Disco Dangdut #1

Last up-to-date branch of the indonesian popular music style identified as Dandgut, the nowadays club disco Dangdut quickly turned into a powerfull idiom, able to federate in the party places of Jakarta, therefore fullfilling its modern floklore function in the most typical way: deliver entertain on the edge between a sound immediatly recognizible and neverending personnal declinations, reinjected in the format.





>>>> Wali Band - baik baik sayang Dangdut remix



Although the crazily hardcore feminist team of Cartilage Consortium selected here extremely reasonnable material, you could notice that "Beginning in 2003, dangdut became the focus of a national controversy in Indonesia over religion in public life and images of sexuality in media in response to performances by singer Inul Daratista that religious conservatives described as "pornography".
And this sonic anedote might be seen in many ways as a reflect of both indonesian society's evolution, where countless nuances on the religious questions may be observed in public opinion , and of Dangdut's evolution in itself through the years: indeed, way before the speedy digital beats, there is of course an original Dangdut that raised in the 70s, and settled the basis of the style: use of tablas and flutes, crossover incorporating indian, arabian and malay elements...



Although the theory of a clash between two generations appears way too simplist, if there maybe was at least a conflict on the question of public morality, it was made sharper by the fact that Inul Daratista actually covered tunes by Roma Irama, considered as Dangdut's godfather, who was directly responsible in the 70s of its modernisation and rescue against western music imperialism, injecting both fuzzy electric guitars and coranic respectful quotations into the old folkloric form.

So how should we in the end consider this speedfull booty-shaking disco, often soundtracking videos dedicated to girlfriends or boyfriends surrounded by doves and sparle explosions ?



Dangdut being rich of more than 40 years of recordings, as there would be no point in attempting to summarize such a production, what else can you do for a substantial view but go and ruin your nights on the Journey of Dangdut ?
Total killer archival blog, fullfilled with treasures like these ones, all directly numerized from the tapes:


Kunci-Kunci Asmara - Etty yulianty


Endang ST Matamu Yang Nakal