The drummer crushed his cymbals. The bassist scratched his guitar. The crowd raised their index and pinky fingers in approval. The singer and guitarist walked up to the microphone and shouted, “Our bodies are not public property!” » And dozens of fans threw themselves into a frenzy for the hijab-wearing heavy metal trio.
“We have no room for sexist thinking,” singer Firda Kurnia shouted into the microphone, singing the chorus of one of the group’s hit songs.(Not) public property”, during a performance in December in Jakarta, the Indonesian capital.
Almost a decade after its first appearance, Voice of Baceprot (pronounced Bachey-PROT, meaning “noise” in Sundaneseone of the major languages spoken in Indonesia) has gained a large national audience with songs focused on progressive themes such as women’s empowerment, pacifism and environmental conservation.
Today, he is also gaining fans abroad. He was praised by Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine. Last year, the group – whose lyrics mix English, Indonesian and Sundanese – performed in the United States, France and the Netherlands.
At the Jakarta concert, Ms. Firda, 23, known as Marsya, told the crowd that the group was “a little sad and angry to hear that someone here had been a victim of catcalling.”
“Anyone who does something like that, whistles or touches someone else’s body without their consent, those are the worst forms of crime,” she said. “Therefore, we look forward to cursing this person through the next song.” And then the band played “PMS», whose refrain is in Indonesian:
“Though I am not as virgin as the Virgin Mary/I am not your rotten servant/Though I am not as virgin as the Virgin Mary/I am free, completely free.”
Voice of Baceprot may be the only prominent heavy metal band in Indonesia whose members wear hijabs, but the heavy metal music scene has been established here for a long time. Jakarta hosts Hammersonic, Southeast Asia’s largest annual heavy metal music festival. The outgoing president, Joko Widodo, is a fan of Metallica and Megadeth.
The members of Voice of Baceprot are all practicing Muslims in their twenties. With songs that break gender, religious and class stereotypes, they have become role models for many young Indonesian women. At the concert, many fans jeered and banged their heads to the music.
Still, the group has faced criticism. Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, is not a theocratic state and has always cherished its secular identity, but in recent years some parts of the sprawling archipelago have adopted a more conservative interpretation of Islam – an interpretation that disapproves of young women wearing the hijab. play heavy metal.
“They faced criticism and intimidation of all kinds, but that did not affect their determination to make music,” said Karim, a 54-year-old fan who traveled from Bogor to Jakarta for the December concert. Like many Indonesians, he uses a single name.
The members of the group — Marsya; drummer Euis Siti Aisyah, known as Sitti; and Widi Rahmati, the bassist, were all born and raised in Garut, a conservative part of West Java province.
Their parents are farmers. The house where Marsya grew up still has no running water and the internet is spotty. Their childhood was spent reading the Quran, playing games in the rice fields and listening to their parents’ favorite music, dangdut – a flavor of Indonesian pop.
The girls met as high school students at an Islamic school, where they called each other “troublemakers.”
In 2014, they were sent to Cep Ersa Eka Susila Satia, a teacher who first tried to introduce them to theater. But “their behavior was horrible,” said Mr. Ersa, whom the women call “Abah Ersa” or “Father Ersa.”
He asked them to play music instead and they were part of a group of 15 students who tried their hand at pop music. Then one day, the three girls borrowed Mr. Ersa’s laptop and discovered his playlist. They played “Toxicity,“, the hit song by American Armenian metal band System of a Down, and they were immediately hooked.
They asked Mr. Ersa to teach them how to play, and they began covering popular heavy metal songs and posting videos of their performances online. They were a success.
Wendi Putranto, the manager of Seringai, one of Indonesia’s biggest heavy metal bands, remembers being “blown away.”
“It’s very brave of them to play this kind of music,” Mr. Wendi said. “I think that’s the most important thing: that they show people that yes, we are women, yes, we wear hijabs and yes, we are Muslim women who play heavy metal. So what?”
At the beginning, women were insulted of all kinds. The group offended many Muslim men who believed women wearing hijabs should be docile and not bang their heads on metal. One day in 2015, someone threw a rock at Marsya. Attached was a note with an expletive.
They also had problems at school, where they were considered “public enemies,” Sitti, 23, said. Their manager told the girls, Marsya recalls, “‘Your music is haram’ or forbidden, and that they were ‘I’m going to hell.’ They dropped out, but eventually graduated from another school.
The hostility took its toll. “We told Abah that we were tired and wanted to stop playing music because of that,” Marsya said. “And Abah said, ‘Why bother with humans? Just ask God directly.
This led to their success 2021 song “God, Please Let Me Play Music”. Mr. Ersa wrote the lyrics and the women composed the music. They now write their own lyrics, but continue to seek guidance from Mr. Ersa.
Last year, the group toured the West for the first time, performing in France, the Netherlands and nine cities in the United States. In Oakland, California, fans in the audience shouted “Allahu akbar,” the Arabic phrase meaning “God is great.”
For those trips, they said, their management company advised them not to go out without a guard to ensure their safety.
“They were afraid someone would shoot us,” Ms. Widi, 22, said.
Women say frequent questions about their headscarves have left them confused. “Many journalists asked more questions about the hijab than about our music, like: ‘Who forced you to wear a hijab?’ “, Marsya said. “It was so weird.”
“We tell them that we wear the hijab because we want to,” she added. “And at first, yes, our parents told us to try wearing the hijab, but once we grow up, we can choose whatever we want.”
The women say they started wearing the hijab in elementary school. “But we wore miniskirts: the top was the Arabic version, the bottom was the Japanese version!” » said Marsya, laughing.
The women said they wanted to continue focusing their upcoming songs on female empowerment and the environment. “We are worried about our future: will we still be able to see the forest in 10 years? » asked Marsya.
Many girls in their village are pressured to marry very young, some as young as 12. “We realize now that it is a privilege for us to be heard by many people,” she added. “That’s what not every girl in our village can have.”
Hasya Nindita reports contributed.
