The Trees and the Wild, (from left) Andra Kurniawan, Remedy Waloni and Iga Massardi: Courtesy of Dimas Wisnu Wardono

Their music does sound nice and quiet. But isn’t it a sign of originality in the indie scene, where trash-talking and political incorrectness rules?  

Once I sat on my pillow, I realized that I was the one who was intimidated. I could tell that I bothered them with my questions. As if I was asking things they never thought of because they didn’t need to.

Music is obvious to them, something they should not even want to talk about. They will talk, but you can feel it is not something urgent for them. They have no need to dissect the ins and outs of what they are doing. Their music is there, inside of them.  

The boys met in elementary school and have been friends since. One day when words came to an end and when everything had been said, music took over. They started another band in their teenage years but it didn’t last long. They reunited in 2006 to form The Trees and The Wild. Together again like good old days.

You can hear the harmony and camaraderie when listening to their music. It is soothing and honest. A little bit of serenity doesn’t hurt these days.  

Just like Radiohead, Davendra Banhart or the Kings of Convenience — all inspiration for the band, even if they don’t admit it — The Trees and The Wild is the kind of band you won’t get tired of, even if you know the lyrics by heart. It is calming.

Too calming? This is a question worth asking when you see them performing live. Without arrangement, drum and violins (The Trees and The Wild resort to friends when doing studio recordings), the two guitars, bass and drums and the tad too melodious voice of lead singer Remedy Waloni hardly create euphoria.  

All the more since the band’s bass and guitar often play the same exact chords. Without arrangement, it is also difficult to distinguish between songs that are similar. Only Irish Girl stands out.  

We should probably blame the fact that The Trees and The Wild have been playing the same songs for a year and a half. Their last album was released in January 2009, after a year of studio recordings that had been delayed by the contingencies of independent production. That was the price they had to pay, given their commitment to remaining an indie act.  

It was out of the question for them to record with a big label, even if they had an offer. The boys don’t try to earn more money or more glory. They just want to play live, wherever and however they feel like it.

Only an independent label could give them that freedom. Playing big venues? Endless photo shoots?

Spending more time in cars or on television rather than on stage? Nothing could be further from the band’s philosophy. They are not ready to make those sacrifices for fame.

They may be famous today, but they keep on performing live whenever and wherever they want. They don’t reject anything. Last week, I went to see their performance on a small stage at a high school in front of 30 uniformed students. Like most of their gigs, the concert was free.

The contrast is quite striking when you think that a week before The Trees and The Wild had played two nights in a row at one of the biggest concert venues in Singapore, the Esplanade Outdoor Theatre.

It was the first time Andra, the guitarist, had left the country.

The three boys come from diverse backgrounds, but they all have a refined, intellectual upbringing and live in the suburbs of Jakarta, in Bekasi. Iga, the bassist, whose father is a novelist and journalist and whose mother is a social worker who gives free education for poor children, is studying electrical engineering.  

Andra, the guitarist, is the shy one. His father is an English teacher and his mother works in a hospital. He has been playing in the traditional Javanese ensemble Karawitan for some time now, something he got from his grandfather. Andra is training to be an accountant. Did he surrender to social norms of having to have a “real” job? Or is he just worried about the future? Maybe both.

Remedy, the band’s singer and composer, is cosmopolitan.  In his early childhood he lived in Madrid, London and Tokyo. Music has been his main interest but he has been drawn into other form of art, notably video. “I edit archives of images from the 1960s: bleached colors on a silent movie tape.  “For now it’s just a hobby,” he said.

He studied design in New York before returning to Indonesia, where he wants to stay. Remedy bitterly deplores the brain drain of Indonesians leaving the country to work in the West and is adamant about his intention to stay here. Even if that means he has to hide his love of Europe.  

And nothing excited them more than talking about the Indonesian indie scene. They believe that Soeharto’s downfall released a wave of creativity in which artists could finally express themselves freely. The indie scene really burst at that time.

Remedy explains that a bunch of independent labels formed in 2006 but collapsed two years later because of the economic crisis. According to him, today the scene is in transition with new indie labels coming out of obscurity and giving a new lease to local musicians.  

This is another thing about the The Trees and the Wild: They are genuinely attuned to political and social issues. They have done so without prejudice, not for some fancy idea about being committed but simply because they care.  

Indie bands often have a tendency to act “underground” (long hair, tattoos, taking drugs, being photographed or filmed totally drunk). Doing so, they actually lose the very essence of the underground culture, which is to be original and critical of society and part of a counter-culture. It is easy for an indie rock band to fall prey to the temptation of acting cool, like a self-fulfilling prophecy where just
by acting underground you become underground.

It is not the case with The Trees and The Wild. They don’t seem to care about what people think about them. The band won’t let people dictate what they should do or sing, even for the sake of selling more albums  They’d rather be hated by being true than loved by being fake.

And this is what really counts today. It is what stands between true artist and poseurs who are oblivious to why they are actually playing.  

So are The Trees and The Wild real artists? Without a doubt, they are.  

The only thing that should concern us more is that the band is not going to record a second album soon. “We’ll see. We haven’t been thinking about it,” Remedy said. For now they just want to play again and again. Too bad it is the same 11 songs.

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