Emma Baulch's detailed ethnography of musical scenes and identity politics in 1990s Bali is a major contribution to the scholarly literature on music and culture in Indonesia. Grounded in years of participant observation and showing careful integration of theoretical perspectives, this well-written work stands out among recent publications on Indonesian popular, rock, experimental, and underground music culture. The text sets out to explore the ways in which certain groups of Balinese youth worked to construct and negotiate identity in the context of dizzying political and social changes in 1990s Indonesia. She examines and situates perspectives from punk, reggae, and heavy metal enthusiasts—musicians and fans alike—within the frames of national political dynamics, theories of globalization, and identity discourse. Having stepped inside groups that are typically impenetrable to outsiders, Baulch offers exceptionally vivid descriptions of the scenes she analyzes, gifting the reader with an unusual feeling of closeness to the ethnography's personalities, places, and events.
Chapter 1 both establishes the ethnography's theoretical and contextual framework and outlines the emergence of Balinese underground music scenes at the start of the 1990s. An overview of the history of youth/student movements in Indonesia relates the intertwining of national politics in and governmental control over the movements' activities and sets up a thorough examination of simultaneous social and political changes that led to the Suharto regime's “messy decay” (p. 15) in the late 1990s. With this political context as a backdrop, Baulch reveals how significant changes in media production linked rock music consumption to ideologies of consumerism and commercialism, contributing to distinct modes of identity formation in two groups of young Balinese men—underground music enthusiasts who eschewed these ideals and the trendy “ABG” (newly grown children) of a rising middle and upper class.
An exploration of the fast-paced, nationally controlled development of particular “tourist” areas of Bali guides the reader in understanding a complex center–periphery dynamic that ignited Balinese farmers, landowners, and religious figures to rally around a common, local identity. “Selective” (p. 39) invocation of this typical Balinese identity and a rising regionalist sentiment functioned effectively as responses to the hegemony of Jakarta, the national and symbolic “center.” Baulch then exposes the parallel between this dynamic and death metal devotees' rejection of standard Balinese identities in favor of marginal, peripheral ones. She argues that this example provides a model for accurately interpreting the meaning of the fans' “gesturing elsewhere” (p. 60).
While chapter 2 specifically addresses the political significance of death metal fandom in the early 1990s and chapter 3 examines the same period's reggae scene, both explore the relationships of their respective musics to contemporaneous, rapidly changing discourses of nationalism, regionalism, and developmentalism. Chapter 3 argues that the Kuta-based reggae scene, which rose and subsequently declined in the 1990s, “sought to revise and reformulate Balineseness on the margins of local elite discourses of identity” (p. 12). Here, Baulch suggests that an obscured link binds emerging resistance to national authority, which she labels a “populist regionalism” (p. 79), to Bob Marley fandom. The fate of Kuta's reggae scene, though, demonstrates how national discourses of development and tourism can powerfully alter physical landscapes, undermining local attempts to “draw global media products into their own, self-determined identity practices” (p. 87).
In chapter 4, attention shifts to the mid-1990s Balinese punk scene, where identity politics intertwine with a newly deregulated media and metropolitan, consumerist images transmitted by that media. Baulch shows that, parallel to the center–periphery dynamic explained previously, underground punk enthusiasts viewed dominant media images as a supercultural “center” that they could reject in favor of a marginal periphery. Identity formation relied, then, on navigating the media's sonic and visual images of fandom and territorializing common spaces such as warung (locally run roadside stalls) and malls. Baulch engages a diverse set of theoretical perspectives to develop subtle conclusions, including interpretations of Derrida's concept of différance, aspects of the Birmingham School's notions of subculture and resistance, and Appadurai's views on displacement.
The final two chapters examine developments in the late 1990s underground music scene, focusing on the gradual meeting of heavy metal and punk, groups that previously had maintained sharply distinct territories. In the fifth chapter, Baulch gives careful attention to the ways in which participants' changing hairstyles and attire choices corresponded to the conquest of space and shifting identity discourses. She argues that the Balinese underground scene was shaped and defined primarily by “three elements—devolved hangouts, participatory modes of cultural production, and the evolution of a confrontational performance style” (p. 114). After vividly describing performances, examining the inhabitation of public spaces, and discussing underground enthusiasts' concept of anarki, Baulch uses Turner's study of carnival to depict the “orchestrated ‘chaos’” (p. 140) of underground events, then disputes Hebdige's claim that interacting with media images pushes subcultures “inevitably . . . toward recuperation” (p. 141).
To clarify the context within which changes in the Balinese underground scene should be interpreted, the sixth chapter explores the impact of the 1993 Metallica concert riots in Jakarta on the Balinese death thrash scene. Baulch outlines the path of postriot death thrash identity, moving from compliance with “an official youth ideal” (p. 145) to eventual identification with the national underground scene—all the while maintaining control of physical territories and modes of production. Finally, Baulch evaluates a series of post-1996 shifts that birthed a proliferation of underground concerts and subgenres, paying particular attention to black metal identity. Restating her focus on “subcultural style as an expression of alternative communality, which is territorially based and dependent on interaction and intimacy” (p. 172), Baulch distinguishes her work from the Birmingham School approach to subculture, instead allying herself with Frith, Stokes, Manning, and Turner in a nuanced summary of her position.
There is little need to voice criticism when a text is as well conceived and carefully thought out as this one is. On the whole, Baulch exercises extreme care in her ethnography, particularly in her characterizations of groups and group identities. From a reader's perspective, it seems likely that this vigilance stems from a combination of scholarly rigor and her deep respect and affection for the individuals and groups she discusses. One bothersome departure from this, though, is her repeated reference to the “Balinese elites,” a group categorization she invokes but fails to describe, delineate, or deconstruct. The reader is left to surmise that this group is likely responsible for the production of “elite discourses,” but it is unclear whether these intersect with (or are perhaps the same as) the “public/official discourse” (p. 86) that she later references. This glossing may be deliberate, given Baulch's otherwise meticulous treatment of group identities and the delicate nature of this particular label—some comment on this would dissolve the seeming inconsistency.
Looking beyond the time period covered in Making Scenes, it is clear that two experiences—the climate of Reformasi and the 2002 terrorist bombings in Kuta—have drastically impacted the scenes that Baulch so thoroughly researched. While substantial enough to grow into a full-length study of its own, the significant, immediate way in which these experiences altered these same cultural and political territories deserves a perfunctory nod. Given Baulch's careful attention to the rapid changes leading up to Suharto's downfall and the centrality of related social and political dynamics, a second look at these scenes, ten years post-Suharto, would be another welcome contribution.
Making Scenes is a well-crafted, insightful exploration of the complex identity politics at work in the social, political, and cultural contexts of 1990s Bali. With its engaging depictions of musical scenes, detailed analyses of youth culture, and deep engagement with cultural theory, this text will appeal to scholars, graduate students, and advanced undergraduate students in cultural studies, performance studies, anthropology, ethnomusicology, and area studies.
