Ciptagelar Remixed

Spanning three continents and seven centuries, Ciptagelar Remixed has been a while in preparation.
Ciptagelar Remixed is a collaboration that spans time and borders.

Featuring a slew of western electronic producers in cooperation with the ancient kingdom of Ciptagelar, this album cross-fertilises old and new in weird and lush ways. Think and evening of junglist remixes of sacred mountain ronggeng chants, and hip hop remixes of traditional bamboo calung, other styles you probably haven’t heard of; because while this village is a close neighbour to Australia, only a very few foreigners ever visit.

Ciptagelar is a tiny community of thirty thousand Sundanese people from Gunung Halimun (“Misty Mountain”) in West Java, still living under traditional law seven hundred years after their foundation as an exiled fragment of the Padjadjaran kingdom. Although they still practice traditional systems of self-sufficient agriculture, these people are fearless in engaging with the outside world on their own terms. They have their own DIY TV-station, their own home-made sound systems, their own hydro power, their own drone-powered forestry monitoring, their own rice goddess and their own locally roasted coffee… They are incidentally, traditional custodians of the forest on Gunung Halimun, one of the last habitats of the Silvery Gibbon and under threat from logging by the rapacious Jakarta timber industry.

The village is in the throes of opening up. Recently they have been involved in court battles, in fair trade networks and… they have produced a video album of Sundanese pop songs about themselves and their idiosyncratic relationship with the modern world. Further, these folks have stepped it up to the internet age, and commissioned a remix album in collaboration with artists across Berlin, Sydney, Melbourne and Bandung. Styles include jungle, hip hop, reggae, industrial, ambient, electro and unclassifiably odd. This latest release includes a diversity of collaborators, such as

• avant industrialist Gail Priest
• bass-heavy beats maverick Anomie
• Indonesian death metal acapella Choir, Ensemble Tikoro
• Melbourne global beats artist Ruffle
• Div Ionic
• Jasmine Guffond
• Dan MacKinlay

Ciptagelar Remixed with be released at the launch party at 7pm at 107 Redfern St, Redfern, on the 29th of September 2017. There will be appearances by four of the participating remixers and screening of the original video album.

This project was organised by Dan MacKinlay, a.k.a. deciwave, with the help of Indonesian liaisons Gustaff Harriman Iskandar of Common Room Networks Foundation, and Robi Rusdiana of Telkom University.

For more information, contact: Dan MacKinlay, +61412671082, dan@danmackinlay.name, or visit the website below.