One of our most favourite things to do in 2013 is seeing a live show! Everyone has their own version of ‘The best concerts in 2013’, so we also have it. Unlike last year’s list (we only listed ten concerts in Indonesia), this year we also listed shows in Kuala Lumpur and Singapore. In case you missed all of these shows, you still can catch some highlights that we had this year! Here is our “Concerts of The Year”!

10. The Cribs

What would you expect from an all out rock concert? Mosh-pits, wailing fans, blood and the undeniable alcohol would all fit in the ensemble. That it was, The Jarman brothers brought out their persona on stage during their Payola tour stop in Malaysia in a rawness that enthralled their fans, not shy of anything. Ranging from broken instruments to rowdy fan-boys barraging through barriers rummaging across the bands equipment. Everything you would list down to happen at a rock concert happened, not shy of anything. No filters to the band, making everything as real as possible to serve the ideology of the band, “We play every show like our last”. Undoubtedly ending their ‘Payola Tour’ with their highest grace, leaving an everlasting impression. With no filters, the entire experience to The Cribs Payola Tour definitely left a mark of excellence and to justify it as that, would be an understatement.

Venue : The Bee
Promoter : Upfront
Full Review : The Cribs Live in Kuala Lumpur

9. The Kooks (Road To Big Sounds Festival)

Luke (and the band) totally performed a good communicative skills to the crowd and his pampered dance. For song “Seaside”, he did an acoustic solo and followed by a crowd’s choir to the song, it was a pretty smooth move. Hugh Harris’s vocal also strongly shone and balanced the performance. The singing along’s session still much happening for the rest of the songs, especially for “How’d Ya Like That”, “Sway”, “Shine On”, and “Do You Wanna”. After performing “Do You Wanna”, the encore’s typical shout out was cheered massively, the crowd seemed still hungry since the band had not performed their hit songs from their previous albums. After shouting for a couple of times, the band returned to the stage again then played the riff of “Junk Of the Heart”. The crowd went into a jiggling-machine and bobbing their heads to the song. Without having a time to catch a breathe, the band played their hit-maker song, “Naïve”, which was the icing of the show. The Kooks totally nailed the night and they surely knew how to make it “big” for “Road To Big Sound Festival”. Despite the fact of the not so crowded, Road To Big Sound Festival has given us something what the young listeners have been waiting for a long time.

Venue : Tennis Indoor Senayan
Promoter : Dyandra Entertainment
Full Review : The Kooks, Delphic, and The Radio Dept : All In One for Jakarta!

8. Yeah Yeah Yeahs (Lovegarage 2013)

Yeah Yeah Yeahs! Not try to repeat the headliner’s name, but that was our straight expression after experiencing the band’s live set. Karen O, Nick Zinner, and Brian Chase had crushed the Lovegarage’s crowd into pieces. By the time Nick Zinner and Brian Chase stepped on to stage, the crowd exploded their throath and even became a huge explosive when Karen O, the super front woman, hopped in and screamed “Jakarta! – Indonesia! Yeah Yeah Yeahs!”. Karen O did the deepthroath to mic (literally), screamed, danced crazily, she did all of the craziest stage acts that a frontwoman would never do. When ‘Date With The Night’ was performed, we knew it’ll top any kind of stage acts that she did in the earlier set. it really put a cherry on top of their final act. Yeah Yeah Yeahs totally pulled the night off and shook Jakarta. Got a chance to witness Karen O’s stage act was something that worth it, since we knew the band almost made it to Jakarta on their “It’s Blitz” tour in 2010, but for some reason it didn’t happen.

