Old men in unironed Santana t-shirts, cliques of brooding, bespectacled hipsters and that forgotten fashion relic – the fedora – were in full effect at the Jakarta Blues Festival on Oct. 16 at Istora Senayan.
Single, very happy: Oppie Andaresta, an Indonesian artist, performs at Djarum Super Jakarta Blues Festival 2010, at Istora, Senayan, Jakarta last Saturday. The festival has certainly come a long way since its establishment in 2008, when the festival took place over one day and one stage. Organized by the Indonesian Blues Association (InaBlues) for the third year running, the Jakarta Blues Festival has expanded significantly to include more than 40 international and local acts over two days and four stages. Its success has spawned a spinoff festival in Bali, with most of the acts from the Jakarta festival making an appearance at the Bali Blues Festival on Tuesday.
Despite a few last-minute changes to the music schedule, the festival was largely a hiccup-free affair. In stark contrast to Java Rockin’ Land, the Jakarta Blues Festival had an excellent stage layout, ensuring no incidence of sound bleed. Even though the tagline of the festival — “Nothing but the Blues” — proved somewhat of a misnomer, the festival was nevertheless a laidback and entertaining musical experience.
Patnam Band kicked proceedings off at the red stage, peddling soothing if occasionally brass-heavy tunes to a sedate crowd. A lively stage presence compelled many stray punters to meander from the food stalls and mill about at a safe distance from the stage — approximately 20 meters — where they could respectfully nod their heads in sync with the music. A soulful rendition of People Get Ready induced a bout of gentle swaying amongst a group of teenaged, tattooed fans, although the serenity was abruptly interrupted when I was cornered by a couple of corporate, who began proselytising the virtues of a certain sponsor’s credit-card rewards scheme.
Naturally, I beat a hasty retreat to the green stage, where I saw the talented Kartika Wede wow an exuberant crowd that was crammed into a tiny stage area inside the stadium building. The size of the green stage lent an intimacy to the performance that was unrivalled by acts on the larger stages. Hordes of people sat on the floor whilst latecomers were huddled by the walls. What made watching acts at the green stage particularly pleasurable was the fact that it was the one place where the audience’s traditional civility and reverence gave way to unbridled, devil-may-care whooping.
Cello rockers: Fonticello, a cello band from Yogyakarta, plays rock and blues for the crowd. After what seemed like an eternal sound-check, Tjahjo Wisanggeni finally took to the stage with their merciless thrash stylings. A clear crowd favorite, they were swarmed by a throng of young festivalgoers eager for their unrelenting brand of metal. In their rare, gentler moments, they were reminiscent of early 90s Pearl Jam with their combination of sullen but anthemic melodies and wailing riffs. The crowd, however, seemed most enthused by the band’s ersatz channelling of Metallica, complete with masturbatory guitar solos and frenzied drumming. They proved a bewildering but ultimately divisive choice for a blues festival, as evidenced by the significant number of disgruntled punters voting with their feet. But the crowds returned for Bandung four-piece The S.I.G.I.T (The Super Insurgent Group of Intemperance Talent), whose garage-rock anthems seemed a fine accompaniment for budding bedroom air guitarists. Much like their contemporaries (Wolfmother, Little Red), their re-hashing of 1970s hard-rock clichés is hardly groundbreaking, but it was pleasing to see them embrace the genre with unabashed gusto.
Over at the blue stage, the Jakarta Broadway Team shimmied their way through a toe-tapping array of pop and musical covers. Fronted by a charismatic lead singer with the brash charm and sexual precociousness of a young Justin Timberlake circa FutureSex/LoveSounds, the Jakarta Broadway Team elicited solid cheers from an audience seemingly more inclined towards civility. Their theatricality and big-band sensibility was far removed from blues, but they were so entertaining it hardly mattered. The harmonies were mostly spot-on, the outfits sparkled and the choreography was polished and confident.
A man of many talents: Abdee “Slank” (center) and Friends from Indonesia, Candil (right), make an appearance at the festival. When the band re-grouped to perform their final song — Parliament’s We Want the Funk — most of the crowd was on their feet, some even giving into the illicit temptation of a subtle jive.
Those keen for Chicago-style blues may have found the festival a little lacking, but there were a few notable acts performing on the black stage. Standouts included Jakarta River Blues, a 13-piece band with a stellar brass section. The lead singer — whose voice was a dead ringer for Mr. Louis Armstrong — habitually addressed the crowd with a throat chock-full of gravel, which was of much delight to the older audience. They were followed by the InaBlues Bandung Band, who performed a polished and confident set with a sonorous brass section.
The headlining acts were a huge coup for the festival, and they certainly attracted the crowds in droves. These acts tended to marry traditional blues with elements of jazz and funk. English blues guitarist Matt Schofield, flanked by an organ trio, enthralled fans with his subdued showmanship and fluid melodies.
Boasting a range of influences such as B.B. King, The Meters and Eric Clapton, Schofield seamlessly transitioned from Chicago-style blues to jazz fusion. The apocryphal Howard Moon of The Mighty Boosh describes the genre best as “the cerebral musicality of jazz mixed with the visceral groove of funk”.
While purists may be disconcerted by the seemingly unholy alliance of these two genres, Schofield carried it off with spirited aplomb. Serbian songstress Ana Popovic also proved her chops with her indelible singing voice and her peerless command of the acoustic guitar.
The festival organizers should be proud of what the Jakarta Blues Festival has achieved in such a short time. Despite an unwieldy commitment to traditional blues, the festival has managed to forge a formidable reputation as an event that caters for a diverse palette of tastes.
Hopefully, this year’s event is a sign of bigger and better things to come.
— Photos by JP/P.J. Leo
