A live mix of selections source from legendary free music label Yes No Wave Music, founded in 2007 by Woto “Wok the Rock” Wibowo in Yogjakarta. It spans genres including punk, metal, mash-ups, club music, electro-acoustic improvisation and folk forms, over one hundred releases. All are free to download at 320Kbps with a Creative Commons Non-Commercial Share Alike license with lossless versions for sale on Bandcamp.
Wok came of age during the collapse of Indonesia’s Soharto regime known as the Reformasi, 1998, and became involved in punk collectives in Yogja, including the activist art group Taring Padi, embedded in an anti-capitalist, share culture. As Wok recalls in an informative interview with Wok by artist/curator Aki Onda from 2023:
In Indonesia at that time, underground music scenes such as punk, indie-rock, death metal, industrial music, hip-hop, and electronic music were developing. We learned how to organize these subculture movements with very minimal resources — how to produce albums and release them, organizing gigs, publishing zines, building and expanding networks et cetera. Some of our friends brought zines, books, bootleg tapes, and VHS from abroad, and those were great inspiration.
Senyawa are probably the label’s most well known artists, a collaboration between vocalist Rully Shabara and musician and instrument builder Wukir Suryadi that Wok fostered. Their album Alkisah (2021) was released simultaneously on 44 labels during the Covid pandemic, with each label producing its own formats, arwork and a varied selection of tracks, further pushing the idea of what decentralized music publishing could be. Stems of the album’s songs were made available for remix, encouraging a deeper engagement and further disseminating Senyawa’s music. Another notable release following on from these ideas is Latent Sonorities (2023), an album that brought together artists to work with a collection of Javanese gamelan at Rumah Budaya Indonesia (House of Indonesian Culture), Berlin. They devised ways to best record these courtly instruments to develop a “royalty-free” sample bank with tuning instructions as well as researching and documenting their histories and cultural significance. More than a sum of its parts, “latent sonorities” is method of engaging with sonic heritage and provenance, as discussed in a podcast conversation with Project Leader Morgan Sully from September.
This mix draws from Yes No Wave Music’s back catalogue of electronic and experimental releases and was mixed live with Rekordbox software and a Pioneer DDJ-FLX4 controller. Also a shout out to Lloydfears [Instagram] & Bonebroth from whom I swiped the idea of asking Wok to leave a voice note. Listen to their great mix of “club music based on folk music“ from around the world on Kiosk Radio here.
Tracklist
01. Yennu Ariendra & J “Mo’ong” Santoso Pribadi – “Raja Kirik (Dog King)”
02. Senyawa/Wahono – “Alkisah II (Dalam Dua Bagian)”
03. Gabber Modus Operandi – “Jathilan Titan”
04. TerbujurKaku – “Rekayasa Cinta”
05. Bottlesmoker – “BA ALUK”
06. JFK – “Stabber”
07. Senyawa/Prontaxan – “Kekuasaan”
08. Mother Bank – “Jalan-Jalan”
09. Barakatak – “Musiknya Asyik”
10. Y-DRA – “1.2. Banjir Rob”
11. rEmPiT g0dDe$$ – “HIERARCHY IS NATURE”
12. Lynn Nandar Htoo – “Unlawful”
13. Pisitakun – “10/05/2010”
14. Y-DRA – “No-Brain Dance”
15. Asep Nayak – “Nayaklak Werni Wamena Aworok Haok Nen”
16. rEmPiT g0dDe$$ – “EROTIC RAPTURE”
17. Uma Guma – “Satu Kali Lagi”
18. Raja Kirik – “ACT III. Perangan”
19. Gabber Modus Operandi – “Hey Nafsu”
20. Haingu – “Nahanduka Na Eti Nggu”
