Punk sprouted up all over the globe in the late '70s, though a few pockets of humanity that were limited by geography and/or political repression took a little longer to really thrive. By most accounts, punk started to take root in Indonesia in the mid-90s, and the scene was almost synonymous with the student activists who rose up against the Soeharto regime. Not surprisingly to fans of Third World punk and hardcore Tian An Men 89 Records was there, and released Injak Balik! as a compilation EP in 1997, featuring some of the earliest DIY bands from Bandung, West Java. Noisy pogo punk (RUNTAH, DEADLY GROUND), gruff street hardcore (PUPPEN), raw metallic crust (JERUJI, SAVOR OF FILTH), some nasty sounding mincecore (CLOSEMINDED), and a few blasts of intense and hopelessly catchy punk (TURTLES JR., PIECE OF CAKE), plus ALL STUPID's absolute ripper "Sia," a sub-60 second primitive hardcore masterpiece. Releases like this don't just deserve to be reissued in physical form, they need to be in punks' hands and in their ears. This punk was urgent punk, it was important, and the context is integral to its creation and its very existence....so keep digging, because the more you learn about punk, the more you'll find that you need to learn.
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