Venue : EX Park
Promoter : Future 10 & Ismaya Live
Full Review : http://www.svanapaper.com/a-date-with-yeah-yeah-yeahs/

7. Mew (Guinness Arthur’s Day Jakarta)

The show was humble and down to earth. Without any trippy visual treatment on the screen, Mew put us into one of the best Saturday nights that anyone could have. Songs like ‘Special’, ‘ The Zookeeper’s Boy’, ‘Snow Brigade‘, ‘She Spider’, Am I Wry? No’, and ‘156’ had changed the venue into a karaoke party in a larger scale. For the encore, Mew had ‘Comforting Sounds’. The beautiful intro, deep meanings, and simply one of the best ballad songs from a prog-rock band to date, made the night into an epic closure. To make the moment calmer, some of the crowd (which we found out that they were Indonesian Frengers, the local fan base of Mew) blew soap-bubbles to the air, the gloomy and mellow mood quickly sprang as the songs fused in with the crowd’s emotion. The addition of confetti also gave a touch of dramatic ending. Without some trippy visuals that they used to have, they were still able to shine us out with their humble performance and a carefully-crafted setlist. It pulled everything together in an magical way. In short, Mew did beauty. It was definitely not Mew’s first time show in Indonesia, but no matter how often they’ll be here, it will always be the fans’ pleasure to welcome them back.

Venue : JIExpo Kemayoran
Promoter : Guinness ID
Full Review : Mew, One Republic, and Club 8 Dropped the Balls at GAD 2013

6. Tame Impala (Laneway Festival Singapore)

Photo by Dawn Chua c/o Chugg Entertainment

Tame Impala’s set at Singapore’s Laneway Festival 2013 was one of the most-anticipated set during the festival. At the time, Lonerism has just grabbed most of the music blog’s “album of the year” title. So that is why people were flocking at their stage, even before their set was even started. We’ve seen Tame Impala once before, but this time, they’re taking their game into the next level. They kicked the gig with “Solitude Is Bliss”, and it seems like the meadow’s green grass has elevated during the intro of the song. They played “Endors Toi”, “Elephant”, “Feels Like We’re Going Backwards”, and they closed the set with “Half Full Glass of Wine”. Even though Gotye was due to perform after them, most of the crowd had left the venue, with a joyous smile on their faces. Because Tame Impala has filled the crowd’s “Half Full Glass of Expectations”.

Venue : Garden By The Bay
Promoter : Laneway
Full Review :Soak Up The Sound At Laneway Festival 2013

5. Linkin Park

Mondays may not be a lot of people’s favourite, it’s the first day of the week and the mediocrity stains throughout the nine-to-five schedule. Yet the Monday on August 19th 2013 was a different story. There were approximately 20,000 people, of which 5000 of it travelled overseas just for this live event, waiting eagerly for the day to come. After precisely a decade for the legends to come back to the land of multi-ethnicity in South East Asia, Linkin Park exclusively came back to yet again amuse the audience. Linkin Park made their fans to sing till their lungs out as they performed their topnotch songs, such as ‘Faint’, ‘Given Up’ ,With You’, and ‘Somewhere I Belong’. Needless to say, Linkin Park live in Malaysia 2013 is among one of the best performances any band could ever deliver. The energy, the music, and the chemistry is one of those substance that can never be engineered as precisely and immaculately. Next time a Linkin Park concert comes play, even if you need to fly over to watch it, do it. The experience is worth the expense. We walked in the stadium as a fan, but walked out as a straight-up LP soldier.

Venue : Stadion Bukit Jalil
Promoter : The Wonderland +
Full Review : A Decade for an Encore: Linkin Park Live in Malaysia 2013

4. Blur (Big Sound Festival)

No one would forget what happened at Lapangan D Senayan on May 15th 2013. Especially if you’re a major fan of British music. Blur, one of the lineups for Big Sound Festival (BSF) made their fans’ surreal dreams come true. Blur jammed the nineteen songs just like it was their first time to pump the crowd, even though they have become wiser in age, they still know how to captivate these songs, sounding as great as how a legendary band should be. Witnessing Blur in Jakarta, where A-list bands don’t come too often, is another reason why you should be in for a whole lot of woe if you didn’t catch their live performance. We witnessed most of the crowd having glassy-eyed and even cried when the show ended. Knowing Blur also felt happy with the crowd has proved that Jakarta has one of the best crowd that the band have been performing to. Whether they will come back to Jakarta or not, they have dropped one hell of a good show. Let us all cross out ‘Blur’ from our ‘Artists That You Have To See Before You Die’ list.

