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No smoke: Event head explains Deep Purple, Rhoma Irama onstage miscommunication
After a clip of dangdut rocker Rhoma Irama being stopped short from playing “Smoke on the Water” went viral, Rajawali Indonesia music promoter cleared up some misunderstandings.
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No go: A screenshot of a video shows a roadie coming onstage to stop Indonesian 'dangdut' rocker Rhoma Irama from performing Deep Purple's hit song "Smoke on the Water" on Mar. 10. (Twitter/Courtesy of @swetermerah) (Twitter/Courtesy of @swetermerah)
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ndonesia’s “king of dangdut” Rhoma Irama performed as a surprise guest to open for rock legend Deep Purple during its concert in Edutorium UMS in Surakarta, Central Java, on Mar. 10.
Rhoma and his dangdut crew Soneta treated the audience to a series of his guitar-licking hits, but he opened the set playing the signature power chord from Deep Purple’s hit song “Smoke on the Water”, or at least 10 seconds of it before a road crew member came onstage to signal him to stop. Rhoma then quickly swerved into playing his own song “Nafsu Serakah”.
The clip of the incident went viral on social media, raking in over 5.9 million views and leading to conversations about intellectual property rights.
“"Indonesia was taught how to respect intellectual property rights by Deep Purple,” Twitter user @swetermerah, who posted the video, wrote on Mar. 12.
The Jakarta Post reached out to Anas Syahrul Alimi, founder and head of music promoter Rajawali Indonesia who brought Deep Purple to the country last week, to confirm the matter.
“What happened was, [the Deep Purple team] thought Bang Rhoma would play the whole ‘Smoke on the Water’ song in full, which was not allowed. No Deep Purple songs are allowed to be performed before the band’s own set,” Anas explained to the Post in a call on Mar. 13.
Anas shared that Rhoma actually intended to use the riff only for five to 10 seconds as a mere intro to his song.
“Bang Rhoma took the initiative, ‘Let’s just do five to 10 seconds of it,’ which I said yes to because it was just an ice-breaker,” Anas explained.
Rhoma’s spontaneity was the reason why the crew was surprised.
“When I explained it to [the crew] backstage, they were like, ‘Oh okay,’ which was why the show went on smoothly,” he shared.
Intellectual property rights in the music industry require performers of other musicians’ songs to pay royalties to the rightful owners of the song.
Unannounced prior to the concert, Rhoma’s surprise appearance was met with huge cheers from the audience who went to watch the Deep Purple concert. Indonesia’s longest-running rock band God Bless also played as the band’s opener, the second time doing so after opening for Deep Purple’s tragedy-filled concert in Jakarta in 1975.
