of them clearly attended in small groups of girls rather than following a boyfriend as is the standard practice in the west. The girls seem to go because they enjoy the moshpit slamming and dancing. At the BLEEDING CORPSE show I managed to edge my way to close to the stage and took pictures whilst around one point five to two metres from the stage. The moshpit area at front and centre of stage stops and breaks up at the end of songs, allowing people to retreat away to the cooler areas near the open windows and other people to go forward to take their place. As such it is possible to edge closer and closer to the stage. The moshpit is made up of a circle pit and people frantically headbanging at the edges of the pit. All of these, apart from me of course, were very young fans. A practice which the Yogyakarta metalheads say is unique to Bandung is groups of young people standing in a semi-circle and raising their bodies up and down in unison; at the top of the cycle they raise their arms and wiggle the fingers like a primary-school child doing the stereotypical impression of a ghost or like someone manipulating hand puppets.

The announcer verbally baited and cajoled the crowd. He was speaking in either Indonesian or Sundanese but I did hear the frequent mention of the band name “BLEEDING CORPSE” so clearly he was aiming to excite the crowd further before BLEEDING CORPSE started playing. The room was around 80-90% at capacity so that in the front half people were quite close together while, in the back half, there was room to stand feet apart with arms folded and even to sit down between bands. With such a large number of people outside I was hoping the organizers were monitoring how many people were inside the hall at any one time as we did not want a repeat of the BESIDE show in Bandung where seven people were crushed to death. The people at the front were clearly the fanatical BLEEDING CORPSE contingent.

BLEEDING CORPSE @ Cibinong, Bobby (v), Luk (b), Uus (g), Ari (d).

For those who do not know Bobby Rock personally, he is a tall, gentle, charming, and peaceable Javanese man (considered an ethnic minority in Bandung) who has recently married the local Sundanese beauty and metal queen Popo. Bobby is gentle off-stage but a ball of aggression and energy on-stage. The BLEEDING CORPSE guitarists attract little attention and Bobby dominates people’s focus with his long hair, bare chest, and forearm spikes. BLEEDING CORPSE plays brutal and fast death-metal of the traditional type which is guaranteed to please a death-metal crowd. However, in all honesty, the songs all begin to sound the same with minimal variation in the vocals. I personally prefer the two faster songs at the end of BLEEDING CORPSE’s debut album Resurrection of Murder where Amenk of DISINFECTED and Man of JASAD do guest vocals on one song each. Popo later told me that the set included a mix of songs from the debut album and from the as yet unreleased second album. The headbanging was frantic and Bobby did a carefully managed stage dive. There is clearly personal rapport and mutual appreciation between Bobby and his fans which clearly extends geographically to Cibinong, three hours out of Bandung. The BLEEDING CORPSE show was a relentless wave of fury and energy, finished with an encore where the band began by standing with their backs to the audience. Bobby’s height is important for BLEEDING CORPSE’s visual image and it allows him to project his energy and will over a greater distance. It appeared to be an easy show for the band to the extent that the fans upfront were all clearly BLEEDING CORPSE devotees and Bobby did not have to win them over to his side during the course of the set as, for example, DEATH VOMIT had to do during that band’s Australian shows. Bobby is a classic front man who reminds me of the best front men from traditional 1980s metal where the front man’s personality, charisma, and showmanship were vital to the band’s whole sound and stage-show. Obvious examples are Udo Dirkschneider from ACCEPT; the late Ronnie James Dio from BLACK SABBATH, DIO, and RAINBOW; Bruce Dickinson from IRON MAIDEN; Rob Halford from JUDAS PRIEST; Biff Byford from SAXON; Klaus Mein from SCORPIONS; and the incomparable and brilliant Dee Snider from TWISTED SISTER. In more recent years I think of Justin Fleming from the Melbourne, Australia power-metal band PEGAZUS. It is impossible to imagine BLEEDING CORPSE without Bobby Rock.

One interesting point to note is that both shows I witnessed this weekend had security teams of ten or twelve people who stood on the stage looking out towards the crowd. They unobtrusively policed the crowds and stopped the crowds from moving on to the stage. They looked serious all the time and did not headbang or join in at all with the music. This alone demonstrates to attendees their official status. However, they wore black metal tee-shirts (plain shirts, not band shirts) rather than security guard uniforms and this was obviously a factor which made them less offensive and irritating to the two crowds. They appeared as “one of us” or as self-policers of the metal scene from within it rather than as outside labourers hired by a faceless corporation.

