Padang Moonrise: The Birth of the Modern Indonesian Recording Industry (1955-69)

Encouraged by an Indonesian government keen to engender ideas of national identity in the newly independent country, a raft of labels sprang up to release music in the 1950s. As the archipelago’s ethnically disparate populace struggled with both a new language and ideas of national character, musicians – often state-sponsored – used the opportunity to create new strains of ‘national’ music.

Bringing together a host of material recorded during these early years of the country’s nascent music industry, Padang Moonrise: The Birth of the Modern Indonesian Recording Industry (1955-69) shows a glorious blending of Indigenous styles from Java, Sumatra, Bali and beyond with imported genres from across the world. There’s an ingenuity to much of the fare on offer. Orkes Suita Rama’s ‘Tepui Tepui’, for example, reshapes a regional Sumatran song as a Cuban chachachá while among the songs from the group Orkes Teruna Ria, ‘Bulan Dagoan’ replicates gamelan rhythms on twanged rock guitars and ‘Budjang Talalai’ blends Arabic styles and vocals with Latin jazz. Ivo Nilakreshna’s ‘Ka Huma’ combines rock‘n’roll swing with a gamelan beat. The cream of the crop are the brilliant Band Nada Kentjana who create a wonderfully atmospheric and Asiatic blend of jazz and vocal pop on ‘Djaleuleudja’.