Everyone loves to complain about the state that the English indie scene has found itself in – and there are excuses and reason aplenty from every Ali, Chong and Muthu strumming a guitar up on stage at a Merdekarya open mic.

I’ve heard a lot.

‘Local people just don’t want to support the indie market.’

‘There aren’t enough good venues that pay enough for us to even cover our drinks for the night.’

‘There’s a dearth of talent and fans because parents want kids to focus on their studies and not come out at night.’

Some of it made sense to me when I was taking my first steps into the industry, but I soon realized that it was mostly mumbo jumbo, that we were in a toxic carousel going in circles playing the blame game for no good reason. Sure, we don’t have a fanbase that comes close to what our counterparts from the Malay industry have to capitalize on – but we’ve also learnt that it is a barrier that can be broken down. Everyone can come together to support good music, for instance, Yuna.

Too many acts around here are content with just being the ‘jaguh kampung’ of the scene. They reach a certain point of fame (or infamy) in the country, but we haven’t seen anybody transition into becoming that international rockstar that we all harbour dreams of living – because what they’ve achieved is ‘good enough’, getting onto local commercials, opening for guailou acts that come down, and playing at every god damn festival in the country.

When was the last time you bought an album from a local artiste that blew your mind all the way through?

It’s not that we don’t have the talent – I’ve seen so many local musicians and singers that can blow global popstars out of the water with their virtuosity . We’re all just lazy fucks. And we love to complain that it’s not our fault.

The music business is an intricate one, but it’s easy to understand from the outset. To make it big on the mainstream market, you’ve got to write catchy, radio friendly, easy to understand shit that caters to the lowest common denominator. So don’t fucking complain if your avantgarde folk-influenced post rock isn’t getting more than a hundred plays a day on Spotify. I digress. But anyway, my point is that, if it’s your goal to be femes – it isn’t really all that hard to write music for the masses, especially when there’s so much fucking space for the scene right now in Malaysia. It just takes a lot of hard work and dedication, words that most people try to shy away from. It’s a disease.

Some of the top artistes in the world have libraries filled with hours and hours of music that will never see the light of day because it just isn’t good enough. I don’t want to name names here but there were more than just a couple of local albums that came out last year from rather prominent acts in the English scene that fell so fucking short because you can’t just write ten songs and call that an album. You’ve got to write a lot more than that, and be selective about picking just the cream of the crop. You can’t afford to be sentimental about your art. As much of a creative genius as you might be, you’re not going to be able to pull a 10/10 out of your ass every day unless you’re Max Martin. And even if you’re working with some of the best studios in the country, a polished turd is still a piece of shit at the end of the day.

Which brings me to my next point – I have no idea why many bands here are so down with going into the studio and producing themselves, keeping other people out of the equation. You can’t afford to be afraid of working with a producer – a third party that can work with your music from a completely detached point of view. Your music might sound amazing to you, but if you don’t get someone with pop and technical sensibilities to temper and help lift your sound to the next level, it’s probably going to sound like self-indulgent bullshit, or at least not do as well as it should. Sure, this doesn’t apply to everyone – but well, in most cases it’s like that la.

Then there’s also the issue of production quality. I mean, it’s definitely getting better – we’re getting more of the ‘wah, this doesn’t sound Malaysian at all’ thing going around. But why is the stigma there in the first place? It’s not just about the accents and the poor grammar (this song is no.7 on the MET10 charts today, by the way). It’s also because so much stuff that comes out nowadays still sounds dated and lacking polish compared to the pristine, almost-too-perfect sound that people are used to hearing on the radio.

Take for instance current flavour-of-the-month SOAP’s latest releases – Euphoria and Fire, and put them next to something like say The 1975, or Bastille. It’s so clear that the mixing and production are lacklustre. Sure, not every brand of music needs that sheen, but when you’re trying to break into the pop market its a necessity. More effort needs to be put into the recording, mixing and mastering process.* This isn’t a slight against the band, by the way. They’re humble, ultra-talented folks with so much potential to disrupt the scene, but they’re being held back by subpar production quality – because someone along the way didn’t care enough to make things right. The songwriting is good, catchy and has all the makings of a radio hit, but the band is never going to conquer international airwaves until this is addressed.

Down south, we’ve got acts like Gentle Bones and The Sam Willows taking steps towards breaking up the western monotony – and they’re honestly on the cusp of doing just about that. Fuck, we’ve got Rich Chigga making waves internationally from Indonesia. What’s our excuse now? It’s time for local acts to take things into their own hands, and take the next step.

Why settle for less? It’s easier now than ever before to break the scene wide open with YouTube – marketing has also become a breeze with Twitter, Facebook and Instagram. We’ve got the talent, the chops – sprinkle that a bit of business sense and discipline, and I think Malaysia’s going to start churning out stars in next to no time at all.



Sure, not everything here applies to everyone. Ya’ll have different aspirations. Some people are happy with less, some are happy with the music you’re doing – and honestly, I’m glad that you get to do what you love, and that you have people listening to you and coming for your shows and buying your music. This is more for the people who are trying to have more than just that – in the radio market, at least. It’s only healthier for the scene if we grow together after all. And, this is a rant. I genuinely don’t mean to slight any band or singer, or generalize everybody. There are exceptions to the rule, but this is basically just a bird’s eye view of the current picture ah completely based on my own opinions – I’m not claiming to have the secret recipe or anything though I’m working on it. Heh.

If you’ve got anything to change my mind, or if you agree with me and just want to talk shit – tweet me at @unmodulatedblog.

*Too much clutter in the SOAP songs that it can start to sound a little bit messy in terms of clashing frequencies – there isn’t enough space for each instrument to shine and breathe. It can definitely be done, though. Some vocals in Euphoria sounded rushed and unpolished – everybody uses autotune now, there’s no shame in that. Fire would have sounded a lot better with electronic beats, at least layered with the actual drum sounds – the Paperplane Pursuit route. Vocals didn’t stand out at all during the choruses. And well, different genre-ish, but if you’re looking for a recent local release with some fucking good production and mixing it’s got to be this Darren Ashley x Talitha track.