Venue : Lapangan D Senayan
Promoter : Dyandra Entertainment
Full review : Big Sound Festival : A Surreal Dream Has Come True

3. Weezer

Photo by Agung Hartamurti / Deathrockstar.com

In November 2012, the rumour of Weezer’s show in Jakarta had been growing rapidly on the social media as Weezer posted “Jakarta!” on their facebook page. And finally, the rumour didn’t stay as a rumour, it came true!. On January 8th 2013, Weezer made their Jakarta debut. The set was pretty amazing and very captivating. With Rivers’ ability in entertaining the crowd (and his ability to speak in some Indonesian words) were getting a good credit. The concert itself was divided into two segments; The Greatest Hits and The Blue Album. When a break to the second part of the show, Karl Koch, the manager and long life buddy who have been with the band for about twenty one years put his slot of Weezer’s journey with a title “Karl’s Corner” which was the best supplement for Weezer’s avid fans of course. A great long set and the surprises put the fans into their very best moment of their life. By seeing how the band got a great feedback from the Indonesian Fans last night, we totally are sure that the band has found the second home and hoping they would be back soon for another show. As Rivers Cuomo said before he left the stage “Sampai Jumpa!”

Venue : Lapangan D Senayan
Promoters : Asia Live Entertainment, Marygops Studios, Blackrock Entertainment, and Star D Pro
Full Review : Weezer did a historical night in jakarta

2. Sigur Ros

Photo by irockumentary.com

Sigur ros have visited Singapore and Malaysia for their first time right 6 months before this Jakarta gig, and there are lots of Jakarta’s post rock aficionados who came to our neighboring countries and witness the beauty of Sigur Ros’ music. That’s the reason why this concert doesn’t drew the same attention to Jakarta’s Indie enthusiasts when the promoter and the band announced the gig date in January. But still, this is the band who is capable of producing one of the best melodies on Earth. So that’s why thousands of people came to Istora Senayan on May 10th, 2013. They opened the gig with a huge visualization and mesmerizing lighting setups. They played a setlists consists of some brand new tracks from their recent albums, Kveikur and Valtari, and some classics such as Hoppipolla, Olsen Olsen, Festival, and Saeglopur. They closed the gig with Popplagid followed with a long applause and satisfied smile from the attendance. That night, Sigur Ros have transformed Istora Senayan into a some kind of new, beautiful world that nobody’s ever dreamt of.

Venue : Istora Senayan Jakarta
Promoter : FLUX&PLAY

1. Metallica

Metallica’s show in Jakarta broke some of the records of Indonesia’s concerts. A couple of weeks before the show, people worried the terrible things that happened to the band’s show (in Jakarta) in 1993 would happen again, but thankfully it didn’t. With a very organized system from the promoters, the show, which took place at Gelora Bung Karno Stadium, became one of the most successful (and also the biggest) concerts, which has been held in the last 10 years. Metallica blackened the stadium, they heated up the metal heads, and they definitely rocked the nation. Half of 20,000 festival class tickets were sold within few days after the ticket box opened. About 54,000 tickets were quoted on sale, more than half capacity of Gelora Bung Karno (GBK) Stadium. On August 25th 2013, People dressed in black, mostly wearing metal band t-shirts, were packing the venue since 2 pm. They came from all over the country to celebrate the ‘National Metal Day’ that day ames Hetfield, Kirk Hammet, Lars Ulrich and Robert Trujillo hit the stage with a bang and all of sudden screams were exploded to the open-air. Everybody was quiet yet amused. After they played some of their songs such as ‘Fuel’, ‘Ride The Lightning’, and ‘Kill ‘Em All’. then Hetfield said “Jakarta, do you feel it?? I know you see it, I know you hear it. But DO YOU FEEL IT? Now here, I know you know every word of the song… CYANIDE!” and the crowd exploded in shouts once more. Metallica never seems aged. They still had constant power and energy since they started the concert until its finish. That was probably the reason why we choose as our Concert of The year! They make other concerts in 2013 seems not so enthusing!

Venue: Gelora Bung Karno Stadium
Promoter: Blackrock Entertainment
Full Review: Metallica Live in Jakarta : It’s National Metal Day!

How did you end up with The Vickers? Are you guys high school friends? or?

Well, it happened five years ago, Fra and Fede were schoolmates, they started to play with other guys here in Florence, then I met them and I contacted Marco to play drums. We started to play some covers by Syd Barrett, Kinks, Beatles, Blur etc… In three months we were working on our original stuff!