At the end of the set, I rejoined Popo who had remained standing with friends in the middle section of the crowd. We headed down the stairs and out to a quieter area to the right of the stairs and away from the front gates of the compound. Soon after Bobby joined us and his transformation from Superman back to mild-mannered Clarke Kent was as complete as it was astonishing. He was now the same gentle, soft-spoken, and charming man as before he had gone on to the stage. Daniel of TURBIDITY was with us none of the young concertgoers even recognized who Bobby and Daniel were or even looked in our direction. We waited a long time until Bobby had completely calmed down from the adrenaline high of being onstage. As we waited, much of the crowd dispersed into the night, tee-shirted slim youngsters on motorcycles heading, satisfied and happy, back to the roads, homes, and cafes out of which they had come a few hours before. This night BLEEDING CORPSE ruled in Cibinong!

[This review is published in my book called Struggle Anger Hate in the Indonesian Underground by Jack Frost which you can buy from Sofyan Hadi in Jogjakarta.]

BLEEDING CORPSE tour bus leaves Bandung for Cibinong 5am              

Roadside stop on the way leaving Bandung as the sun rises, 6.30am

Roadside stop on the way leaving Bandung as the sun rises, 6.30am. (That is Daniel Turbidity on the right side.)

BLEEDING CORPSE vokalis Bob Rockiller stops for food @ 8am

Soundcheck @ Cibinong, 11am - 12 noon

At Event Organiser's house before going to the venue, 6pm

BLEEDING CORPSE tour bus stops for KFC on the way back to Bandung after the show, 3am.

CONCERT REVIEW / METAL HISTORY: Soreang, West Java, 1 April 2012 (show cancelled by police)

Adam (Humiliation vocalist) and John Yoedi during the festival which was cancelled by the police @ Soreang, 1 April 2012. Humiliation played their set and the police closed the show just as Outright was ready to start performing.

Only a few minutes later we all watched in amazement as young fans in OUTRIGHT tee-shirts swarmed out of the side entrance all with very sad looks on their faces. The word passed around at lightning speed that the local police had cancelled the rest of the festival. A few policemen could be seen here and there within the compound and a macho police voice sounded over a megaphone. We congregated under the side entrance porch for a long time as people did not want to disperse quickly.

As we climbed uphill and the rain grew harder and harder, Bobby Rock (Bleeding Corpse vocalist) had a difficult time controlling the van amidst the traffic. He used a dry cloth to wipe the inside of the windscreen on his side while I wiped the windscreen on the passenger’s side of the van with the same cloth. Bobby did very well to stay calm and to drive carefully and skillfully. We finally turned right into the venue’s car park at around 2.30pm or 3pm. The rain was still very heavy and Bobby parked the van close to the back entrance of the venue. Although many high-school aged metalheads ran past the front of the van towards the back entrance we were all older and wiser and we chose to stay in the van until the rain lessened. A POISON song was playing from Bobby’s homemade mp3 collection. I thought the song was “Every Rose has its Thorn” but I realized it was not this song because the familiar chorus never came! [Author’s note: The actual song was “Something to believe in”.]

After a fifteen minute wait, and with the rain still heavy, we [Bobby Rock, Popo Demons Damn, John Yoedi, and me, Kieran James] all made a quick dash to the back entrance of the venue. The porch was full of high-school age metalheads and punks queuing to enter the venue. We followed Bobby and Popo inside walking in single file. As they were able to call us “special guests” we did not need to pay an entry fee. We walked through the crowd to a back stairway which led to a dressing room on the second level about eight metres wide and three metres deep. This room had windows looking out on to the venue below. The room had doors on each side and on the far side just outside the room itself there were three chairs on the stairs’ landing looking out over the hall below. When we arrived a band was playing, then there was a break, and then another band played. There was a stage at the opposite end. The hall itself was around 25 to 30 metres long and around eight to ten metres wide. It was hot inside with no fans or air-conditioning. The crowd was around 200 to 400 people, mostly of high-school age. Punks made up nearly 20% of the crowd with metalheads making up the other 80%. The punks were there to see Bandung hardcore band OUTRIGHT and Bandung skate-punk band TCUKIMAY at this mixed-genre festival.

