Imagine when a DJ collides with a great flamenco guitarist. What would the music be? Max Don,  a famous DJ in the dance circuit collided with Yeppi Romero, a famous guitarist who could bring the authentic flamenco naturally. This is one of the interesting collaboration to chek out, as they joined hand in a collaboration called Electro Funk Latin. It turned out to be a cool house music mix party with Romero’s playful touch on all kind of songs thrown from the turn table. It was highly entertaining as they both turned the Java Soulnation Festival into a dance club.

Boogiemen is a group with interesting concept to talk about. Originally formed in Bandung 4 years ago, this group know how to bring the soul and jazz to fit perfectly to their hip hop style as the main flavor. They carry one simple mission: representing Indonesia in the international music industry, and have a goal to take Indonesian Hip Hop back on the right track. They brilliantly combine the old-school hip hop, R&B, soul, funk, jazz flavors and guitar distorsions in addictive live performances. Te group consists of the famous DJ Cream, Rudy Silfa and Mistah (Matt Santos). DJ Cream has tasted how it feels to collaborate with many international artists such as Brian McKnight, Ja Rule, Craig David, The Prodigy, Kenny Dope, Quentin Harris, Naughty by Nature, Jazzy Jeff and Grandmaster Flash just to name a few. This talent combined with Mistah who stepped on to Jakarta underground hip hop scene since 2002 and has established himself well up to this day, and Rudi, a fine soul/RnB vocalist who is deeply inspired by Motown artists. Joining them was Homegrown, continuing their mesmerizing performance at last year’s Java Soulnation Festival plus Dira J Sugandi with her third appearance for tonight and Nikita Dompas. Having jazz layers behind hip hop enabled their performance to become one of the final show for this year’s festival.

The Grammy Award winning and multi platinum selling artist, a composer, an actor and also one of the most popular rappers worldwide, Leon Ivey Jr famously known as  Coolio has finally landed in Indonesia. All these quality blends with highly entertaining and captivating, bold personality, making himself standout as one of the best rappers of all time. Perhaps the ultimate hit “Gangsta’s Paradise” will always be the song people would remember him for. This song which was used for Dangerous Minds OST was the first rap single to sell over a million copies in UK alone. Gangsta’s Paradise also brought Stevie Wonder‘s “Pastime Paradise” (1976) back on the surface again, simply because it sampled the chorus and music of this Stevie Wonder’s hit. It’s clearly seen that he has many fans in Indonesia, as his show at the Java Soulnation Festival 2010 was fully crowded.

“This Soulnation Festival is full of spirit”, Coolio told us. “Not like the average festival that people just come and go, I can clearly see that people are here because of the music.” Then he went on explaining more about his passion into the hip hop music. “Some people only look for cash, but we are making music for people, we love what we do.” For tonight he said he would bring fusion, including jazz. Jazz? Yes, jazz. For us that’s a great news! Coolio went on talking about jazz futher. “I like to have jazz as a twist, giving a new element and mixing it with the old elements, with jazz to bring the nuance just like in the 80′s. By giving the element of jazz, we’re trying to show the freedom, as freedom is the key to life music. Hip Hop, funk, jazz, all need freedom. For me, jazz is like the air, it’s so important that you can’t breath without it.” And Goast, one of the personnel of Coolio added “Mixing jazz into the hip hop would seal it into whole.”

And that was what he gave on stage. It was highly interactive and entertaining. Jarez’ saxophone gave jazz delights on Coolio’s show. Coolio showed that he’s still a showstopper in everyway. He delivered many songs including “If I Was Your Boyfriend” and of course the ultimate hit “Gangsta’s Paradise”. Just as the last show for this year’s Java Soulnation Festival 2010, it reached the climax when the whole Les Nubians‘ team and also Akil joined on stage dancing together. Coolio gave one memorable ending to the event, wrapping the whole 2 days show to perfection.

Two blasting days of party has served at Istora Senayan through the third Java Soulnation Festival. Just as promised before, this time we got the chance to see the soul world wider than ever. The Java Festival Production has successfully stretched the soul so far to reach many other related genres. We saw unique collaboration, surprising projects with so many unpredictable twists and turns.  Simply Red gave the unforgettable touching moment which brought tears to some audiences’ eyes, while some other group entertained the crowds to maximum satisfaction. It was a festival for all, despite of the musical taste, age, gender or status. It was a grand party, a sheer extacy, a spectacular one. This wraps up our full report for 2 days of the AHA Java Soulnation Festival 2010. Kudos to the Java Festival Production for making a memorable event like this. We hope to see you again next year! Keep the soul alive, yes, our souls like it indeed.

See more pictures:

Reporter: Riandy Kurniawan, Ata Michaella, Ardhi Saputro, Muhammad Fadhly, Vierna Mariska
Photographer: I Putu Surya KB, Febrian Dirga, Omar Arif Maulana

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