Hujan, to big for mainstream to ignore

No doubt that Hujan is currently the ‘it’ band at the moment. Creating stirs in the underground music scene and at the same time taking the mainstream by storm.

You’ve heard their songs played on the airwave. You’ve seen them sell out gigs. Though Hujan was only formed about two years ago, their rise to fame has been unprecedented. In fact, they are the most talked-about act to emerge in recent memory, an indie band too big for the mainstream to ignore.

Hujan’s rise to fame reminds me of OAG during the 90s, just before the whole underground scene turn against them. I’ll probably be getting a lot of hate mails for comparing Hujan to OAG, I’m prepared. OAG also starts out to be the darling indie band adored by the underground scene before the mainstream makes them into the ‘poster band’ as they went on a fame and popularity roller-coster ride.

Noh ‘the hero’, Hujan’s frontman admitted in an interview that the band started out with nothing more then a MySpace page. Now, the band get radio plays, invited to perform on events and even on television, they also got to perform at Sunburst KL Music Festival sharing the event with international acts like Incubus, The Roots and such. These days, it seems that a MySpace page or a YouTube channel might just be enough.

Hujan’s fans are known as ‘Raingers’. The band name, Hujan, translates to English means ‘rain’, not to be confuse with that Korean guy with a similar name. Hujan’s fan are renowned for their devotion to the band. You can see a sizeable audience on almost every show they play on.

Fans devotion to fill up the hall each time Hujan performed is great, but rising enough money to bring the band to perform in UK has to be the one of the highlights of the band career, so far.

A group of Hujan fans calling themselves ‘Kugiran Hujan Ke UK Foundation’ was determined to make it posible for Hujan to perform in UK. Through the selling of CDs and other Hujan merchandise, they had managed to rise the money needed for Hujan to perform in UK for their UK fans, most of them are Malaysian students studying in UK.

Great success doesn’t mean that everyone loves you. I’m pretty sure there are people who thinks Bono is annoying. Hujan could not run away from negativity either. There was at one time an anti-Hujan movement that starts off as nothing but a simple MySpace page.

All the negativity against Hujan leads to an incident at a gig in Johor Bahru where the band had performed recently. The crowd booed and chanted “fuck you” while the band was performing. Hujan was only able to play one song. Some said that it was a response to a statement made by Hujan frontman, Noh in a gig before this one. I do not have the background knowledge to comment on this any further.

The little incident however doesn’t change the fact that there still legions of Raingers and the numbers are increasing. To them Hujan is unique, fresh, and offered something different. To me, Hujan’s music isn’t as groundbreaking, different as one might suggest.

I see Hujan as one part The Strokes, a little bit of British post-punk influences bundle with smart lyrics and catchy tunes. What differentiate Hujan form the rest is its charisma, style and coolness, something you will notice when they perform on stage. Hujan is a stage band, more comfortable on stage then in studios. You can see in almost every weekend the band will be playing at several shows in Klang Valley and all over Malaysia.

The band’s rapid rise to popularity might cause some to speculate that the band is abandoning its independent roots and are embracing the mainstream fame. Labels have come knocking too, but in a magazine interview, Hujan doesn’t seem too keen on making any deals anytime soon. They like taking care of their own business. I would like to see Hujan stays indie forever, but it wont be easy for the band to do that.

Search and download their songs on the Internet. Buy their EPs. Go to their gigs. The same songs you get from the Internet, from the EP and what you hear at their gigs are different, in a good way. Get them all.

Here are some tracks form Hujan :-