The city of Bandung has a special thing from its own music atmosphere. This special feature contributes lots of colour in Indonesian music scene. Bandung’s own musicians and their works often become an example and reference for other musicians in the country. Likewise with the Jamaican sound scenesters from this city. Kultur had the opportunity to do an interview with Danil Usman, one of the dub & reggae leaders from Bandung.

Danil, who was born in 1980, is one of the active figures behind several music outfit of Jamaican sound from Bandung. He is known as the guitarist of the enchanted reggae band, The Paps. Together with Terranova Waksman he brought a special touch of dub with their own Anjing Dub. He also has another dub project called Kusni Kasdut. And one more thing, he is the founder and owner of the musical imprint Dub House Records.

Talking about The Paps, a reggae band with a militant fan base, he explained, “Dave and Erik are the founders of The Paps, I just joined the gang (as guitar players) in 2007.” Even so, Danil has been involved since the beginning of this outfit. He remembers that it all started because of the jamming session between The Paps’ early members at a couple art schools in Bandung.

“At that time, 2001-2005, I was still the drummer for (the band) The Panas Dalam, I often watched The Paps (which at that time was an 11 pieces band and did their jam session). Until finally I was asked to arrange a production schedule for them after introducing The Paps with a producer.”

After that, he supported The Paps as an audio engineer and officially became one of the production team members.

Danil said that his introduction to reggae music had actually happened since he was little. From his brother, he had heard Bob Marley‘s songs (even though he didn’t understand that it was reggae music). Even when he started his artistic journey, he didn’t touch reggae yet. “When I was in middle school, I played Sex Pistols’ songs, like ‘Silly Thing’ and the The Clash’ repertoire,” explained Danil with a laugh. It wasn’t until 2003 that he found an interest in reggae.

For Danil, his existence in the band and interacting with other personnel is the top form of artistry. He said, with The Paps, the interaction between personnel was dialectical. The communal or collective ideas are so very special to him.

About the formula for The Paps, Danil shared, “We could spend one shift alone to find the pattern of the drum. We can even add more shifts the next day if the band still doesn’t feel right.”

This is one of the reasons for him about making art in a band become his preference. Even so, artistic expression for him must still be delivered as well. Danil shares his philosophy about Jamaican sound for him to kultur.

“I really believe, the passion that anyone is carrying out today will bring results for them in the future”

Together with The Paps, Danil also found his musical satisfaction. However, he also continues to deliver his personal expression. For this, he actualized it with “Anjing Dub”, a dub unit he ran with Terranova Waksman. This Live PA duet is known for their ingenuity in delivering renditions of popular songs so it is easy to enjoy on the dance floor in jamaican sound gigs. “Anjing Dub” has released “Gembira”, their debut in 2019.

Danil added that his introduction to the dub started with King Tubby. About dub, he argues:

“Something that is needed for art is the space. I found a lot of space in dub. And the love is growing even more after knowing and learning the culture in dub.”

There was an incident that became a trigger for him to learn more about dub music. Because the computer for the production equipment they used to use was damaged, forcing Danil to continue production with the rest of the tools he had. This has made him known as one of the dub acts in Indonesia which predominantly uses analogue equipment in every show.

This incident is also the background for “Kusni Kasdut“, a very ‘good-times’ oriented musical project he is running with the front man of The Paps, Dave Syauta. Run only with the tools he addressed as “very minimalist.” Again, Danil recalls that he and Dave were inspired by King Tubby for this project. Having aspirations to become an electronic music unit, this duet has a strong dub touch. 

Music references are so important to Danil. He admitted that he was lucky because he could find them in his city, Bandung. Sometimes in the form of gifts from friends who returned from abroad. Before the internet was easy to access, he said, he often got interesting releases from one Cassette/CD seller in the corner of the city of Bandung which sold various releases that were not easily found in established record stores. An ‘unofficial’ music source that not only shares lots of references to the city of Bandung, it even reaches out to other cities in Indonesia.

Danil agrees that Bandung has produced many charming musical figures. Some of them are present “on the surface”, even though some are not, still, they have a big database and capable works. Currently, Rub Of Rub, a Bandung based music outfit  has really caught his attention. He answered a question from kultur about how the dub and reggae scene is in Bandung.

Danil also runs a musical imprint which he named “Dub House Records“. Anjing Dub’s full album was released by this musical imprint. Also his solo project with the moniker Dnl FX. In addition, Dub House Records has undertaken a big effort to archive the talents from Indonesian dub scene. This project is called Nusantara Dub Connection, a various artists LP featuring dub producers and musicians from Aceh to Bali and Makassar.

Danil Usman, is indeed a figure from the reggae and dub scene from Bandung who owns lots of portofolio. He shared his voice, words and power as if he had full energy to carry out all these passions. And, all of them are powerful!
(Sam)