"Lagu kahiji [this is the first song]," Mario Prasetya, Bandung, West Java, post-punk band Leipzig's vocalist, squeals over the sound of a thumping floor tom and snare drum at the beginning of the last track on their debut studio album, Garbage Disposal Communique.

Whether inserted deliberately as a senseless blurb or mistakenly left in the mix after a change of track-listing decision, the squeal, spoken in Sundanese, represents the band's consistently incongruous collective state-of-mind.

Clocking at just a little over 13 minutes, the 10-track album delivers a set of fairly straightforward, no-nonsense musicality. 

The band's aesthetics, however, goes beyond its well-thought-out (sometimes deliberately goofy) visuals, inextricably linked to their vaudevillian live performance.

Sign of four

"We did everything in a month or so," claimed Iman Firman Amarullah, the band's drummer, speaking to The Jakarta Post, on Nov. 10, on the second floor of a shared office-store complex at Jl. Bengawan in Bandung.

Although seemingly rushed, the process happened organically. The band achieved it by eliminating unneeded rehearsals and hang-out sessions -- four of the album's 10 tracks were recorded without rehearsals. "It was full throttle," Iman reminisced.

The four members have been around in pretty much the same circle of creative workers in Bandung, but they only started to get to know each other after their first rehearsal session that was put together by Mario, who personally knew the members separately.

One sandwich short: Leipzig, consisting of Mario Prasetya (left), Mirza Pahlevi Wardhana (second left), Ryan Arman (second right) and Iman Firman Amarullah (right), has to make some compromises in their live format as Mario, who was initially slated to double as a guitarist (the recordings feature 2-guitar format), decided that he wouldn't be able to sing the hard-to-remember lyrics while playing a guitar. (Courtesy of Muhammad Fauzan Santana) (Courtesy of Muhammad Fauzan Santana/.)

"I only got to know Iman from our first rehearsal," said Mirza Pahlevi Wardhana, the band's bassist, as he pointed at Iman from across the table.

"We weren't acquainted back then," Iman added.

"Yeah, we only knew about each other before. This guy showed up in a pair of Crocs," Mirza jeered.

The first rehearsal, however, turned out quite well for the band. "We instantly connected, although we had just met. That was the first time we met and the first time the songs were played in person; but it felt right, and we were comfortable playing the songs," Mirza reminisced.

Although the band's current creative structure is relatively flat, with each of the members holding a fairly equal control over the output, Mirza was the one who churned out the demo songs that were then built upon by the band. "It was initially for a personal project of mine. I gave Mario a listen -- there were six tracks -- and he immediately said, 'Let's use these songs for our band project'," said Mirza, imitating Mario.

Before Leipzig, Mirza was working on a project with Mario and Ryan. According to Mirza, they gathered five songs that sounded much like the psychedelic-rock band King Gizzard and The Lizard Wizard. "Space rock and such," said Mirza. "I was working the synth, Ryan took the bass, Mario was on guitar and vocals." The project was scrapped.

"Fortunately, they proceed with the current songs because if it sounded like King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard songs, I wouldn't be joining the band," said Iman with a cackle. Iman was once the drummer for Bandung progressive/psychedelic bands such as GAUNG and KAITZR in the past.

Breaking the mold

Their initial rationale behind the name was simply because it sounded cool and had a punk-rock feel to it, according to Mirza. His fascination with Eastern European aesthetics was also the reason he gravitated toward the name. "You know when Germany was split in half. But it had essentially no meaning aside from sounding cool."

These days, however, the band would often answer differently as one of the audience members from their first show gave them a historical crash course on the German city.

Mirza, as the band's sole lyricist, gave the band a general feeling that it could never tell the truth. That his writings could mean everything and nothing at the same time, in which he swings effortlessly between his sometimes-archaic choice of words and intentionally kitschy combinations -- all in three languages: English, Indonesian and Sundanese.

Seemingly chaotic, in the way that the words were somehow kneaded toward the nonsensical, Mirza's approach is almost dada-ist.

He admitted that the inspirations behind his writing came from Bandung hardcore-collective Hark! It's a Crawling Tar-Tar's studio album Dorr Darr Gelap Communique. 

"The formula is mixing up Indonesian with English. Then, thematically, we talk about menial things everyone can relate to. For instance, getting hungry in the middle of the night, not having money to pay for food or being in love. How to write about these things without sounding, you know, cringe," said Mirza. "That's why I made a metaphor using Frida Kahlo."

Mirza noted that as a child, he had a lot of literature within arm's reach as his father was a journalist. "I was force-fed [with literature]," he said. One particular author Mirza referenced was writer Yapi Panda Abdiel Tambayong, better known as Remy Sylado. "He created Puisi Mbeling," added Mirza, referring to a column created by the author in Aktuil, a music magazine from the 1970s, that houses poems that lean more toward the chaotic side.

"It can be said that it follows a dada-ist formula, maybe, but I don't want to be held accountable for it," Mirza said, referring to the lyrics that he wrote for Leipzig.

His writing, however, fits Mario's vocal style and stage presence like a charm. In "Ponzi Scheme”, Mario sings with a moody, sinister vocal that oozes crotch-thrusting, bugger-all demeanor, talking about the emptiness of life and practicing onanism. A theater of the absurd.

Alluring chaos: Cover artwork for Leipzig's debut studio album 'Garbage Disposal Communique' by MIrza Pahlevi Wardhana. (Mirza P. Wardhana/Leipzig) (Mirza P. Wardhana/Leipzig)

Vaudevillian excess

Leipzig's coherence in its absurdity extends to its live performances, where bizarre and sometimes-unplanned stage acts pop out somewhat intermittently, enabling the band to deliver the gig as a whole.

Mario was ambushed, pinned down and barraged with punches by a random boxer -- which turned out to be Bandung alternative-act Sunbath's guitarist, Zulfi -- during a performance at Buqiet SkatePark, Bandung. "There was no brief whatsoever," Mirza said, laughing. Some of the audience took it seriously and even begged the assailant, Zulfi, to stop. "That's enough A [short for A'a, a Sundanese title for big brother], that's enough A, please." 

"Both of them -- Zulfi and Mario -- trained in the same boxing gym, so the punches looked real, but he's quite used to it," Mirza noted.

Aside from getting barraged with punches on stage, Iman noted that Mario often popped in on the band's WhatsApp group with random ideas. "I might try to breathe fire on stage," Iman imitated Mario's text on WhatsApp.

Some promoters and organizers started asking the band whether they would do something absurd on stage. 

This stage acts, Iman pointed out, in a way, are something that they hope could even out their "minuses". 

Mario, as the vocalist, would often tune into chaos naturally. During one of their past performances, he started yelling out a verse from Indonesian pop-artist Gombloh's "Kugadaikan Cintaku” (Pawning My Love) without any visible cues for the others. 

"Di radio [on the radio]," Mirza imitated Mario. "Or at Pesta Pora [a music festival held in Jakarta], he suddenly started a serious discussion about how to get rid of pimples. An audience reacted with concern and asked back whether he liked to eat peanuts," Mirza laughed.

Leipzig is aiming to release another studio album at the beginning of 2023.