Adam's mother, Adam, Kieran James

John and I took seats on the stairs’ landing overlooking the hall while Popo, Bobby, and Dimas disappeared in order to prepare for the DEMONS DAMN performance. Adam [the HUMILIATION vocalist], a cheerful, young, handsome guy in white tee-shirt, came to greet us. He has thick, wavy but short hair and I mistook him for Deank [the bassist for DESPAIR]. Adam was very happy that Busuk Webzine had sponsored his band for its festival appearance. I felt much rewarded to see Adam and his mother’s happiness and their warmth towards John and me. I thought that sponsoring a young band’s show was an excellent way to build up and encourage death-metal musicians in Indonesia and contribute to the building of the scene there. As it turned out, the local police cancelled the festival before HUMILIATION got to play its set. For a time Adam was very angry and disappointed that HUMILIATION could not play its set especially because John and I had travelled a long way for the festival. However, we do not at all regret sponsoring HUMILIATION. As I posted on Busuk Webzine, Adam is a young guy and he will be able to perform with his band in many shows in the future.

John and I decided to go downstairs and mix and interact with the young metalheads in the crowd. There was a break in the performances and the high-school age death-metal fans at the back were busy taking group pictures of each other. They were really enjoying the social and community aspects of the festival and clearly they had waited a long time in eager expectation for this festival to take place. We had advertised the festival as a News posting on Busuk Webzine several weeks before it took place and the News posting at one point entered the Top-10 most viewed pages’ list. We should point out that HUMILIATION is a popular young group with our interview with the band for a long time remaining in the bottom half of the Top-10 most viewed pages’ list on Busuk Webzine. [Author’s note: Although it comes from Soreang, the band is associated with the Bandung Death Metal Syndicate (BDMS) community group and it released its debut album Savor of Human Destruction in January 2013 with Iwan’s Extreme Souls Production (ESP) record label.] One of the reasons we chose to sponsor HUMILIATION for the festival was the number of page-views gained by the band’s interview on Busuk Webzine.

Downstairs John asked a high-school metal-chick to take a picture with some of the high-school fans. One of these pictures appears on Busuk Webzine. The crowd is aged 12 to 16 and most fans wear tee-shirts of respected Bandung death-metal bands UNDERGOD and JASAD. The choice of tee-shirts shows the desire to support and respect the death-metal scene from the nearest major city Bandung. Slowly the barrier between us and the high-school crowd broke down and more and more people wanted pictures taken with me and John. We gave the metal-chick our Busuk Webzine URL address and we hope that the website can also become known among the high-school death-metal crowd of Bandung and West Java. It is unusual to see a Westerner at an underground death-metal festival out in the countryside areas. I think the crowd was pleased with my presence because my presence reminded them that as metalheads they are part of a dynamic global underground-music scene which has touched every corner and country of the world.   

We were very hot and sweaty by this time so we went outside. The rain had nearly stopped and outside the countryside air was very crisp and refreshing. The venue compound was around 40 metres by 40 metres and it sloped gently downwards to the roadside and we could look across to the mist-covered mountains in the distance. People grouped together in their twos, fours, and sixes and many young metalheads sat down along a curb alongside the far side wall of the compound. Apart from the senior Bandung contingent of travelling metalheads and friends, most of the locals were of high-school age.  The punk-rockers tended to congregate together but there was an overall atmosphere of goodwill and friendship at this mixed-genres festival. John and Glenn of BLOODGUSH began talking; Bobby, Popo, and Dimas were there, and I chatted about punk rock with band-members of TCUKIMAY. Glenn was wearing his new long-sleeved BLOODGUSH tee-shirt with the red logo font and magnificent power-metal style artwork. Glenn is an interesting character – like Bobby he is a brutal vocalist but a gentle character offstage. He has a shy smile and a soft yet deep speaking voice which is a little difficult to hear at times. I also had a picture taken with another legendary Bandung death-metal vocalist, Amenk of DISINFECTED, famous for his duck-walk and jug-of-beer-sharing onstage. Through Popo’s interpretation, I told Amenk that I enjoyed his guest vocals on the track on BLEEDING CORPSE’s debut album The Resurrection of Murder. Amenk’s death-metal denim vest doubles up as an actual motorcycle jacket and he is one of those old-school hard-nuts of the Ujung Berung [East Bandung] death-metal scene who has devoted himself to death-metal with complete integrity for as long as anyone can remember. I talked with Man of JASAD’s brother Iwan of the famous ESP record label. He told us of his plans for a split DISINFECTED / MOTORDEATH album for 2012. [Author’s note: His plan was for the HUMILIATION full-length debut album to be released around April to June 2012 but its eventual release was delayed for six to eight months.] He also announced that a full-length debut album from BLOODGUSH was also to be released by ESP in 2012.

