On Saetia: A Retrospection
Reflections on adolescence, hardcore music, and unexpected reunions.
Wild. Intimate. Archetypal. Soul-stirring. Unique. Alive. Conscious. All-at-once. Nostalgic. These are the words I scribbled onto a page shortly after seeing Saetia in Los Angeles on April 30, 2023.
I must have heard Saetia for the first time around 2003. They had already disbanded as of 1999. I bought whatever I could find of their music––a copy of their self-titled LP (1998) and a compilation CD “A Retrospective” (2001). I was entering adolescence, navigating my way through new levels of self-awareness and its accompanying struggles. I was discovering and defining my identity in unconscious ways––culturally, socially, emotionally. By this time, the internet had emerged as a world unto itself, a crucible within which our generation forged new connections and meaning. It was inside this bubbling cauldron of angst, friendship, and yearning that I absorbed Saetia’s thoughtful anguish.
The days of dial-up were behind us and high-speed internet was paving the way for a new era of music sharing. I entered a virtual subculture of message boards, file sharing, and record collecting. I discovered music just as much as it discovered me. There were no streaming platforms or YouTube as of yet, but one record led to the next via word of mouth. I was living two lives––one in the immediacy of school and local friendships and another in the subculture of hardcore music that mostly existed for me in online spaces. A close friend who lived near me also enjoyed hardcore music. He was a couple of years older than me and would take me to shows, much to my parents’ chagrin. But most of my connections within this culture were with people I would never meet in the flesh until years later (and, sadly, some I never met who left this world far before their time).
This dual existence was mirrored by a growing division in me, culturally and spiritually. I was a second-generation Indian kid born to immigrant parents, growing up in the deep South. Idols of Krishna, ghee lamps, and the smell of incense sticks placed in bananas were pervasive in my home. When I opened the door to the outside world, I entered a distinctly Western universe, where Christianity screamed its epithets at every corner I turned. I was not only between religion and culture, I was between influences that would ultimately shape my worldview.
The fact that I grew up in Alabama is what shocks people the most when they meet me. But really, living in the South was not as bad as people usually imagine. I was blessed with an upbringing relatively free of prejudice in my immediate spheres. It seems as though fewer communities and families are able to enjoy such an atmosphere these days, with the world regressing to extremes of an earlier stage of cultural consciousness characterized by discrimination and fear of all that is “other”. I grew up in a comparatively simpler time, when the urgencies of our global crises were less apparent and visceral. Nevertheless, I was confronting a tumultuous landscape in myself that was characteristic of adolescence, and music had become my refuge.
Hardcore music and culture were a light to me in those times––and they continue to be. Reflecting on the past 20 years, I see how much this unique subculture shaped my formative years––the collapse of social hierarchies, DIY ethics, radical acceptance of self and other, music as a vehicle of emotional expression, the value of the collective, and a love for all things analog. The music, the emotions, the ethos, and the records were a taste of something real in what felt like an increasingly artificial world. Here, clichés abound, except that it wasn’t cliché then in its reality. I was listening to music that was difficult for some to appreciate as more than “noise”, but for me, hardcore music had become an artistic language I not only understood but loved.
It was in this context that Saetia had such a defining impact upon me. Variously described as “post-hardcore” and “screamo”, Saetia formed within the culture of hardcore music with a sound that is ultimately genre-defying––at once compelling, sensitive, introspective, raw, and poetic. Saetia presented an aesthetic gestalt I had never heard before but that also paradoxically felt like déjà vu. They represented a holistic realization of all that I intuited, experienced, and needed at that time. This is not to say that I only listened to Saetia––I enjoyed a lot of their forerunners and contemporaries too, in addition to other styles of music. It is just that Saetia’s music carved its way into a part of me that nothing else had and, in some sense, that nothing else can in exactly the same way. This observation is a new truth for me to acknowledge and it brings forward questions of how true art transforms us in unexpected and non-linear ways.
