Photo from instagram.com/Jawirsex

On 20 December 2024, three young artists, Tenxi, Naykilla and Jemsii, released their first single, “Garam dan Madu” (Salt and Honey), on YouTube. Their video went viral instantly, garnering more than 31 million views in just a month.

On Spotify, the world’s largest music streaming service, their debut single topped the Top 50 Indonesia and Malaysia Top 40 charts, second only to “Anugrah Terindah” by Andmesh and “Rahsia Tuhan” by Noh Salleh. The trio are currently on a tour nationwide, with gigs in nightclubs in major cities like Banjarmasin, Jakarta, Malang, Batam, Yogyakarta, Palangkaraya, Semarang, Lombok and Surabaya.

“Garam dan Madu” is clearly gaining popularity among the Gen Zs. But what is it about the song that appears to have enamoured a generation so saturated by an unlimited stream of digital content?

In many interviews, Tenxi and Naykilla openly describe their music as hip-dut, a blend of hip-hop (a music genre that emerged among the black American community in 1970s New York) and dangdut (the idiosyncratically  Indonesian folk fusion music that also emerged in the 1970s). Dangdut combines the sounds from Indian, Melayu, Arabic and Western cultures with indigenous Indonesian traditions to create an intoxicating blend of melodies, rhythms and harmonies.

Like all genres, hip-dut is not for everyone. Some find the lyrics of “Garam dan Madu” too vulgar, immoral even (it’s a song about having an affair). Dangdut fans are not happy that the song, they say, contains only a few elements of dangdut, while non-dangdut fans, perhaps pejoratively, call the genre “musik kabupaten” (regional or provincial music), a local term used to describe low brow music for the unrefined masses.

Regardless of its pros and cons, the song is phenomenal. It did not take long before the trio were anointed by netizens as the poster boys and girl of dangdut Gen-Z.  While hip-dut is not an entirely new genre (it is part of a long history of dangdut), the song’s release is, without doubt, a landmark moment in Indonesia’s music scene.
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Why ‘Garam dan Madu’ is a big hit

Tenxi, Naykilla and Jemsii are not dangdut musicians. While both Tenxi and Naykilla are from East Java, where the dangdut koplo scene is thriving, they are not necessarily dangdut lovers or influenced by the genre. Tenxi is a hip-hop singer from Sidoarjo, and Naykilla is an RnB/pop singer from Surabaya. Jemsii, meanwhile, is a Jakarta-based producer. The song was also recorded in Jakarta, not Surabaya or Sidoarjo.

That said, it is in fact their relative detachment from the dangdut koplo scene that I believe made their music collaboration work well. It enables them to explore the dangdut subgenre of hip-dut, which has been around for decades in Indonesia’s dangdut scene.

That explains why the song has been well received by Indonesians, particularly among the Gen Zs. It sounds familiar to their ears despite its novelties.

Fourteen years ago, NDX AKA, a hip-hop dangdut group from Yogyakarta made a splash on the local music scene with songs such as “Sayang” and “Kimcil Kepolen”. A decade earlier, the rap element of dangdut was popularised by dangdut singer Alam, with his widely popular song, “Mbah Dukun”.

And long before Alam, there were Farid Hardja with “Ini Rindu” and Fahmi Shahab with “Kopi Dangdut”. The latter also introduced disco-dangdut, which has less kendang-ketipung sound.

“Garam dan Madu” uses the same formula as the older hip-dut songs —  they simply change the beat of kendang with electronic beats. Again, this is certainly not new. This formula was used by Jeffry Bule, who dominated the dangdut scene in the 1980s, and also Feel Koplo, Jono Joni, Y-Dra and Prontaxan in the 2010s and 2020s.

However, “Garam dan Madu” is not entirely derivative. It has its own idiosyncrasies that make it more appealing to the younger generation.
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Why hip-dut sees its revival among Gen Zs

“Garam dan Madu” combines hip-hop, house, and dangdut — and that is still a novelty in the dangdut scene. If you listen to the song, you will hear the beat of kendang sounds replaced by digitalised or sampled kendang sounds (this would be a problem for dangdut koplo groups since, for that genre, the kendang must be played in person to gain ‘liveness’). The complexity of instruments in dangdut songs produced by Rhoma Irama or Denny Caknan is now replaced by simple keyboards and hip-hop drumbeats.

