Jakarta based underground label – Space.Rec. – has been around for 5 years. However despite its considerably young age it has shown signs of enormous promise and potential representing a group of talented artists from the city. Introducing artists such as Space System, Voyagers of Icarie and Svarghi, this label is refreshingly original and take their music and art very seriously.

They  seem to be doing something right since one of their artists has been gaining international attention. After releasing their first album last year, Space System recently collaborated with Italian dance label Pizzico Records and released their first 12”. This year another highly anticipated release from Space System is their collaboration with the legendary DJs/producers from Glasgow, Optimo .

On this occasion we had a brief chat with the very laid back founders of Space.Rec – Pattra, Ojon & Aryo – and tried to get a sense of their plans for the label.

Q: What made you decide to set up Space.Rec?

We actually had the idea of setting up Space.Rec since we started Space System in 2005. At the time we wanted to manage and explore our work through Space System in a certain way, especially in distributing it. There were several major and indie labels that we looked into, but in the end we felt we would get more freedom and satisfaction if we did it ourselves. So a year later we decided to go for it despite our lack of experience about the whole music industry. Ever since we can tell you for sure it’s been a constant and challenging learning curve for us yet it has been very gratifying as well.

Q: What are you expecting to achieve through this label?

Basically what we’re trying to do is for Space.Rec to become a music label that can function as a conducive platform for the music industry here. We want to be able to recognise that each type of music that we represent has its own audience no matter how big or small it is. Based on that we feel obliged to continuously support and distribute that music to the right audience. So even if a certain music only has a small following we hope that with careful and proper management the music will continue to strive.

Q: Who are your artists at the minute?

So far we’ve collaborated with Space System, Voyagers of Icarie, Curah Melodia Mandiri, Svarghi, Iblis Kotor, Ghaust, a Fine-Tuning Creation and Kusuma. We also have artists coming up like Duck Dive, Komodo, Dynomonk, REI, I Wayan Sadra, Suarasama and Rhythm Salad Music League.

Q: Any exciting projects coming up?

Quite a few yes, and all of them are exciting! Haha..
The way we see it all our artists carry the potential to express their ideas objectively. So it doesn’t matter whether they’re well-known or not, local or global etc.

But our most anticipated one is the launch of our 2 projects which are ‘Music Composition by I Wayan Sadra’ and an album collaboration called ‘Mashed’ by Curah Melodia Mandiri.

Q: Did you guys come up with your own artwork? They look very iconic. Are there any philosophies behind your design?

We do most of the artwork ourselves and we also welcome other collaborations. The design philosophy is simply to represent the artist’s vision. It’s certainly not meant to be iconic, but maybe there is a certain style that we (undeliberately) go for.

Q: Has it been challenging trying to get your label/music heard?

Yeah it has been pretty challenging; but that’s also what motivates us to keep going.
There are so many talented artists in Indonesia and we would like to collaborate with all of them if we can. But unfortunately at the end of the day we can only work with artists who share a common ground with us. And we strongly feel that for our artists’ work to be heard, we have to have a mutual understanding that it can take a lot of patience, commitment and a thorough understanding concept wise. Once we get that sorted then we can start working on the aesthetics.

So yes it has been quite a difficult process but we believe this is just the beginning to a great end.

Q: How did Space System collaboration with Pizzico and Optimo come about?

Niccolo Bruni (Billy Bogus/Pizzico Records) got in touch with us through MySpace in 2008. He was interested to release a track from Space System. A year later we finished the latest version of ‘Master of the Sky’ and offered it to Pizzico, and Niccolo agreed to release it under his label.

As for Optimo it says on their website that ”if you know of a band/act that you think would go down well, then send us an email”. Even though we know the chances of us performing on that side of the world is pretty slim because we are based so far away here in Jakarta, we decided to send them a  copy of Space System’s Nature anyway, along with the ‘‘Mysteries’ compilation. Not long after JD Twitch contacted us saying he was interested in releasing a 12” of 2 of our tracks ‘Sorrow show’ (from Mysteries compilation) and Petik (from Nature) which are going to be released under Optimo Music.

Q: I can’t help noticing that you guys are  also involved in projects like Live at Rossi and Sacred Bridge Foundation. Can you tell us more about that?

Live at Rossi is a collective performing art collaboration that takes place in the ROSSI building. It’s organised by the community in ROSSI which are us (Space.Rec), the guys from “Pesta Mikro” (8-bit community) and “Jenggo Movement” (rock community).

Sacred Bridge Foundation (http://www.sacred-bridge.org) is not our project but we’re involved in it and support the programs that they’re doing. It’s a cultural body that gets a lot of support from UNESCO. One of its program is called Rhythm Salad which is a music clinic for everyone in the Indonesian music industry with the intention to build an understanding, roots, attitudes and good inter-relations within hopefully a well-structured music industry. As part of this project we formed a music collaboration called Rhythm Salad League with Space System as one of the group members.

Q: What are your hopes for the music scene in Jakarta or Indonesia even?

Our hope and dream is for music in Indonesia to gain its credibility back and be heard all over the world.

Pictures taken at LIVE at Rossi, Jakarta. November 24,2010. Featured Duckdive, Space System and Hendrikus Wisnugroho, Svarghi, Gerhan.

Words: Renata Maris

Photos: Regan H.

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