4 days a go, Free Malaysia Today published an article about me related to VIMA2013. Thanks so much FMT & VIMA. Here's the original
link to the article and here's the article:
Yacko, rapper who likes teaching
December 29, 2012
The rapper from Indonesia is a lecturer by day, and a rapper by night.
Yacko
signed her first record contract when she was 16 years old. She and her
group Pumpkin Crew joined a compilation called Pesta Rap 2 (1996) with a
single called Nongkrong.Then, after finishing her masters degree in Business Administration
& Applied Science in Australia, Yacko’s first solo hip hop album
entitled Refleksi (EMI Music Indonesia) was released in 2005.
The album was produced by Sydney’s DJ and musician DJ Edo under the
record label of Arqetech Studios. Two years later, Yacko released Mendua
(RizkyRekordz) which was under heavy gauze layers of catchy hooks and
melody.
In 2010, Brrapp! (produced by NSG), Yacko’s first single from the
upcoming album was released and managed to capture lots of attention
from the crowd. All Nite Long (produced by Doe) featuring Lloyd Popp
came next and followed the huge success. Eleven remixes were crafted by various DJs and the song was on heavy
rotation in the clubs. Third single, Filthy Rich feat. Lawrence Philip
was number 1 at Paranoia Dance Chart for two weeks in a row.
She’s the one who’s living a double life, hectic & busy 24/7. A
college lecturer by weekdays and a rapper as fate would have it. Having
performed at different venues in Indonesia and alongside international
artist like Lil Jon in Singapore, Yacko definitely caught people’s
attention. If you are into a performer that is high-caliber, full of stamina and energy, Yacko’s performance is surely not to be missed.
How does it feel to be nominated for a VIMA award? What does this nomination mean to you?
Being nominated for a VIMA award makes me feel deeply honoured. But
being nominated in 7 (supposed to be 6. sorry typo) categories? I am shocked!! Never really thought
about this since I only want to contribute and share my passion to
others but it feels amazing to know that my music has been recognized
outside of my own country. Of course I won’t go this far without the
help of the music producers I work with, NSG and Lawrence Philip. They
are equally responsible for being nominated for the awards.
What efforts have you made to promote your nominations to your fans?
I post every single news about VIMA nominations in my
official blog
which also linked to my other social media site such as Twitter,
Facebook, LinkedIn, MySpace, ReverbNation, Path, Instagram, and others. I
also announced the nominations when I perform and urge my friends and
fans to vote. Moreover, my management team (2313) also help creating
press release about this nominations and distributing it to local media.
As a result, you will be able to read this news in online local media.
Few radio interviews were also conducted to gain awareness.
Do you believe that social media platforms such as Facebook,
Youtube and twitter are relevant marketing and publicity tools for a
musician? What efforts have you made to engage with your
fans using social media?
Definitely! Publicity at no cost. It helps you to share any news that
you would like share and highlight right to your targeted market,
friends and fans. I believe people that follow you in Twitter, like your
page in Facebook and subscribe to your social media site at least will
be disclosed to and aware of the information. But of course in order to
increase the possibility for them to vote, needs to be supported by more
integrated strategy. For example, providing the link to vote in the
post and giving those who vote my unreleased track send to their
e-mails. Please read the efforts that I have made in the answers above
and visit
http://itsyacko.blogspot.com to read the posts.
How would you best describe your music?
Raw
and Other Hip Hop. Raw because l like raw sound, lots of distortion,
and crazy sound. Other Hip Hop means my basic is always been in Rap
music and Hip Hop culture. Where Hip means digging more knowledge where I
interpret in my lyrics and Hop means to jump and to explore to other
sound and noise. That’s why I add the term “other” since you might hear
other forms of Hip Hop music which also explain the reason that I tend
to work with range of different music producers to capture their
signature sound.
Share with us two of your favourite quotes.
“I reached my dreams by having the courage to pursue them, you can do it
too” – I always believe that it is not enough just by having a dream.
Courage is another element that you need to pursue your dreams and if I
can do it, others can do it too. It’s a self-motivation quote but also
can be used to motivate others.
“Tak pernah sekalipun aku mundur dari jalan yang kupercaya” – another
quote that I make to focus on the things that I believe. Never doubt
the things and the paths that you choose. I choose to be a lecturer and a
rapper because those are things that I really passionate about. Both
have the same roots, to share and be shared, as well to inspire and be
inspired.
What are your songs about?
Pretty much ranging from I-don’t-care-about-haters-attitude to
criticising the government to lesbian, gay and transsexual. I am just
trying to reveal all the feelings that I have by writing it down to my
lyrics. But I have to admit, writing about love has always been a
difficult one for me. LOL.
What is your biggest achievement to date?
This year I have been nominated in three different awards, in total I
received 11 (supposed to be 10. sorry typo) nominations. Shocking and grateful to know that you work has
been recognized not only locally but also in SouthEast Asia.
What is your advice to up and coming musicians ?
Be consiflex. Be consistent to your objectives but stay flexible in your
approach. Means you have to set up your objective. For example, if your
objective is to make an album, you have to stick with it. What you need
to be flexible is the strategy, choose who you want to create network
with, get support from a (management) team, friends and fanbase, gain
more experiences and knowledge to add to your original style, absorb any
ideas to your flavor and you don’t have to always listen to what other
people say to develop your song. At the end of the day, you cannot
please everyone and haters will always be there to watch you fall. One
thing for sure, you cannot fall apart, if you are being true to yourself
and have the courage to pursue your dream.
What was the most embarrassing thing that has happened to you while performing?
There was one time that I had to use ear monitors since the room where I
performed didn’t really have a clear and good sound monitor to listen
to the beat. To tell you the truth, I hate ear monitors because they do
no good and most of the time it ends up in technical errors where I
can’t hear anything. That gig was a big failure to me, nothing came out
of my ear monitors and I lost the tempo of the beat.
What are your thoughts on music piracy?Would you give your music away for FREE?
It might be difficult to stop but you can trick it. You can try to
legalize it by officially giving your music for free. Means that you can
choose your own platform for your music to be downloaded for free, for
example I use www.likelovelife.com to direct the people to download my
music for free and legal. This way you can track how many people
download it legally. I also use the free download to trigger the people
to listen to my music. Eventually, if they like my music, they will buy
the official CD or purchase it in iTunes. I also differentiate the bit
rate of the song between the free download and the one in the store. If
you want the best quality one you can purchase it.