My musical tastes continued to develop throughout high school and I eventually landed on jazz. Jazz and hardcore have much more in common than I initially realized. I believe this is true about many things in life. What we see as disparate realities are, in truth, deeply woven together. What I saw in myself as a movement to something different was an expression of the same vector that brought me to hardcore in the first place. I’m speculating, but Saetia may have had more jazz roots than I suspected. The name “Saetia” is an intentional misspelling of “Saeta”, a track on the Miles Davis album, Sketches of Spain. Saeta is a Spanish word derived from the Latin sagitta, meaning “arrow”. It refers to a form of Andalusian religious song, typically sung acapella and characterized by a piercing emotional expression. Saetas are also partly improvised. While I cannot say that Saetia evidences much flamenco influence, their music does carry a powerful emotionality. I am also remembering how some of my first exposure to jazz was through hardcore. I can still hear Bessie Smith’s voice on Indian Summer’s defining track “Woolworm”. The track opens with the sound of a Bessie Smith record playing in the background that gently fades into a clean and introspective guitar melody. This transition seemed oddly perfect to me at the time, despite the unusual meshing of genres.
Hardcore and jazz may not be overtly sacred forms of music, but they strike me as free forms of music that can potentially attain a similar height in their realization. These musical approaches value the beauty of the moment, no matter what shade presently colors the emotional palate. Diving into the present, the past is left behind and the future to itself. There is also an aspect of these styles that only translates in the live context. Prized jazz recordings are either live albums or improvised studio recordings. Hardcore music often has a live quality to it, regardless of whether it is recorded or performed. But a significant aspect of hardcore music comes alive at shows where you experience the raw energy of the music in the context of community and the intimate connection between the band and audience.
In this sense, hardcore and jazz share an approach that lends itself to ingenuity–– challenging existing conventions and re-defining the meaning of creative expression. I am reminded of Pat Martino’s comments about jazz being inextricable from the cultural milieu in which it arose and how an essential study of jazz requires a cultural context. Martino was particularly responding to the jazz scene of 1960s Philadelphia, a time when contemporaries like Les Paul, Wes Montgomery, and George Benson were defining jazz guitar. Martino’s playing is clearly in the vein of the “soul jazz” organ-trio format that was characteristic of the era, but his guitar lines have no real likeness among his contemporaries. When Saetia was playing in basements and venues like ABC No Rio in the mid-90s, they were responding to a musical culture, and spontaneously giving it a living form. The 90s were a major decade in the development of hardcore music and its subgenres. It is an era I assumed had either been forgotten or only preserved in our memories. Saetia’s reunion proved otherwise to me––what began in the 90s was just that, a beginning. Hardcore, like jazz, is nothing short of an aesthetic revolution, an uninhibited spontaneity giving voice to the marginalized. This may be one of the secrets of its timelessness.
Saetia’s music struck me with its realization of dynamics––transitioning from soft to loud, fast to slow, distorted to clean, spoken to screaming, all within a heartbeat. These dramatic twists and turns made them all the more captivating for me. The music was well-written, at times patiently developing from clean guitar melodies to sudden caustic intensity. The lyrics were a major cornerstone of their music for me, and I spent much time reading and resonating with them. As a high school student, I had an affinity for English and all forms of creative writing. Saetia’s lyrics were not just words, they read to me like poetic masterpieces with enduring literary merit. And they still do. Within these words and sounds, I discovered an implicit permission to be myself, to develop a love for writing and poetry, and that human sentiment is beautiful in all its forms. The dynamics of the music was always poignant for me, as was seeing Saetia last night playing to their largest audience in history.
The reality of Saetia’s reunion in November 2022 hit me like their music first did 20 years ago. I was in shock and I still can’t believe it. Like many hardcore bands, Saetia had a short but blistering tenure. My friends and I arrived on this scene in the wake of their departure, with the thought of Saetia reuniting never even crossing my mind. As a band formed by college students at NYU, I always assumed they were done with that part of their lives and I had no hopes of ever seeing them. I committed their music to history and developed my own relationship to it. This was in many ways sufficient for me. Still, seeing them live was an impossible dream coming true at long last. Saetia’s reunion led me into the corridors of a past life, a place where I recovered an aspect of myself that was lost to time and surprisingly welcome. My younger sister went to the show with me without any prior exposure to the band––I think she gained an appreciation for them and it was special to share this experience with her.