In 2008 you’ve been chosen by David Bash for IPO. That’s awesome. How did that happen??

David is a fantastic music lover, really cool person. One day he sent a message on our MySpace messages box (at that time MySpace was at its best): “Hi guys, you sound great, amazing songs, do you wanna come to play at the Cavern Club in Liverpool?” I remember we were incredulous, we formed the band a few mounths ago and now we’re gonna play at the Cavern Club? It was an amazing experience, we all remember those days with affection, four young people at the Beatles’ home!

When I listened to your Album Fine For Now and then listened to She’s Lost I felt something different. Fine For Now is kinda brit-pop-rock or more like garage rock and She’s Lost gives more psychedelic ambiance which is cool. Do you guys also think it’s different?

We definitely agree with you. Fine For Now was an album strongly influenced by British music, we tried to do an LP full of singles, catchy tunes, short and fast tracks, jingle jungle guitars, we still think it was a great record. She’s Lost is different; it’s a space song, a psychedelic dream made of delays and echoes with surrealistic vocals. After Fine For Now we decided to take more time to produce the songs, we experimented new sounds and we approached the songs in a different way.

For Andrea, since you wrote She’s Lost. What’s the story behind that song? what inspired you when you wrote it?

She’s Lost is inspired by a person very near to me. She uses to tell me her childhood memories. Those kind of images showed me a lost and far time that unfortunately will not return causing a deep conflict between past and present. So I wrote the song trying to describe the feelings of those tales and after we produced the track like it was a dream.

Since you guys are from Italy, how’s the music scene in there?

The scene in Italy could be more and more better. There are a lot of talented bands suffering the difficult of Italian music situation. We should need people who believe in music like promoters, labels, journalists..Someone is trying but is not enough. At the moment the good and real music is not on TV, radio, there are no important summer music festivals in Italy, and this is horrible.

What do you want to show to the music listeners when they listen to your song for the first time?

We write and play music cause is our passion and we’ll do it for the rest of our life. We hope that people enjoy our songs and we hope that our music makes they feel good! This is the role of The Vickers!

You can get their ‘She’s Lost’ single on bandcamp for €2 EUR  or you can buy their limited edition 7” vinyl here. You won’t regret it. I promise.

1. Coldplay – Yellow (2000)

2. Missy Elliot – Work It (2002)

3. The Strokes – 1251 (2003)

4. Green Day – Warning (2000)

5. Jimmy Eat World – The Middle (2001)

6. Blur – Music Is My Radar (2000)

7. Wheatus – Teenage Dirtbag (2000)

8. Red Hot Chilli Peppers – By the Way (2002)

9. Madonna – Music (2000)

10. Phantom Planet – California (2001)

11. Linkin Park – Somewhere I Belong (2003)

12. The Vines – Ms.Jackson (2001)

13. The White Stripes – Seven Nation Army (2003)

14. Muse – Time Is Running Out (2003)

15. Avril Lavigne – Complicated (2002)

16. Simple Plan – Just A Kid (2002)

17. Eminem – Without Me (2002)

18.Vanessa Carlton – A Thousand Miles (2000)

 19. Las Ketchup – Asereje (2002)

20. Pink – Don’t Let Me Get Me (2001)

21. Blink 182 – All the Small Things (2000)

1. Blur – Coffee And TV (Released in 1999)

2. Oasis – All Around The World (Released In 1998)

3. Sugar Ray – Someday (Released in 1999)

4. Radiohead – Karma Police (Released In 1997)

5. Björk – Jóga (Released In 1997)

6. The Cardigans – Lovefool (Released in 1996)

7. Cher – Believe (Released In 1998)

8. No Doubt – Don’t Speak (Released In 1996)

9. Vengaboys – We Like To Party (Released In 1998)

10. Save Ferries – Come On Eileen (Released In 1997)

11. Fatboy Slim – Right Here , Right Now (Released In 1999)

12. Smash Mouth – All Star (Released In 1999)

13.Red Hot Chilli Peppers – Californication (Released In 1999)

14. Foo Fighters – Learn To Fly (Released In 1999)

15. Natalie Imbruglia – Torn (Released In 1997)

16. Suede – The Beautiful Ones (Released In 1997)


17. Alanis Morisette – Ironic

For some it may seem like a normal 9-5 Wednesday (15/05), but for music enthusiasts, it was a surreal dream come true. Big Sound Festival (BSF) 2013, one of the most talked festivals in South-east Asia happened at Lapangan D Senayan. Blur, the Temper Trap, Tegan And Sara, and Van She were ready to give a musical earthquake.

