Friday 28 June 2019

Abbhama's Alam Raya from Indonesia







It's true that Indonesia did make some phenomenal progressive rock, mostly emanating from Giant Step and Benny Soebardja.  (Someday I should post all the Giant Step albums, which are all distinctly inferior to Giant on the Move! but do contain some nice progressive tracks here and there.)  And on this blog we've called attention to British-Indonesian library composer Toni Campo (misspelled as the more proper Tony earlier).  He made a great album called Garuda, which should still be kicking around here.  So it shouldn't be too much of a surprise to discover this one, which is in the symphonic prog vein, complete with flute, synth-strings, etc., mostly recalling the classical-influenced early Italians like PFM, Banco, Celeste.

It looks like they made only one album, back in 1978, only released to cassette.  Surprisingly the discogs bio is longer than usual, or than expected:

It's hard for a band outside Europe or USA to reach the rest of the world and sadly some good material is lost due to the limitations of Asian or African countries, this is the case of ABBHAMA, an Indonesian band who released a cassette in 1978 called "Alam Raya".  The information about them is pretty hard to find being that they were not popular even in Indonesia because as in many countries of Asia, the charts are dominated by native Folk bands and Pop groups mainly from United States and there's a very small fan base for Progressive Rock bands. ABBHAMA was born in 1977 and was the brainchild of the talented keyboardist Iwan Madjid, who was clearly influenced by Yes, Genesis, ELP and all the Symphonic icons but with also a strong French and Italian influence, the special touch are the lyrics sung in their native language and the clear ethnic influences.  The addition of Oboe by Hendro (That's how the musician is credited) gave them a very special and unique taste. Due to the strong and characteristic Indonesian sound, ABBHAMA could have a place in Folk Prog, but the essence of their music is clearly Symphonic. 
Sadly their story ends with the release of Alam Raya, proving once more that you don't only need to be skilled but also require to have the luck of being born in a country with a strong musical industry. 
After ABBHAMA disbanded Iwan Madjid and the bassist Darwin formed a more mainstream oriented band named WOW that apparently had more luck in the Indonesian charts releasing three albums. 
Iván Melgar Morey - Perú

For example the track called Keriadaan Yang Ada checks off some of the biggest elements of  the symphonic prog style, incl. the tempestuous hammond organ riff intro, the quoting of another well-known tune (God Save the Queen), chamber instrumentation (aforementioned oboe), digital synths, an odd chord change or two, sudden rhythm changes, a middle section that knocks off some tritonal or diminished chord riffs:





Not all the music holds up to scrutiny, but there's a handful of tracks that one needs to listen to repeatedly to appreciate, which is a good thing.



1 comment:


  1. https://www57.zippyshare.com/v/Ov5a1hWs/file.html

    https://www.sendspace.com/pro/dl/s2zch5

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