A few days before I flew out to see Saetia in LA, I had a tabla lesson with my teacher, Aloke Dutta. At the beginning of our lesson, Aloke spoke spontaneously about the nature of art. He said an artist never really makes art, rather art is what is experienced by the listener. He said art cannot be self-conscious, and that an artist doesn’t feel like they are making art. This is key to understanding what art is about and how it happens. The artist becomes a transparent vehicle, not a self-conscious maker. As I was reflecting on his words, I couldn’t help but think of Saetia, the unintentional pioneers of a genre whose influence has persisted beyond their imaginations. Earlier this year on The New Scene podcast, vocalist Billy Werner talked about how Saetia shows were very small with maybe 50 people at the most, and that they were not even particularly well-liked at the time. Saetia was not trying to pioneer a genre any more than jazz musicians were trying to re-define music. Saetia was just Saetia, a unique amalgamation of influences and people discovering self-expression and community in unlikely places.
I never really knew how Saetia felt about their unexpected legacy. Watching the show last night and listening to Billy share his appreciation with everyone made it clear that they are still amazed and humbled by the reality of their enduring relevance. Billy was chockfull of gratitude, thanking the fans generously, and genuinely overwhelmed by the love we all were feeling. Seeing Saetia makes me wonder what it is like to resurrect aspects of the past. I think they never imagined it possible and had relegated their time together to history as I had. Yet, their reformation feels more like an awakening than mere nostalgia, an awakening mirrored in my own consciousness––again.
I was surprised to meet a 16-yr old wearing a yellow Indian Summer shirt. He knew all the bands I listened to 20 years ago. His name was Jack and he started listening to Saetia two years ago. He was literally half my age and had just found Saetia during the pandemic. This blew my mind. There were lots of younger people who obviously were fans, screaming along to each and every lyric. I saw Saetia’s legacy transmitting itself to another generation. I had assumed that younger kids would not discover these bands, that the scene had changed, as it already was changing back then. It is surreal to see the world is no longer post-Saetia and to feel the ways in which we are all tied together––aesthetically and humanly.
The younger generation now seems different than we were at their age, but also the same in many ways. I did not expect to see so much stage-diving and moshing during Saetia’s set. Over-the-top enthusiasm was totally appropriate, but at times verged on the chaotic as Adam’s mic was knocked out of the way more than once. But it is a hardcore show after all. Some chaos is expected. Toward the end of the show, Adam commented on these dynamics, noting that 20 years ago, Saetia was playing shows to kids bobbing their heads with hands in their pockets and eyes closed. It brings up questions about what it means for Saetia to be Saetia today, playing to bigger crowds than ever before, and in a multi-generational scene. As for stage-diving, I did not even contemplate it––I’m content being more of a “hands-in-pocket” type. Nonetheless, the energy was absolutely infectious and ecstatic––I was especially amused to see Adam dive into the crowd at the end of their set. Billy was very embracing of fans, telling them they are welcome on the stage. Some memorable words from him were that they are guests in our house, part of something that we have built.
Saetia continues to inspire with their powerful music, humble attitudes, and exemplary ethos. All of their reunion shows were benefit shows supporting charities in need, raising $25,000 from their West coast shows alone. All of that goes to Border Angels, a non-profit that advocates for human rights, humane immigration reform, and social justice. In the aforementioned podcast, Billy mentioned how he came to recognize that the band could be a vehicle for something positive and saw Saetia’s reunion as a way to make the world a better place. At the end of the show, I shook Billy’s hand and took a photo with him. I thanked him and told him I knew it was for the charity but that it was also much more than that. What I was feeling then was how Saetia was not only benefitting those seriously in need, they were also giving something to all of us who were there and even all who were there only in heart. Billy is right that Saetia has now become a vehicle for something much larger than itself, and that is a beautiful thing. I am hopeful for more shows, perhaps on Kauai where I live, but will nonetheless cherish what I have already been given. 20 years after discovering Saetia, I can say with a smile, there is plenty of happy here.
May 1, 2023