This study explores the context of identity in the musical arts echoed by a Black Metal band from Kediri, Immortal Rites. Aesthetically, Immortal Rites articulate Javanese locality using Black Metal, a sub-genre of underground music that emerged in Indonesia in the late 90s. Accordingly, the band lined up as one of the Kejawen Black Metal whose consistency and depth of understanding are well appreciated within the scene. The unification of two different cultures provokes a complex contemporary value of a cultural reflection concerning identity. This study uses a qualitative research method with a descriptive approach. This study aims to discuss the narrative of identity that Immortal Rites wish to embody for its fans to understand. By focusing analysis on the main data of song lyrics with additional data in the form of interviews, we found that the echoed locality represents a notion of contemporary Javanese identity. Within the arts, there was a close relevance of the content with the identical Javaneseness in the era of the Kadiri kingdom. Thus, based on the engagement of the arts and the Kediri-based Javaneseness, it leads us to an understanding of the mediated cultural representation of contemporary Javanese identity, of a Daha-based Javanese identity.
Virgil in Inferno is claimed to be a perfect example of human being concerning to his mastery of maturity and rationality viewed from the perspective of western philosophy as phrased in ‘Love of Wisdom’. As we know, the wisdom taught by western philosophy is the most important thing in someone who philosophies because western sees efforts as an absolute thing in human philosophizing process rather than its result or the truth itself. As believed by western, wisdom can be acquired by practicing and thinking which then the result is human with high intellectual and ethical attitude as depicted by Virgil in Inferno. On the contrary, a different concept stated by Javanese philosophy which truth is the absolute one whereas effort is only a means as stated by the phrase ‘Love of Perfection’. Relying on the belief in God, Javanese philosophy states that perfect human is person who understand the existence of God, the unity of man and God as termed by manunggaling kawula gusti. Human ethics and wisdom have only been destined along with the maturity of one’s age and spiritual attitude. Therefore, Javanese philosophy based on Serat Wedhatama used as the perspective of reading and interpretation to expand the exploration toward Virgil’s role and symbol, also structuralism which is used as a method of extracting pieces of evidence based to Virgil’s action and speech in relation with that two philosophical concept. Not merely to expand exploration, the use of that two philosophy concept is to compare those different values in discussing Virgil in Inferno. Keywords: Love of Wisdom, Love of Perfection, Wisdom, Ethics, Manunggaling Kawula Gusti, Compare.
Sebagai sebuah kebudayaan, Kejawen Black Metal adalah satu bentuk subkultur hibrid yang tercipta atas inkorporasi kebudayan Jawa yang ada di Indonesia dan subkultur Black Metal yang berkembang di Eropa. Sebagai sebuah bentuk musik, Kejawen Black Metal adalah satu subgenre dari Black Metal yang pada praktiknya memasukkan unsur-unsur ke-Jawaan, yaitu konsep mistik yang berkembang dan eksistensinya dipercaya nyata dalam kebudayaan masyarakat Jawa. Melihat hibriditas dari eksistensinya, subkultur tidak serta merta mengambil dan meniru segala konsep yang ada pada kebudayaan akarnya. Maka dari itu, penelitian ini ditujukan untuk menemukan dan menjelaskan apa sebenarnya esensi dan tendensi dari Kejawen Black Metal sebagai sebuah subkultur hibrid. Secara semiotik, Kejawen Black Metal dilihat sebagai sebuah simbol yang bermakna sebagaimana mestinya, namun berdiri sendiri membentuk nilai yang berbeda menurut konteksnya. Penelitian ini menggunakan metode deskriptif-kualitatif dengan data yang digali lewat dokumentasi yang berhasil dilakukan oleh pihak lain. Berdasarkan penelitian ditemukan bahwa secara esensi, Kejawen Black Metal tetap merupakan perlawanan kepada sesuatu yang berbeda dengan subkultur akarnya. Selain itu, dalam konteks tendensi, Kejawen Black Metal menyimbolkan kebebasan yang ditujukan untuk mengingatkan kembali tentang kebudayaan Jawa namun dengan cara dan konsep yang berbeda dalam pembawaannya. As a culture, Kejawen Black Metal is a form of hybrid subculture made of Javanese culture of Indonesia and the Black Metal subculture that grows in Europe. As a music, Kejawen Black Metal is Black Metal subgenre that its practices incorporates Javanese mystical concepts whose existence is believed to be true in Javanese culture. Seeing the hybridity of its existence, this subculture does not necessarily take and copy all concepts exist in its root culture. Therefore, this study aims to find and explain what actually Kejawen Black Metal’s essence and tendency is as a hybrid subculture. Through Roland Barthes' semiotics, Kejawen Black Metal is seen as a symbol whose meaning stands as it should be, but also standing independently to form different values based on particular context. The study uses a descriptive-qualitative method with extracted data based on indirect documentation that has been successfully carried out by other parties. The result, it is clear that in essence, Kejawen Black Metal remains a struggle but against something different from its root subculture. Therefore, in the context of tendency, Kejawen Black Metal symbolizes freedom that intends to remind people about the Javanese culture but in different ways and concepts in their nature.
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