Jendral Kantjil - The Story So Far (English, for you out there outside Bekasi)

Jendral Kantjil was formed in February 2001. At that time, the pioneer of the band, a kid named Panjul, were still wearing high school uniforms. At first, Panjul gave the name of the band TRUBUS, but he changed the name into 'Jendral Kantjil' because he was inspired by the title of a classic national Indonesian movie called 'Jendral Kancil', and he added some unique twist of his band's name, that is to change the letter C in the word 'Kancil' to TJ, an old Indonesian spelling, so that the word became 'Kantjil'. Why did he do that? The answer is simple, so that anyone asks why he's doing that.

Back in the early days, Jendral Kantjil was influenced fully with the punkrock ideology, and it makes Jendral Kantjil known as a punkrock band in their neighborhood. They often plays some songs from their favourite punk band such as The Casualties, The Exploited, The Business, Propaghandi, Blank 77 and so on. Sometimes Jendral Kantjil also plays songs from a local punk band called The United Smokers.

In the first years of establishment, Jendral Kantjil had some switch of the members. At the very first establishment in 2001, Jendral Kantjil was firstly occupied by 5 high school teenagers, they were Panjul in Guitars, Putut in Basses, Deway in Drums, Ervan and Odink in Vocals. With this lineup, they began to roam around the punkrock scenes near their county. And eventually, Jendral Kantjil began to spread among various punk community in Bekasi. But as the time goes by, Jendral Kantjil had to change their members for many many reasons, and finally in the year 2002, Panjul decided that he plays the bass substituting Putut, and a new member, Mbhoots, substituting Panjul playing the guitar and he also taking the role of the vocalist. Another new member named Motjil also joins the band and he also plays the guitar assisting Mbhoots. Meanwhile, the position of the drum player still belongs to Deway.

With this fresh and convenient lineup, Jendral Kantjil began to spread their wings into another scenes rather than the punkrock scene. Because they think punkrock is about freedom and never stop in just one community. Eventually, Jendral Kantjil started to open their minds and began to learn how to play a punk music that can be accepted in a big society accross the globe. They have started experimenting their playability of making punk rock music. They've added some licks and riffs of unique guitar melody between parts of their songs, and this was called 'melodic-punk', a kind of punkrock music but a little bit softer and more melodical. With this type of punk music, Jendral Kantjil's musicality sounded more mature in their playings, but still, their attitude is not changed at all. They still doing everything by themselves without any monopoly from anyone.

After graduating from their high schools, the members of Jendral Kantjil started to think that their band were had some kind of potential opportunity to be brought into the next step. Until in the year 2004, Jendral Kantjil gets the invitation to join a local recording underground compilation called "From Family to Family" and they have their single in that record witch was entitled "Me, My Girlfriend, and a Girl Named Windy". Through this compilation record, the name of Jendral Kantjil began to spread widely across many cities in the Java Island.

After years and years of doing concerts and attending venues accross the cities of Java, Jendral Kantjil does another member-switching. They picked up Slebe, an old-skool hardcore vocalist who unbelievably had a unique singing characteristic if he doesn't scream (because in the previous band, Slebe sings with a screaming technique) and he willingly join the band. and Deway, the previous Jendral Kantjil's drummer, was replaced by Dicky, a former breakdancer who also have a talent with drum-playing. Motjil was also replaced with Phitoy, Panjul and Mbhoots' senior when they were in high school years ago. With this lineup, they ahave successfully made an EP in 2005 entitled "This is What I Think About Love", and in this record, it has included 5 of their songs. This record was also produced by their own record company called Middlename Re-Chords.

Fast forward to the year 2010, Jendral Kantjil have again succesfully made a full-length debut album entitled "Bertahan" and it consist 12 of their songs. Eventually, this album, until now, are acceptable and loved in a few society.

With the appeareance of the new member, a keyboardist and a synthesizer, Gerry, Jendral Kantjil intends to, again, spread their wings of musicality into more and more soft and even more mature music, because punk music is not always hard and distorted, the most importantly, they still doing it without any intimidation from anyone.

Right now, Jendral Kantjil is merely a bunch of young man who doing what they wanted to do and trying to do the best for the people who surrounds them with doing it with themselves, without any interference from anything. They can do it themselves, and the satisfaction is not replacable with anything in this life.