John Yoedi and Glenn Bloodgush

During this time I also had my picture taken with a group of young punk-rockers. My friend Lord Butche, vocalist of punk-rock band THE CRUEL, was not at the festival and the JASAD guys were yet to arrive at this point. The headlining bands were scheduled to be JASAD and DISINFECTED. I enjoyed the fantastic atmosphere of camaraderie and mutual support as everyone exchanged the latest death-metal news and gossip from Bandung and beyond. Of course Daniel [guitarist of TURBIDITY and BLEEDING CORPSE] was among the senior Bandung travelling contingent and he was as usual enjoying this kind of atmosphere.

The festival was due to start again and people had mostly disappeared indoors again to see the popular Bandung hardcore band OUTRIGHT [the “HATEBREED of Bandung”]. Some metalheads, including most of the senior Bandung contingent, had remained outside gossiping and networking in the cool mountain air. As expected, some traditional Indonesian “arak” wine was passed around and I became immediately drunk. Only a few minutes later we all watched in amazement as young fans in OUTRIGHT tee-shirts swarmed out of the side entrance all with very sad looks on their faces. The word passed around at lightning speed that the local police had cancelled the rest of the festival. A few policemen could be seen here and there within the compound and a macho police voice sounded over a megaphone. We congregated under the side entrance porch for a long time as people did not want to disperse quickly. Bobby and Popo joined John and me and some of the young crowd recognized Bobby as the vocalist of BLEEDING CORPSE and many more pictures were taken.

Bobby Rock and Kieran James

I think Bobby wanted to at least give the young fans some pictures from the festival given that it was going to be a disappointing day overall for them. Bobby is a humble giant [183 cm. tall] and he never tries to attract attention to himself at a death-metal show. He happily merges into and mingles with the crowd in his capacity as a fan. He may have the rock-star look and swagger when walking down a Bandung street but at a show he merges into the crowd and does not want or clamor for any attention from the teenage fans. He is a wonderful ambassador for Ujung Berung and Bandung death-metal with his calm nature, humble manner, cheerful attitude, and generosity of spirit. John and I have benefitted from the kindness and helpfulness of Bobby and Popo and this couple is certainly wonderful company. They have a great sense of humor and they exude natural warmth which is always a surprise to outsiders. John has told me that he expected Bobby to be arrogant because of his status in the death-metal world and his brutal onstage persona but he found this not to be the case at all.

I went back inside the hall where everyone was busy packing up gear and exiting now the show had been cancelled. I met Adam and he expressed his disappointment that HUMILIATION would not be able to play. He apologized to me although there was no need to do so because the police’s cancellation of the festival was obviously not an event within his control. I tried to comfort and encourage Adam by telling him that we will see him perform again at another show later. John had told me that Adam’s mother was there to watch her son play. I asked Adam that we could meet his mother. She was seated in a parked van at the rear of the compound near the back entrance of the hall. Although it was now raining she came out of the van for a picture with Adam and me. She is a policewoman and wearing the uniform but she did not have the power to stop the police from cancelling the show. She was very proud of Adam playing for HUMILIATION and receiving the sponsorship from Busuk Webzine. She was distressed by the cancellation of the show and earlier she had been crying. I think our sponsorship of HUMILIATION’s gig was a highlight in the short life to date of Busuk Webzine.

