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Molek FMPop Malaysiana: Soul Searching of the Music Kind
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MONOLOQUE
THE NUSANTARA RENAISSANCE MAN
“You can’t say a band that sounds 99% like Kings of Leon or Gotye to be the new Malaysian sound without any traditional influences even though it’s a band from Malaysia, right? That’s plagiarism (laughs),”
– LOQUE, MONOLOQUE
Who hasn’t heard of loQue, let alone his current band monoloQue (comprising Ijoo, Dax, Loko, Apex and loQue himself)? The musically erudite Malay Renaissance man isn’t just a musician, he also imparts his knowledge to those willing to learn – he’s a music teacher. The band monoloQue’s sound is something of a Frankenstein-esque genre monster that owes itself to everything Nusantara (without eschewing some Western influences).
monoloQue, or loQue at least, has a specific image that according to the man himself is “the real ‘Malaysian’ style rather than the ‘borrowed-from-the-West Malaysian identity’.” This is something he has dabbled in since his days with Butterfingers (just listen to Malayneum). Don’t make the mistake of equating the band’s image as purely Malay-influenced though, as loQue points out, “our goal since Malayneum was to achieve ‘bunyi Malaysia’ based on local elements and the marriage between Malay and Indian and Chinese cultures, arts, and music, but of course some inevitable Western elements can’t be filtered out.”
Some quarters have reacted rather dubiously to loQue’s image of wearing the tengkolok, that it comes off as contrived, to which he counters effectively to us. “I don’t see myself as a Panglima from historical Melaka when I wear my outfit. To me, it’s just as how you would wear your hoodie or snapback, a fashion statement,” he says, claiming that what he’s trying to achieve is to make Malaysia more aware of their ancestral relics and customs.
The West, according to loQue, is to be blamed for the ever mundane Western-dominated fashion of today. We are all somehow dictated by the Western definition of what is proper and improper wear.
“Have some sense of originality my fellow Malaysians, stop aping the west too much.”
His stance against conformity to Western culture is stronger when it comes to music. loQue is adamant that localising music by adding traditional elements is necessary. “Not many of us are doing it right now. You can’t say a band that sounds 99% like Kings of Leon or Gotye to be the new Malaysian sound without any traditional influences even though it’s a band from Malaysia, right? That’s plagiarism [laughs],” he tells us half-jokingly.
Because JUICE is one to press artists further on when they make a claim, we ask him whether it is possible to be Malaysian without mixing olden ways to modern music. To which loQue quickly asserts as impossible, imagining a dystopian future, he leaves us with this scenario;
“It could happen at the rate we’re going though, how Malaysians… especially Malays… are carbon copying the West and forgetting their roots. Perhaps 50 years from now Malaysian bands will sound Malaysian because they sound like Elvis instead of P. Ramlee.”
This is a future loQue is actively trying to fight; he’s attempting to de-westernise the youths of the Malaysian scene with his movement Skolah Baru Kuala Lumpur. To him, the Malaysian identity is firmly grounded in traditional instruments such as gamelan, erhu, sitar, rebab, and gong; and our own genres in joget, dragon dance, keroncong, ghazal, inang, and makyong. All of which are fundamentally different from your average Western music.
loQue blames the ever changing cultural trends on how globalised the world has become. People are afraid to be themselves due to pop culture; MTV, Glee, Hollywood, the internet.
“After all, the majority aren’t even proud of their own national language, how in the world could we achieve music that is ‘something Malaysian? We are too embarrassed to be called ‘sakai’ or ‘kampung… that is why!”
To date, loQue is most proud of ‘Kekanda Adinda’ as the band’s cornerstone in churning out a successful mix of Nusantara and Western elements. “It’s a bit poppish, even kampung to some, to me it’s still an experiment, and contrary to musicians who regret writing pop hits, I am still glad that I wrote it.”
As are we.
monoloQue’s debut Hikayat Halimunan Abad ke-21 Jejak Tanah is out in stores. Currently they are hard at work finishing the second instalment of the Hikayat trilogy, Jangan Puja Sampai Kecewa. Get more on the band by logging on to www.monoloque.com. To join his Skolah Baru Kuala Lumpur, e-mail [email protected].
