Ikbal Lubys

At times when I think about directions, geographical or otherwise, I wonder to whose reference I should take. Or should I even have reference ? How we had traditionally been defined to be the South , East or Southeast, will always be of a reference to a particular world order that’s been set by a moribund ideology. But what if started taking a position eviscerated of direction – to a fracture where every second is a middle moment? That’s when we can begin appreciating and listening to something that is bereft of reference and colour. Hence, I am begining to think that the music of Tenggara Trio is like that experience . Perhaps I am lucky enough to have propably seen them play live the most number of times. And each encounter left me with a strange liberating feeling – that feeling of being lost – and then constanly finding my way around through the coalescing yet distinct layers of rythm, atonality, familiarity and obscurity, to find my self, one again , lost with no further for bearings. Yuen Chee Wai, July 2018