Kieran James and Amenk Disinfected

Most of the metalheads had quietly dispersed by this time. Even the punks left quietly without a fight and without any harsh words. In the climate of modern Indonesia (which is really still a police-state but just with outward democratic form) the police will always have the last word and it makes as much sense opposing the police as it does hitting your head against a brick wall. The police all entered the back entrance and came out a few minutes later. There must have been around 20 or 30 of them. The senior Bandung metalhead contingent was dishing out and eating noodles on the back porch as this was happening. They adopted a look of nonchalance as if the festival was already naturally winding down and they were making preparations to go. The 20 or 30 policemen stood as a group in front of their van which was parked in one of the back corners of the compound where they could watch both the side entrance and the back entrance. All the police were male and most were in their 20s, 30s, and 40s. They stood in stiff fashion, almost like death-metal fans posing for a picture, with significant empty personal space between them. All the policemen had very serious facial expressions which to me suggested guilty consciences since they had no valid reason to cancel the festival. Usually police walking around and guiding traffic in Indonesia look cheerful, chat with the civilians, and try to build rapport. Here we saw the opposite situation with very stern faces. The police had a somewhat arrogant and idiotic appearance as if the younger and junior ones among them did not really agree with what they were being asked to do.

Kieran James with the punk rockers

The metalheads behaved very well, departed very slowly and casually, and avoided eye contact with the police. They left slowly so as to “save face” and self-respect by keeping up the appearance that they were leaving voluntarily rather than being forced out (much like Western CEOs who “pretend” to resign out of their own choice when actually they do not have a choice). The police allowed them this dignity and no-one was manhandled by the police. I was disappointed because I had travelled 5,000 kilometres from Australia to watch an underground West Javanese death-metal festival and now the police were seizing this opportunity from right underneath my nose. There was no logical or valid reason to cancel the festival. The high-school crowd was well-behaved and just enjoying harmless fun. Later Man [the vocalist for JASAD] told me that the police were nervous because of the recent chaotic demonstrations about petrol prices in Jakarta. He also said that if he had been present at the venue he could possibly have negotiated with the police and then the final outcome might have been different. It is important to mention that this was not the city-police from Bandung but countryside police from this region three hours out from Bandung and countryside police can be expected to be more socially conservative and risk-averse.

The bands whose gigs were cancelled included: OUTRIGHT (hardcore), HUMILIATION (death-metal), DEMONS DAMN (death-metal), TCUKIMAY (street-punk), JASAD (death-metal), and DISINFECTED (death-metal). It was a very strong line-up of bands for a countryside festival and the local crowd missed the chance to see some excellent bands from a mix of genres. Bobby’s van, containing Popo, John, Dimas, me, and one or two others, was appropriately the last car to leave the compound, the police vans obviously being excluded from this calculation. People were angry in their hearts but they adopted the philosophical attitude that this was just part of life in modern Indonesia. People’s spirits slowly improved as we drove along the beautiful, hilly countryside roads. Mist hung over nearby mountains and light rain fell on the rice-fields and the orange-roofed houses of the kampongs [villages].

Man Jasad, John Yoedi, Kieran James @ hot-springs

We drove on further up into the mountains and then parked in the parking lot of the hot-spring swimming pools which are a popular tourist attraction in the Bandung region. This is a usual location for metalheads after shows in this region but this night we all ventured there a little earlier than planned. There are two huge swimming pools which combined are around 50 metres long and 20 metres wide. Around the pools there is paving and beyond that places to sit and talk under cover and many tents. Most of the senior Bandung death-metal contingent from the festival was there. Everyone wanted to relax and unwind after the distressing experience with the police. Although I had given the police some harsh stares they had all avoided my gaze. In my view, the police had been “grandstanding” – they wanted to be the stars of the afternoon rather than the headlining bands. Therefore, I ironically labeled the Busuk Webzine News Item about the festival as “West Javan Police” so this label appeared [at one time] alongside all the band names down the right-hand side of the website home-page.