Van She, who once have come to Jakarta in 2012 (for Playground 5), paid their second visit for BSF. They were the kickstarter of the festival. Van She shone out the early comers of the festival with their sparkly synth and electro-rock musics, the crowd were incrementing as the sun set.

Let’s double the fun with Tegan And Sara. The twins brought eleven songs including ‘Back In Your Head’, ‘Walking With A Ghost’, and ‘Feel It In My Bones’ a song that they worked with Tiesto. Their amiable approach to the crowd made the show into an intimate kind of show, even though they performed a short set, they managed to partially sang a requested song from the crowd that was not listed in the setlist.

As the night got crazier, the Temper Trap went to the stage as the last performer to open the night for Blur. The Australian stunners opened their performance with ‘Love Lost’, Dougy Mandagi’s vocal was pretty jaw-dropping and we were sure he didn’t miss any high notes to reach his heavenly falsettos. The night’s most fascinating moment evolved when the band performed ‘Drum Song’. The band successfully invited the crowd to sing along to their well-sought and worshiped song, ‘Sweet Disposition’.

Three amazing bands had opened the night and it led to a one legendary name that the crowd had been shouting since they entered the festival’s area, the one and only, Blur. It looked like the crowd couldn’t hold their feelings to sing their lungs out for Blur’s song, even before the band hit the stage, the crowd sang Tender’s “Oh My Baby, Oh My Baby, Oh Why, Oh Why”. The backdrop of the stage started revealing a huge picture of “Under the Westway”, as a clue that the band would be on stage just in a few minutes, the lights were dimmed, and Blur, one of the most historical bands, appeared on stage!

The crowd erupted to a great mass dancing scene when the band launched ‘Girls & Boys’ to start off their show and then followed by ‘Popscene’ which turned up the energy into another level. As the show went on, Damon Albarn and Graham Coxon loosened up by performing ‘Badhead’, ’Beetlebum’, and ‘Out Of Time’. The band who were awarded the Outstanding Contribution to Music award at the 2012 Brit Awards played ‘Coffee & Tv’ which its video was being known as one of the most iconic music videos. The karaoke session didn’t stop there, the band then played the intro of ‘Tender’ which was immediately responded by the screams of excitement from the crowd, the soul of the song brought the atmosphere into a much deeper power. Furthermore, the addition of a horn section and four backup singers brought another level of depth to Blur’s sound. After receiving the daunting ambiance  the band bombarded the fans with ‘Country House’, ‘Parklife’, and ‘End Of Century’. The band decided to went off from the stage after they performed ‘This Is A Low’ which simultaneously made the crowd to do the classic encore cheering. After a few minutes of cheering an encore, Blur wandered back to the stage and played ‘Under The Westway’ and ‘For Tomorrow’. When Blur performed ‘The Universal’, the crowd got mesmerized to the song, but the peak of the show was not to the very glorious of ‘The Universal’. The crowd had recognized (and according to their setlist on their show in Hong Kong) that ‘Song 2’ would be the last song to perform. And it was. The last song totally shook the crowd and Song 2 was an epic closure to wrap up the memorable night for Blur’s fans.

Blur jammed the nineteen songs just like it was their first time to pump the crowd, even though they have become wiser in age, they still know how to captivate these songs, sounding as great as how a legendary band should be. Witnessing Blur in Jakarta, where A-list bands don’t come too often, is another reason why you should be in for a whole lot of woe if you didn’t catch their live performance. We witnessed most of the crowd having glassy-eyed and even cried when the show ended. Knowing Blur also felt happy with the crowd has proved that Jakarta has one of the best crowd that the band have been performing to. Whether they will come back to Jakarta or not, they have dropped one hell of a good show. Let us all cross out ‘Blur’ from our ‘Artists That You Have To See Before You Die’ list.

