Dhany Saputra’s Blog

I spent my last day of Practical Apprentice (Kerja Praktek) by watching Dian PP’s live concert in I Like Monday Today’s Sensation - new Hard Rock Café Jakarta. When I came to the first floor I unexpectedly met Lusy Rahmawati was being congregated by the fans. I think there were still many time before the concert, so then I decided to talk just for a moment with her about music.

Then I went to the 2nd floor, and I found that the concert was still an hour later on. So I decided to sightsee around the café. There were many white-skinned women (compared with Surabaya, of course), many happy-walking bartenders, many well-known artists sat there, and so on. I was enjoying this situation when suddenly the entrance officer confirmed Bucket as my free-drink, and I said OK. But wait a minute, I thought I have a suspection on it. Then I asked him how many percent alcohol contained in this Bucket. And he said, “I think it’s around 10%”. And of course I swapped it to an orange squash, because my religion said that I’m not supposed to consume alcoholic beverage (even now I know that some people argue that orange squash is one of less alcoholic beverage, not a non-alcoholic beverage).

There I met my friends of the Jazzytunes Affiliation, where we customarily shared jazzy talks in the mailing list. And also I met Mr. Seno, producer of the latest Dian’s album.

The concert started at 23:00. There I saw many of Dian’s fans such as Vena Melinda and Ivan (her husband, both of them used to be Abang None Jakarta winner in 1995), Glenn Friedly (directly near me!!), Sonny Tulung (Famili 100), Ria Irawan (Tante Tuti), Sarah Azhari, Audy, Amanda, and Irianti Erningpraja. They were ready to see the concert.

1. The concert was opened with one of the hits of Dian’s first album, Indonesian Jazzy Vocal (1983), “Kubawa Kau Serta”. The band rocked it out!

“Kau dara semakin dewasa, di saat resah dan gelisah, kau dara pecinta bahagia, di saat kubawa kau serta”

2. Then he sang the most famous song of 80’s, “Melati di Atas Bukit”, still from his first and success album, in lovely jazz-bossanova style. Wow, it’s so cool man! It was a better arrangement than the original song. He sang well-jazz ornamentation in the mid melody, following the same note of the piano session. Then I remembered Ngobras on SCTV (when Tike Extravaganza was still an unfamous servant in that TV program and when Indra Safera was still alive), when Ahmad Dhani was the featuring star to be interviewed at the moment, then Ahmad Dhani said straightforwardly that he was an admirer of Dian PP, listening to his songs in their teenage, and collecting all Dian’s album, and while Dhani was told to play a grand piano and sang his favorite song (Melati Di Atas Bukit), Dian PP came into the room and continued the singing surprisingly, and both of them sang duet finishing the reffrain.

“Menari-nari aku di alam mimpi yang indah khayal, kukejar cinta tiada, aku cari-cari bayangan dirimu datang oh sayangku, kuingin jumpa”

3. Then Dian PP introduced his sister, Ika Ratih Puspa, to sing his brand new song from his newest album, “Dian PP Terbaik-Terbaik” (2004), entitled “Tak Kuasa”, you know, which clip was included many famous artists as cameo, including Ahmad Dhani, again. At the stage Dian joked that his sister was taller than him because of plenty mother’s milk given to her, meanwhile he didn’t get much so he continually looked for other’s breast. Hahaha …

“Aku tak kuasa menahan rasa, rasa yang melekat di dada menikam jantungku …”

4. Next, Dian sang just a bit of “Melayang”, which was composed by Dian and Deddy Dhukun as well as popularized by January Christy in her album “Melayang” (1987), and then let the new singer named Gya, surprisingly she was his niece, to sing this song. No longer than a month, Gya launched his first solo album “Semoga Kau Mengerti” and included “Melayang” in her album. I criticized and told about my admiration on her singing when she was in the audience crowd and I think she was so kind to spend more time to discuss about her singing.

“Melayang fikiranmu melayang, melayang khayalanmu melayang jauh, melayang anganmu melayang, terbawa asap nirwana”

5. Then Dian came back to the stage with Malyda, a singer which was known to be orbitted by Dian PP and Deddy Dhukun. Then she said to the audience, “Guess what will we sing together?” and of course the audience spontaneously answered “Semua Jadi Satu” from album “12 Bintang Idola” (1988). Then an eighties-uptempo song rock the cafe.

“Cinta adalah kenangan rasanya tak mudah dilupakan, cinta adalah kenangan indahnya tak dapat dibayangkan”

“Tangisan dan tawa serta riang canda berjuta benci juga rindu semua tumbuh jadi satu”

6. Then Malyda came back to the back stage, and Dian took his guitar (this was what I wait for in this concert, he and his guitar). He started to tell a story about his childhood. He has started to learn guitar since he was 11 years old. He was insisted by his friends to play a gig in his high school events frequently, but his teachers didn’t agree with him. And then Dian played one of two most-frequent song to be sung at that moment only with his accoustic guitar, without any music accompanyment, “Blackbird” from The Beatles.

