Return of Butterfingers

They left us in 2004, leaving us with their album “Selamat Tinggal Dunia“, in English it says “Good Bye World”. Now they are back with an album “Kembali“, a Malay word for “Return”.

In the early days, Butterfingers is the epitome of ’90s indie rock/grunge scene. As a Nirvana fan, it was easy for me to dig Butterfingers’ music. During the 90’s, Butterfingers homegrown ‘Seattle grunge scene’. I was still in my secondary schooling days.

Formed in late 1993, with the line up, Loque (songwriter, guitarist), Emmett (vocals, guitar and lyricist), Kadak (bass) and Kalai (drums) they hit the underground scene with such vengeance, that one could only describe as ‘the stuff of underground legends’. Most of their shows were sold out.

Even though during this time the Seattle grunge scene slowly fading away after the death of Kurt Cobain, and making way for more melodic and less angst bands, but the Malaysian youth were far from over with grunge.

In 1996 Butterfingers released their first album ‘1.2 Milligrams’. This grungy Nirvana-esque album, was widely accepted by their strong rapid growing fan-base. Even as of today, I still think this is one of the best english album coming from our local underground acts.

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Naive Sick Chasm

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Royal Jelly

They followed up with another album release, ‘Butter Worth Pushful’, this time more intricate but still grungy. This album strengthened their following. “Nirvana reincarnated”, that was what everyone was saying at that time.

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Girl Friday

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Fire Is A Curse

It’s clear that they do not wish to be under the shadow of Nirvana forever. In 1999, we see them transcends into another level with their third album ‘Transcendence’. This album showcased massive songwriting potential. This was when they break away from their Nirvana mold. This brought Butterfingers to the peak of their popularity. This was also when the mainstream starts noticing them.

Transcendence sales was and admirable feat for a local English band at that time. It gives American and British imports a run for their money.

Following up with Transcendence, they release ‘Butter Late Then Never’, which is just a collection of old live tracks and some previously unreleased songs.

Coming into the new millennium, Butterfingers release an epic album, Malayneum, showcasing some of the most impressive material in Malaysian music history. Malayneum has less of the grungy, angst-ridden, three-chord tunes and the fans responded less favorably. While the band had showed maturity and had grown past grunge, their fans however are not ready to leave grunge behind.

In 2004 Butterfingers released a Malay language album, ‘Selamat Tinggal Dunia’. Unlike the other local and Indonesian bands that sings in Malay with their predictable easy listening ballads that some say lack depth, Butterfingers’ Selamat Tinggal Dunia is unique. It still has a little bit of grungy angst feel to it.

Songs were written with unique choice of words. A nice mixture of controlled raw-ness and advance musical arrangements.

After their long hiatus, the band are back. Butterfingers have shows scheduled all around Malaysia. Expect a full house of Butterfingers fans at the show venue.

In conjunction with their return to the scene, they had just recently released a new album ‘Kembali‘. All new material. The album was expected to be selling at record stores on 8th August 2008 (8/8/08), but record stores got excited and start selling their album earlier.

With Kembali I can safely say that they now have grown way past grunge. Their new material are different, unique but still very good. Its more instrumental at times. Its an art form.

For nostalgia reason, I’ve put up some of Butterfingers old tracks. Here are some of their new stuff. These three tracks were released as singles, it sounds different from their earlier work but it still kick ass.

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Maharani

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Terus Terang

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1000 Tahun (Mahu Hidup)

If you like what you hear, go to a nearest record store and grab their album, Kembali. Other notable tracks on Kembali are Joget Global, Bebas, Air Liur Di Kuala Lumpur, and Gelombang Cinta.

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