But what sets the song apart is that it is played in a slower tempo beat, unlike the other hip-dut songs that are played fast. As a kendang player, I can say it sounds like the chalte tabla technique, which leads to a slower and swing tempo than the dense and full beat of the kendang koplo technique.

While the beat is slow, that doesn’t mean the song is mawkish. On the contrary, its more upbeat lyrics are a welcome respite for dangdut lovers who have become tired of sappy love songs about broken hearts and unrequited love (thanks a lot, Didi Kempot, the Godfather of the Broken-hearted, for starting the trend!). Indonesians call the mood associated with that kind of song ambyar, which means broken or shattered.

Tenxi, Naykilla and Jemsii are unapologetic about what they are singing about: the joy of having an illicit affair and leaving one lover for another. In Indonesian Gen Z lingo, the song promotes the notion of  cogil-cegil, which refers to an anti-establishment and no-nonsense attitude. That the lyric is written in three languages — Indonesian, English and Javanese — only makes it more relatable to the multilingual, Tik Tok-crazed Gen Zs (though I must say the use of Javanese language in the song’s lyrics is insignificant, mere tokenism).

Their low budget, DIY music video is also a factor. It shows the singers having a chill time with friends at home. That resonates deeply with many Gen-Z, who have long been accused of being the lazy generation by their seniors. In Indonesia, they are called the kaum rebahan (bed-rotting people) or nolep (no life) generation.

But is hip-dut really dangdut, though?

Not everyone is convinced that hip-dut is dangdut. Are Tenxi, Naykilla and Jemsii really playing dangdut music? Are they part of the dangdut scene? These questions always pop up whenever there is a newcomer to the scene, as we can see from dangdut history.

The Queen of Dangdut Koplo, Inul Daratista, had it worse. In 2001, she ruffled the feathers of dangdut old guards with her controversial ‘drilling dance’. The King of Dangdut himself, Rhoma Irama, along with the Indonesian Association of Dangdut Artists (PAMDI), blasted her dance — and by association, dangdut koplo as a dangdut subgenre — as pornographic.
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Even now, Rhoma is still refusing to recognise dangdut koplo as a legitimate dangdut sub-genre. This is reflected by the fact that he refers to the new dangdut koplo icon, Via Vallen, as only a “phenomenal millennial singer”.

This kind of rejection also happens every time an artist introduces new elements into the dangdut scene. A case in point is the Yogyakarta-based dangdut koplo band, Wawes Band, which has a male singer, when the genre has long been dominated by female singers. There was even a moment when the audience asked them to Wawes Band to stop playing and swap the band’s front man for female singers.

It is also worth noting that Rhoma himself was chided when he introduced rock dangdut in the 1970s with his group, Soneta. Many Orkes Melayu (Malay dangdut groups) disapproved of his changing the way dangdut is played, along with its musical expressions, its lyrics and its instrumentation.

Tenxi, Naykilla dan Jemsii have extended the legacy of hip-dut and remix-house-music dangdut, or disco dangdut, which have long had a huge audience. In 1995, Rhoma Irama had even classified dangdut into three sub-genres: classic dangdut, creative dangdut (he put his group, Soneta, in this classification), and disco dangdut.

“Garam dan Madu” is part of the long history of dangdut in the country. It epitomises the very essence of dangdut, which is about absorbing, mixing and blending new sounds and styles in every era. It is a testament to dangdut’s adaptability and versatility.

Dangdut is more than just a music genre that makes your hips move. It is a cultural expression that represents all kinds of people. It can represent you, me or anyone else, whether they are boomers, Gen X, Millennials, Gen Zs, or even a new generation yet to come.

*The author would like to thank the National Library of Australia for allowing him to conduct archival research for this article.    

   

 

 

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