After the audience gave applause, Dian continued his story about his admiration to John Lennon and Paul McCartney (The Beatles). The audience, including me, started to guess, what was the next song to sing. The most noisy applause started to appear when Dian said the title, “Here, There, and Everywhere”. For God’s sake!! Suddenly I was surprised, because you know, Dian sang one of my first arrangement score for ITS Choir, and sang it with a highly skilled vocal. More beautiful and romantic, especially due to his guitar plucking to be brought in jazz.

“Here … making each day of the year, changing my life with a wave of her hand, nobody can deny that there’s something there”

7. Then he continued to sing with his guitar. He sang a new song he wrote for Vena Melinda’s new album, released in September 2004, entitled “Selamanya”. But I think he sang more appropriately than Vena when I imagine Vena sang the song. Still, he sing accompanied by his romantic guitar plucking and sophisticated chord progression.

8. Then the curtain was closed for a while. Suddenly we heared a slap bass stamping played alone. After the bassist finished 2 bars then I recognized the song … “BOHONG”, from Dian’s trio album, “Kelompok 3 Suara - Bohong” (1992)!! Then gradually the curtain is opened and we could see duo 2D (Dian PP and Deddy Dhukun) sat in a sofa, accompanied by bass playing of Adi Darmawan and the band. A very noise standing offation was given to their gigs and the audience participate to sing. I was surprised because I’ve arranged this song to the score partiture for the ITS Miniconcert.

“Bohong … kamu tukang bohong … bohong … janjimu palsu … huu ……..”

9. Then both of them started to tell a story of how they wrote this song. Deddy asked one of the audience to go forward and kiss Deddy Dhukun. Also, this very cohesive duo of the late eighties acted as if Deddy was Deddy Corbuzier and Dian as the MC. And of that fake show, we can conclude that the magic Deddy showed was a fake (BOHONG).

10. Afterwards, a sweet most famous bossanova entitled “Keraguan” from their duo album “2D - Keraguan” (1987) was played sweetly and interactively.

“Percayalah kasih, untukmu kar’namu kuberjanji, slamanya sehidup dan semati, apapun yang nanti kan terjadi”

11. When seeing Glenn in the standing audience crowd, Dian and Deddy spontaneously commanded Glenn to come up stage and to give him jacket of 2D. In this unplanned part of the concert, Dian and Deddy left Glenn in the stage alone to sing a song from Dian PP. Out of the plan, a confused Glenn sang Bohong in his own style (R&B). Due to less attractiveness, Dian spontaneously came out to the stage and sang a famous romantic 2D that I’ve never heard, and Glenn directly sang with him, and I think this was one of the most beautiful duet ever after. The audience suddenly screamed hysterically after they had finished the song. Note that at that time, Glenn was of the peak of his famousity.

12. After that, Dian move out from the stage and then suddenly came Melly Goeslaw singing “5 Menit Lagi” from Dian PP’s solo album “5 Menit Lagi” (1987). This originally jazz song was arranged by the band just like Potret’s “Terbujuk”.

“Resah hatiku tak gembira, angan terasa jauh sudah, tinggal waktu yang sebentar, 5 menit lagi kau sendiri”

13. The show was continued with Pongky Jikustik singing “Sebelum Aku Pergi” from duo Dian and Deddy’s album “Sebelum Aku Pergi” (1995). The song was originally a mellow slow rock but Pongky made it rock ala Bon Jovi. Wow, it’s cool. And then I just realized that, everybody in the audience crowd could sing the song well without any mistakes, even though they are still seventeen.

“Sebelum aku pergi, kutitipkan cinta dan kerinduan jangan sampai hilang, sebelum aku pergi, kutitipkan segalanya padamu dan hanya padamu kasih”

14. Subsequently, Dian sang Jikustik’s hits, “Setia”, taken from album “Jikustik - Setia (2002)”, duet with Pongky .

“Dan bila pagi datang, kutahu kau tak di sampingku, aku masih di sini untuk setia”

15. Malyda came back to the stage to sing Biru, composed by Dian and Deddy Dhukun, from Vina Panduwinata’s solo album “Cium Pipiku” (1988) in a new arrangement as in album “Terbaik Terbaik” (2004).

“Tiada pernah aku bahagia sebahagia kini oh kasih, sepertinya kubermimpi dan hampir tak percaya hadapi kenyataan ini”

16. Finally the concert was closed with the most hit and well-known song of 2D, “Masih Ada”, from album “2D - Masih Ada” (1989). This song was rearranged in Warna’s many others’ recent album. And all performers came out and sang this song together. And surprisingly, Dian PP was Pongky’s favorite singer and it was proved by mimicing Dian’s voice, dominating the vocal group. Deddy Dhukun also jumped from the stage to give the mic to one of the audience randomly and surprisingly her voice was so nice. Everybody in the stage was surprised too. But then Deddy was flustered of his inability to came back upward to the stage. Then Dian give their hand to help Deddy.

“Haruskah kuteteskan air mata di pipi, haruskah kucurahkan s’gala isi di hati”

After the concert, I discuss many things PRIVATELY with them in the backstage. I asked tips of writing and arranging song. And I was also given a Chromatic Tuner by Dian, as a gift and souvenir from him. Wow, what a nice experience.