Candra Darusman -- Kau

 

A little over a year ago, I put up the article "Well, If You Like Japanese City Pop..." which features some of the artists outside of Japan who have put up their version of urban contemporary music, relaxing or bopping, over the years. The memory of that some nights ago had me trying out this video of Indonesian Pop Kreatif, which I gather is the equivalent of Japan's City Pop, on the YouTube channel named logically enough, Pop Kreatif. 

Well, dang. The first song caught me like a largemouth bass on a masterfully operated fishing rod. It gave me that shiver up and down my spine as is the case whenever I hear a great song. Reading the list, I discovered that it was "Kau" by Candra Darusman.

I couldn't find really comprehensive information on Darusman and even the Indonesian Wiki didn't have a whole lot on this singer. However, I did find out from Last.fm that he was born in Bogor, West Java in 1957 and that he was a member of two jazz groups before going on a solo career. He released two albums, "Indahnya Sepi" (1981) and "Kekagumanku" (1983). Apparently, he's living in Switzerland, although the news at Last.fm is about a decade old.

"Kau", which means "you", starts off "Indahnya Sepi". Considering that title and the melody, I can only think of it as a love song for a lucky young lady. A whole lot of West Coast AOR groups and individuals including the Doobie Brothers come to mind, and any song of that genre will never falter with a fluegelhorn in there. The Pop Kreatif video of driving down the highway at night really helped the visual imaging match with the aural splendidness involved in "Kau".

If anyone has any other information about Darusman that you can share in the comments, please feel free to do so.