Group Gapura | Sangkala |Ikon | Indonesia

I first heard Sangkala during a visit to Ubud, Bali in the early 90's. It seemed that every evening, no matter what restaurant I ate in, the same soothing gamelan sounds accompanied my meal. I came to think of this tape as Balinese dinner music and guessed it was a new release. In fact, it was neither recent nor Balinese, but the work of the Sundanese gamelan degung ensemble Group Gapura, produced in Jakarta ten years earlier.

Its continued popularity then was a testament to what a national phenomenon the album was--by the time of its U.S. release on Ikon records in 1985, Sangkala had sold over 100,000 copies (much more impressive when the prevailing poverty and cassette piracy are taken into consideration). It was one of the biggest non-Western albums in Indonesian history.

To understand why, it's helpful to come back to the usual Indonesian fare we consume in the West. The Monkey Dance, for example is neither listenable (a hundred guys shouting "CECAK!" repeatedly a cappella for a half hour is an occasional listen at best) nor created for domestic consumption (this "native" performance as we know it was really molded under the direction of German artist/impresario Walter Spies for the 1933 film The Island of the Demons). The Monkey Dance is also a dance. Like the traditional gamelan recordings of dances and shadow puppet shows we usually hear, the music is only part of a total experience and was never meant to be taken in the abstract. Indonesians can have the full experience in person, so they would be no more likely to purchase these recordings than they would the touristic picture postcards these CDs so closely resemble.

In Sangkala, on the other hand, gamelan finds its own new form in an era when cassette players and Michael Jackson tapes are proliferating the modern pop experience: music in the abstract, on demand, accompanying peoples' daily activities. The rhythmic shifts that demand unconditional attention have been stripped away, leaving a static tempo that emphasizes the repetitive metalophone figures. The resulting sound is shockingly similar to the minimalist, ambient and dance loop aesthetics developing simultaneously in another hemisphere. The tracks are pop length with titles that reflect people and images from modern Java. The recording is made in the studio and not "in the field." It is the sound of Sundanese players reinventing themselves and their sound and this may be why it resonated with so many ethnicities throughout the 10,000 islands struggling to become something called "modern Indonesia."

Ikon's 1985 LP release of Sangkala was pressed in Germany on premium vinyl and includes a gatefold cover with excellent liner notes. Occasionally, you can still find it used in the States. Hopefully, someone will re-release it soon.