City Roars! Festival Returns After Two-Year Covid Hiatus

cityroars — Wed, 06 Apr 2022 04:28:06 +0000

City Roars! Festival Returns After Two-Year Covid Hiatus

City ROARS! Festival is slated to return on its third edition with an all local line-up after a two-year hiatus due to the pandemic.

This year’s City ROARS! Festival will take place in Kuala Lumpur, 28 May from 3:00pm to 11:00pm. The day-long event will have ten bands performing in an indoor venue, which will be announced at a later date. Despite the scale down, the festival will have the same vibe as the previous festival’s outdoor and multi-stages set up: the range of artists spans up-and-coming pop punk band Hacktick!, Borneo indie-pop legends Nice Stupid Playground, maximalist producer and pop star Shelhiel who recently made his debut at SXSW, indie rock mainstays Seven Collar T-Shirt and instrumental trio Dirgahayu, returning after a long hiatus, and more to be added soon.

FIRST CROSS-BORDER HYBRID FESTIVAL

While live-streaming has been gaining popularity, no overseas hybrid event has been done – that is – until now!

On 28 May, 2022, City ROARS! Festival intends to co-organise the first-ever cross-border hybrid event, including both physical and live stream performances by Malaysian and Taiwanese artists, with Taiwanese partner – Emerge Music.

The eight-hour event will provide live audiences and online viewers (via web-conferencing platform Gather Town) with both real-life and immersive experience.

City ROARS! Festival was first conceived in 2019. This one-day festival is jointly organized by Kuala Lumpur based promoter Soundscape Records, Dong Tai Du and Taiwanese label Emerge Music – an international collaboration to bring together independent artists from all over Asia on one platform, showcasing the best of innovative independent music. The festival also serve as a collaborative space for artists to share and present new musical ideas. There’s a host of performances lined up on various stages, and workshops and activities including an art market, peddling interesting knick-knacks and craft pieces.

Its purpose is twofold:

To support Malaysian artists in the exploration and development of international markets around the world, and
To engage the international music industry and inform them about the rich and diverse Malaysian music scene.

Over the years, City ROARS! Festival brought many Malaysian artists abroad, to ensure that a diversity of local artists connect with audiences everywhere.

This component provides financial assistance to undertake activities that help Malaysian artists gain a greater profile internationally, increase their artistic and business skills, and build their export-readiness and overall competitiveness.

Visiting trade fairs, participating in showcase festivals and match making sessions, establish two-way artistic exchanges that result in new collaboration, and joint performances, these are some of the initiatives we have taken since a decade ago, an effective tool for making new contacts internationally.

This year’s edition is supported by Cultural Economy Development Agency (CENDANA), an umbrella body with enough resources and expertise to reach and improve the cultural sector of the creative economy. With a large and growing amount of data, CENDANA will be able to see the big picture and diagnose the effects of one part of the ecosystem on another, funnelling aid where it is needed. UK clothing brand Fred Perry, the first British heritage brand to successfully blend sportswear with streetwear to create some of the most iconic styles of the last century, and US-based TuneCore, a leading digital music distribution, publishing, and licensing company with over 150 premium partners across the globe. TuneCore expanded into South East Asia in April 2021 and has localised websites in English, Thai, Bahasa Indonesia and soon to be launched, Vietnamese.

Early bird tickets are now on-sale at https://cityroarsfest2022.peatix.com from 7th April to 21th April.

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ASEAN Music Showcase Festival 2021 returns for its second edition, co-curated by seven countries

cityroars — Wed, 06 Apr 2022 04:26:52 +0000

ASEAN MUSIC SHOWCASE FESTIVAL 2021 RETURNS FOR ITS SECOND EDITION, CO-CURATED BY SEVEN COUNTRIES

ASEAN Music Showcase Festival (AMS) is slated to return on its second edition with an initiative to help regional artists stay connected with their fanbase and introduce themselves to new audiences despite the setbacks caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Southeast Asia’s first collaborative intraregional music showcase festival will have its online premiere on September 11-12, 2021 (Saturday and Sunday) via YouTube. Virtual speed meetings aimed to provide one-on-one networking opportunities between emerging regional musicians and global music industry professionals will be held as a private event on the following day, September 13, 2021 (Monday).

With the live music and entertainment industries being hit hard across the globe, AMS promises to offer an alternative but viable platform that connects global music networks to Southeast Asia, primarily the seven co-organizing countries: Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore and Thailand; with Cambodia and Vietnam further expanding this year’s programming with additional participating delegates and more up-and-coming and established local artists to the regional lineup.

AMS co-founder and Director of Educational, Governmental, and Overseas Partnership of Bangkok-based music company Fungjai, Piyapong ‘Py’ Muenprasertdee, shares that instead of waiting for the pandemic to end, the participating organizers of each country aim to help regional artists be proactive and put their music in front of potential talent buyers from all over the world.

“Because of the pandemic, many showcase festivals around the world are going online, which means artists don’t need to spend money on travel and accommodation to join—and consequently, international music professionals and talent buyers need to hop on this virtual online landscape as well—opening the door of opportunity to more export-worthy artists.”

“We were conceived during the peak of the Covid-19 pandemic in 2020, so we weren’t able to organise the showcase festival physically and were naturally forced to prganise it virtually, Py explains. “However, we do hope to organise it physically and rotate the host country each year after the pandemic is over.”

AMS is co-organized by Fungjai, NYLON Thailand, and Bangkok Music City from Thailand; The Rest Is Noise PH from the Philippines; Steady State Records from Singapore; SRM from Indonesia; City Roars Festival from Malaysia; Baramey Production from Cambodia; and Monsoon Music Festival and Swan Zoo from Vietnam.

This year’s edition is co-presented by Malaysia’s Cultural Economy Development Agency (CENDANA), the Thailand Convention and Exhibition Bureau (TCEB), and US-based TuneCore, a leading digital music distribution, publishing, and licensing company with over 150 premium partners across the globe.

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