PATAHAN

About 2 months ago I reviewed "Demi Masa" by this excellent Indonesian band SIMAK DIALOG, and rated it with 4 stars due to the surprising combination of sounds, flavours and styles, so when I placed "Patahan" in the CD player, they surprised me again but for different reasons.

If "Demi Masa" was an ode to the unexpected, "Patahan" is more what I would expect from a Fusion band (at least during the first two tracks), with excellent piano performance, splendid guitar by virtuoso musician "Tohpati Ario Hutomo" and a solid rhythm section, in this case with the peculiarity of not using drums but Indonesian Kendang percussion.

The general mood is calm, relaxing and fluid with an audience so respectful that there's almost no "Live feeling", but this doesn't stop the band from improvising and giving the best of them.

As I said before, the album is very relaxing, mainly during the first two tracks "One Has to Be" and "Spur of the Moment" in which "Riza Arshad" carries the weight of the band with an amazing piano performance in the vein of "Chick Corea".

But after that everything starts to change "Kemarau" is a vibrant experimental track with radical changes from martial to peaceful and some haunting chorals, but the really complex material comes with "Worthseein", almost frenetic jam session where all the musicians allow themselves to shine and demonstrate how skilful they are.

The closer "Kain Sigli" begins with a simultaneous narration in two languages, "Emi Tata" in Bahasa language and "Marla Stukenberg" in German, after which an incredibly beautiful acoustic guitar solo captured my attention.

The rest of the track is more experimentation and jamming with "Nyak Ina Raseuki - Ubiet" singing and scatting with a background of guitar percussion and synths....Frenetic and delightful.

Even when Jazz is not my passion, it's obvious for me that the performance and composition is amazing and that would be extremely unfair to rate "Patahan" with less than 4 stars.