Mocca to be in Japanese rock festival

JAKARTA: Retro-pop band Mocca is expected to stage a concert in Okinawa, Japan, in late November, sharing the bill with scores of hot Japanese indie acts.

The Bandung, West Java-based indie band will perform in a music festival titled Sound Rainbow: Living with People of Asia, a show that is expected to draw a crowd of 20,000 people, Astaga.com newsportal reported.

Going against their penchant for performing in small venues as their indie creeds dictate, Mocca -- also a headliner for one date in the festival -- is scheduled to stage their gigs at two baseball stadiums in Okinawa.

Mocca was among the first indie bands to achieve a huge commercial success. With their debut album, My Diary, Mocca shifted 70,000 copies, an indie band record.

The band's follow-up, Friends, hit the shelves earlier this year and received rave reviews.

Both albums were released by Fast Forward Records, an independent record label from Bandung. In Japan, Friends was released on local label Rosemary Records/Apple Crumble Records.

Mocca wrote all their lyrics in English but they penned some of their songs in Bahasa Indonesia for a soundtrack album to children's movie Untuk Rena (For Rena). -- JP