1.Jaw-dropping Line-ups

Eventhough this is the very first volume of Dyandra Entertainment’s concert festival, Big Sound Festival has shown its fangs on the very first time they released the line-ups. The event will be featured big names like Blur (UK), Van She (AUS), The Temper Trap (AUS) and Tegan & Sara (CAN). Did you just say “Is this really happening?”. YES, IT IS!

 2.The Reasonable Price

We know at some point you’ll whine about the price of the ticket, but guys, take a look to the line-ups one more time! They got Blur, Van She, the Temper Trap, and Tegan&Sara. Four bands and it only costs you IDR 950.000 for the regular festival and IDR 1.250.000 for the VIP festival. And there are so many offers that give a discount (Check Dyandra Ent’s twitter to find out the offers). It must be out of range for some people, but if you want to experience one of the most anticipated music festivals in 2013, this is one hell of a “You Shouldn’t Miss” event.

 3.Completing the series

If you went to Road To Big Sound Fest 2013 (the pre-event for Big Sound Fest 2013), we really think you are in a halfway to complete your music festival series. You started it with a good experience in April with the Kooks, Delphic, and the Radio Dept., why not wrapping it up with Blur, the Temper Trap, Tegan & Sara, and Van She?

 4.One Of the Biggest Events in South-East Asia

People from Singapore, Phillipines, Malaysia and some neighbour countries, are coming to Jakarta just to catch this festival. They have to get some extra fees just to get in to Jakarta, meanwhile, you, who live in Jakarta, only need to pay for the ticket concert. And if you are a live music enthusiast, this should be on your must-see concerts in 2013. The excitement waves from international visitors have confirmed how BIG this festival is!

 5.Blur!

This is the strong point of why you shouldn’t miss Big Sound Festival 2013. Blur is a legendary band who have made a remarkable career in the music industry. NME also put Blur as one of the 50 artists that you have to see before you die. The chance is just right in front of your eye balls! Furthermore, we live in a country where it’s very seldom to have a super legendary band to come to your city. Psst, Blur’s set in Jakarta will be 2-hours long!

After reading the 5 ultimate reasons above, you might have an eye-opening moment and start realizing how must you have to attend the Big Sound Festival. Save your spate of “thank you” words to us, the only thing that you have to do now is rushing to the nearest ticket store or buy it online as soon as possible. See you at Big Sound Festival 2013!

Go to Dyandra Entertainment‘s website to know more about Big Sound Festival 2013

And today (February 19th), the promoter revealed another name to the current line-ups, The Temper Trap!

Blur are an English band which were formed in London in 1988. the group consists of (singer/keyboardist) Damon Albarn, (guitarist/singer) Graham Coxon, (bassist) Alex James and (drummer) Dave Rowntree. In 2008, Blur dediced to do a reunion for a concert at a London Hyde Park on July 3rd 2009. And, the latest Blur’s achievement was in Brit Awards 2012, the band were awarded for Outstanding Contribution to Music. In 2013, Blur are scheduled to headline Coachella Festival 2013.

Tegan and Sara are a Canadian indie-rock duo. Tegan and Sara are identical twin sisters. In 2013, Tegan and Sara nominated in Grammy Awards for “Best Long Form Music Video”.

The Temper Trap are an Australia-based indie rock band, The Temper debut their first Indonesia’s show in 2010. Last year, the Temper Trap got nominated for three nominations on  Aria Music Awards, and they scored two of them!

If you are a huge fan of Blur, this is a thing that definitely you don’t need another think coming about whether you should go or not to Big Sound Fest (FYI, this is the very first Blur’s appearance in Indonesia!). And,sure, Tegan and Sara and The Temper Trap are a kickass performer!. The presale tickets will be on sale on February 21st 2013 in a very limited number, so, game on! (Alcander Alonzo)

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Ticket Price :

Festival : (Presale) IDR 750.000 | (Normal) IDR 900.000

VIP         : (Presale) IDR 1.000.000 | (Normal) IDR 1.200.000

Tickets can be purchased via online February 21st 2013