Man of JASAD was there at the hot-springs, along with his brother Iwan [ESP], and he came over to chat with us. The big, broad-shouldered guy from the TCUKIMAY punk band pointed to the forest and the mist-shrouded mountains, around 200 metres higher than us and also around 200 metres distant, and said it looked like a classic black-metal scene (Norway van Java). Before the twilight disappeared totally I took a picture of the forest and the mountain and we have used it alongside black-metal band interviews on Busuk Webzine. During this time, Dimas and others took scary posed death-metal pictures of each other and John and I enjoyed relaxing chats with many of the metalheads. However, when originally writing this one week later on 8 April 2012, I could not remember who had been talking with whom. I do remember talking to people I did not usually get to talk to and people who knew me even though I might not know them. I do remember Daniel being there and the band members from TCUKIMAY. As is his style, Man walked around chatting to the various groups but he did not stay very long with each group. Man confirmed with me that the police had been nervous after the chaotic Jakarta demonstrations but, as usual, the cancellation ultimately happened because of money issues with the police pressing for more money. Most things in Indonesia, no matter who is involved, can be solved when more money changes hands. Western liberal-democrats might label this as police corruption and they would be correct. However, Indonesian history progresses according to its own dynamics and consistent with its own internal logic. Although I think the police were wrong to cancel the festival, I respect the fact that they used no physical force against anyone. However, they took harmless entertainment away from the high-school crowd and perhaps that crowd returned to their neighborhoods and graffitied on some walls, kicked some chickens, and bullied some younger kids! In a sense the police must accept some responsibility for any violent or anti-social actions conducted by the metalheads after the festival back in the kampongs because the festival should never have been cancelled.

Popo Demons Damn, Bobby Rock, John Yoedi

We said farewell to the other Bandung metalheads in the hot-springs car-park. I had been slightly worried that John or I would become detached from the group and Bobby would leave without us. It had been very cold at the hot-springs, perhaps 12 degrees Celsius, and John had been lent a hoodie. Being from the hot climate of Balikpapan in East Borneo he was now learning how cold the nights could be in the West Javanese Mountains and even, to a lesser extent, in the city of Bandung itself.

We drove down the mountains on the roads back to Bandung. The roads were filled with pedestrians and motorcycles enjoying the nighttime markets and Bobby consistently had to be very careful in his driving. While still outside Bandung a motorcycle clipped the left side of our van causing a minor accident. Everyone got out of the van and Bobby and Popo talked to the two motorcyclists, coming to certain agreements. John and I stood together under the front porch of a nearby house which looked abandoned apart from some faint light shining through the makeshift curtains. In Australia you would not want to stand on the front porch of a private house uninvited but the concepts of private and public space are less fixed and more fluid in Indonesia. We were still in the mountains and it was still cold although now perhaps it was closer to 16 degrees Celsius than to 12 degrees. John took the opportunity, as usual, to enjoy a cigarette. It appeared that the two young motorcycle guys had a good attitude and were apologetic. The “good attitude” test is always vital in Indonesia. The conversation between the motorcyclists and Bobby and Popo switched from animated to casual and friendly. Soon we were on our way again and we reached Bandung around two hours later.

This day, Sunday 1 April 2012, was Popo’s birthday. We celebrated her birthday at a roadside food stall in Bandung. At this stall, like in Singapore, all the food available is displayed and then you can all help yourself. We were tired and after the meal Bobby dropped John and me off at the hotel. The time then was around 11pm. Just before this we had driven through the historic red-light district in Bandung and we had invented new brutal band names such as PROSTITUTE CORPSE! I can’t recall whether it was this night or another night but Bobby has a homemade collection of 1980s songs which includes many hair-metal ballads and even pop hits. On one occasion we all joined together in singing the beautiful chorus of the 1980s pop hit “Ordinary World” by DURAN DURAN! It is true that there is an “ordinary world” out there we all have to find. The vocalist Bobby Rock from the brutal death-metal band BLEEDING CORPSE has his softer side and I’m sure that this softer side is very appealing to Popo. The death-metal life holds in balance the forces of violence and self-control, gentleness and strength. However, I don’t expect we will get a cover of “Ordinary World” by BLEEDING CORPSE or HYDRO any time soon (“obituary world” perhaps)! [by Kieran James aka Jack Frost. This review is also published in the book Struggle, Anger Hate in the Indonesian Underground by Jack Frost which you can buy from Sofyan Hadi of Death Vomit band.]

Popo's birthday party @ Common Room Network Foundation, April 2012. Left to Right: Bobby Rock, Popo Demons Damn, Butche (The Cruel), Man Jasad.