DINI of Bittersweet sat across me. His band mate, Emai, was to my left. Between the four of us is an ash tray with over a dozen of our cigarette butts. The conversation had run from my current unemployment to girls to movies to music gear and, back again (of course), to music.

Across the room, "Green Street Hooligans" was playing with wide-eye Elijah Wood getting punches in the face to the background of some Brit-pop music I couldn't really name.

Drawing deep on his cigarette, Dini began: "Hey Phang, do you know Adrian? Adrian Yap? He did a review about Bittersweet on (online magazine) Think. He was kind of harsh about Pijie's lyrics. I mean, he starts off the review naming all these great musicians and then compares us to them, saying that our lyrics don't mean anything.

“To me, Pijie's lyrics works for me, I could relate to them. And it's not like we're, say, Jim Morrison wannabes or anything. It's not fair to compare us that way. Besides, I don't think someone who's in a band should review other bands. Because that's kind of like saying your own band is better."

I did a mental double-take. A considerable double-take. In a land where quality music reviews are depressingly scarce in both the mainstream and alternative media, we indie musicians can't exactly afford to cast off good reviewers just because they're musicians.

I agree with the fragility of drawing harsh comparisons with famed legendary musicians and local ones, but there is absolutely no point in ignoring constructive criticism and confusing professional role-playing with ego-trips.

Yet, this seems to be somewhat of a "trend-of-thought" among local indie musicians these days.

"I don't think we're quite ready for honest criticism yet. We become defensive when confronted with our own flaws and I don't think that's going to change very soon because that's the culture we're used to," says Faiz, an avid indie music fan and musician of sorts.

“But I think overall, the art form is progressing, the scene is progressing and it's a great sign that changes will come eventually”, he continues.

Media and corporate attention: Miracle or menace?

In 2007, the Malaysian indie music scene had been given heaps of attention far more than previously. Media coverage increased with the introduction of Junk Magazine in the last quarter of 2006 while entertainment-media businesses began to allocate air-time for indie music. Corporate businesses (especially telcos) began to realize the increasing youth market potential in the scene previously untapped and ignored while fashion brands are turning their seasons over to "nu-rave" -- the current favourite look of young indie hipsters.

All this have meant promotional miracles and a resulting sheen -- not without a subtle "Malaysia Boleh!" aura -- for the indie music scene. Show organisers no longer need to hit the streets and distribute gig flyers. Musicians can upload their music on an increasing number of dedicated websites and receive instant response while indie fashion labels are taking on names beyond the hipster periphery.

However, with this sudden burst of perceived "coolness", the questions loom: Is the scene ready for this? Will the corporate sponsors taint the outright honesty and dignified purity we've worked so hard and long for?

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Indie musician Pa’an observes: "The scene had always moved according to routine; we go forward a little, then we become saturated and stagnant, and then we either progress some more or we fall back again to where we used to be.

“Right now, I think we're at the point where we're beginning to stagnate. We have a number of good bands out there and as a whole, it's a considerably diversified scene here but we are also seeing bands which are just jumping on to the whole new-wave/indie-pop band wagon."

Where we got better

Curiously, the current local indie music trend bears a close resemblance to the new-wave/nu-rave Brit-pop UK (not including the evergreen punk, hardcore and metal collectives) revival in the. The emergence of bands like Franz Ferdinand, The Killers, Bloc Party, Keane, Coldplay, and Artic Monkeys has arguably created a massive change towards music preferences here.

Indie Mod masters Bittersweet is probably the first band to bring the genre to the stage, pioneering the new Brit-wave. More bands have since emerged with similar new Brit-wave repertoires.

They Will Kill Us All evolved from the shadows of Bloc Party to a marriage of Brit music influences -- a total becoming of a true musical identity while Hujan is the new raging indie phenomenon, so much so that they actually charge a whooping performance fee of RM1,500 per gig.

Other worthy names would be The Otherside Orchestra with their cool brand of tasteful Madchester sound meshed wondrously with a strong 70's disco slant while Komplot and Meet Uncle Hussein's euphoric indie-pop has equal infectious funk to get any crowd head bopping. I've mentioned in a previous review of a gig that the new Brit-wave is something worth embracing and these names are but some that I personally think have brought local indie music to a whole new level.

Where we’re dragging our feet

However, the concern of imitation over originality still exists and as more bands follow this trend, a saturation of similar bands has begun to emerge. What is more worrying is that, while the indie music is finally beginning to see some progress, the scene's mechanisms have not.

Show organisers are still struggling with finances, musicians are still stuck with day jobs and there has yet to be any indie labels with the managerial capability of sticking up to the big boys. Even the two inaugural giant music fests -- Street Roar and Rock The World -- were absent this year reportedly due to sponsorship withdrawals.

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The truth is, while corporate entertainment and media businesses tap into the scene for current market potential, the indie music scene itself lacks both the ingenuity and the experience to deal with these.

Laundry Bar, for example, is currently the highest paying gig venue in the Klang Valley that offers free gigs to a crowd of both hipsters and yuppies. But the venue's acoustics is crude at best. While the equipment is relatively good, the set-up is a musician's nightmare; there is only one floor monitor that doesn't seem to function very well, the amps are oddly spaced, the stage system ends up under-powered at times and the resident sound operator … well, let's not go there.

Yet, because it's free and the pay is good, the place attracts huge crowds with top indie musicians.

It’s a case of musicians and scene operators having failed in their negotiations for a better music environment. Performance fee is one thing but quality of our own music is another. If indie key players are unable to realize that businesses like these are equally reliant on the music as we are on them for promotion, it is our music's that ultimately suffers -- without decent performances, there can hardly be real progress.

Fighting the coolness of it all

Nokia's dramatized and stereotypical depiction of scenesters via TV drama series KAMI is another example. Granted that the show has arguably increased public interest among youths about indie music and the scene but it has also created a distorted picture of it, perhaps even to the point of trivializing the depth and cultural significance of local indie music to mere made-for-TV-drama formulae.

In 1997, Hong Kong director Mabel Cheung went to Shu Village in Beijing, China -- the blooming hotbed of Chinese underground music -- to shoot her movie "Beijing Rocks" which was supposed to have been about the scene there. The movie turned out to be a distorted version of the subculture. Half-way through the production, the musicians signed a joint public statement that put across how the film is a lowly, superfluous piece of pop entertainment. The musicians also denied all affiliations with the film.

What have indie musicians here done about KAMI? Do we truly believe that KAMI is a respectable depiction of the scene?

"Most corporates don't really understand what the scene is about but we have to work with them because it's good publicity. We do have a more appreciative and selective indie crowd now but it's really a little too over-rated now. It has become difficult to tell if an audience is really into the music or if they just into the whole “coolness” of it. We have to realize that this isn't just about the image, it goes far deeper than that," said indie T-shirt label operator Gigi.

While the scene still needs time to mature, the once obscure danger of corporate involvement and its resulting distortion of the scene are already apparent. Will indie musicians be able to hold the last bastions of our dignity against these?

As Pa'an so eloquently puts it: "It's not about principles but about the passion for our own work. First comes the music, then the work to promote our music ourselves.”

The rest we can only hope.

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Phang Kuan Hoong plays for the Citizens of Ice-Cream.