Our ‘Track By Track’ guide sheds light on the stories behind some of our favourite artists’ music.
We love pulling back the curtain on the stories and inspirations behind intriguing new releases. It’s always fascinating to hear the personal anecdotes, creative processes, and little-known tales that shaped each track, giving us all a deeper appreciation for the artistry that goes into crafting these musical gems.
On her second album of the year Indonesian composer, performer and educator Peni Candra Rini reimagines ancient Javanese musical traditions and turns them on their head. Rini’s virtuosic, quirky, and surprising vocal performances burst through eight loud, playful, rambunctious, and explosive tracks. Unlike the deep introspection and ambient tranquillity of her previous album, Wulansih, Wani bursts with chaotic fun, electrifying energy, and an exhilarating sense of surprise.
The album came to life by handing the recorded musicians some “very basic outlines” of the songs. They then improvised around these frameworks in the studio, while producers John Dieterich and Chris Botta enjoyed “free rein” to shape the tracks however they fancied.
Wani is out today, courtesy of New Amsterdam Records (order your copy here). Take a listen to the album right below, and then dive into Rini’s track-by-track guide.
Urashima Taro
This piece was composed by my collaborator Danis Sugiyanto as an accompaniment to an innovative painting-scroll (wayang beber) by Sugiyanto’s brother, the artist Dani Iswardana. The scroll portrays the Japanese legend Urashima Taro, a kind of pandora’s box story. In the legend Urashima Taro rides a turtle beneath the sea to meet with princess Otohime. He stays for what he believes is a few days, but when he returns to his village he finds that 100 years have passed. We he opens a treasure box she has given him (but ordered him not to open) he suddenly becomes an old man. Andy McGraw and I arranged this piece in an experimental rock-keroncong style, recalling the experimental music we made with Danis when we played together in the Sono Seni ensemble in the early 2000s.
Kombak Kombek
(Here to there)
This innovative percussion arrangement combines folk texts from the East Javanese region of Banyuwangi, the Central Javanese region around Surakarta, and the West Javanese region of Sunda. The east Javanese lyrics are about missing a lover. The Central Javanese lyrics are often used in the traditional shadow play (wayang kulit) for the flirtatious dance of female puppets. The West Javanese text appears to be in the voice of a prostitute speaking to her conservative Islamic John, Kakak Haji. This seems to be a critique of hypocritical religious zealots.
Raden Panji
Like Urashima Taro, this piece was composed by my collaborator Danis Sugiyanto as an accompaniment to an innovative painting-scroll (wayang beber) by Sugiyanto’s brother, the artist Dani Iswardana. The scroll portrays the 12th century Javanese legend of the prince Raden Panji. In Iswardana’s scroll, Panji is transported to the modern era and travels, incognito, to Europe where he encounters poor Indonesian climate refugees seeking working abroad. The scroll describes the environmental destruction wrought by pollution and climate change in Indonesia. Andy McGraw and I arranged this piece in an experimental rock-keroncong style, recalling the experimental music we made with Danis when we played together in the Sono Seni ensemble in the early 2000s.
Wedang Kacang
This keroncong piece was composed by Any and recorded by the famous Javanese singer Waldjinah in the mid 1960s, when Indonesia was experiencing a massive wave of anti-communist political violence encouraged by the CIA. The piece apparently has no connection to this trauma. The lyrics describe waiting for a love letter and receiving only a bill in the mail. There were many pieces like this composed during this era, most of which fell out of the repertoire in the 1980s. I tend to think that the nostalgic, stridently non-political nature of these tunes served as a kind of balm for traumatized Javanese. But the reference to a missing lover certainly must have been a poignant reference for the many people who lost loved ones during the violence.
Tapal Kuda Liar
Zoel is from the island of Madura off the north coast of East Java. My lyrics evoke the powerful and energetic speaking style of the Madurese, who are well known for their food, especially their sate. In this piece I imitate the vocal style of Madurese food hawkers in the market. From the perspective of the “refined” Central Javanese, the Madurese are wild and bombastic, free of the conservative social mores of Javanese court culture. Zoel composed this piece when he, Danis, Andy and I played together in Wayan Sadra’s Sono Seni ensemble. Our arrangement is a radically new and bombastic avant-rock version.
Pocung / Memento Mori
In traditional Javanese singing, pocung is a type of macapat, an ancient metered Sanskritic poetic text. Each macapat meter is associated with a particular phase of the human life. Pocung is associated with death and the lyrics remind the listener that we all will die. Pocung literally refers to the white shroud placed on the deceased. Our innovative percussion arrangement is, ironically, full of the joyful energy of life. We remember our mortality not to be moribund but to inspire us to live a full blooded life.
Sok Ada-Ada
In the traditional shadow play the ada-ada is a free-metered vocal interlude performed by the shadow master in his role as disembodied narrator. It is used to increase the dramatic tension in the play, often prior to a battle. Our innovative percussion arrangement is in the “style of” (sok) a traditional ada-ada, in which I attempt to create a tense and mysterious atmosphere. For this I created a new ada-ada from the dhang-dhang-gula macapat meter, associated with young adulthood, because it matches my own age and temperament.
Beringin Kurung
There is a large banyan tree outside of the court (keraton) of Central Java in Surakarta. During the colonial era, this is where criminals (or those who offended the court) were executed and hung up in the tree’s hanging roots. During the late independence era this is where the city’s prostitutes hung out, where people drank and gambled. The banyan was (for better or worse) the symbol of the court, but also was adopted by the ruling GOLKAR party of Indonesia’s second dictator, Suharto, who ruled from 1965-1998. This piece was composed around 1998 when Suharto’s regime was forced out by popular democratic reforms. Andy McGraw, Danis Sugiyanto, Zoel Mistortoify and I all met in Sadra’s Sono Seni ensemble around this time and often played an acoustic version of this piece. Our experimental arrangement honors Sadra’s role as our mentor and provocateur.
