Credit: Far Out / Album Cover
Mon 7 September 2026 12:00, UK
Psychedelia has come a long way since lysergic acid diethylamide – LSD to us non-chemists – was first concocted in a 1938 laboratory.
From the heady countercultural days of Ken Kesey and the Grateful Dead, to the mind-expanding Anatolian psych of Barış Manço halfway across the world, psychedelia has always sparked rock and roll innovation and, in the present day, Nusantara Beat are carrying that same torch.
Hailing from the city of Amsterdam isn’t much of a curveball for a psychedelic outfit; the city of canals, bicycles, and tourists over-indulging in funky-smelling brownies has long since been an artistic haven and, during the 1960s, it played host to an essential sect of mainland Europe’s very own hippie revolution.
Shocking Blue, for instance, spent a considerable part of their acid-fuelled career hanging around Amsterdam, despite being from The Hague, while pioneering garage rockers The Outsiders proudly called the city their home.
Nederbeat, though its influence still prevails across the rock and roll underbelly of the Netherlands, is not the extent of Nusantara Beat’s influences, however. With each of the band members boasting Indonesian blood – one hailing from West Java and the rest made up of second or third-generation members of the Dutch-Indonesian community – the band owes a core element of their sound to the incredible musical heritage of the Asian archipelago.
Credit: Far Out / Record Sleeve
Although it isn’t routinely discussed, at least not in Western circles, the thousands of islands that make up the fabric of Indonesian culture are awash with musical mastery. Whether it’s the chanting traditional folk of Indonesia’s indigenous population, the Indo-pop heritage of Koes Plus, ska-obsessed subcultures in Malang, or the sweet, soulful sounds of Thee Marloes, there appear to be as many distinct, rich, and innovative music scenes in Indonesia as there are islands themselves.
It is that endlessly diverse cultural identity which Nustantara Beat tend to draw from, uniting their personal heritage through traditional Indonesian rhythms, with the far-out psychedelic rock and Nederbeat garage stylings more commonly found in their home base of Amsterdam.
There is always a risk, of course, that a sonic identity so expansive, and so caught between two very different worlds, emerges from the sound-desk feeling muddled, overly ambitious, and disorientating. However, in the case of Nusantara Beat, and proven by their masterful self-titled debut released in November of 2025, the collective is incredibly adept at presenting their genre-defying sound in a naturally enchanting, mind-blowing fashion.
That Glitterbeat-released album, along with the handful of seven-inch singles put out by the group on Switzerland’s Les Disques Bongo Joe label, act as an excellent introduction to the sonic identity of Nusantara Beat, but it is within their live performances that the group truly thrive. During a recent visit to the UK, including one performance at Green Man Festival that this writer was lucky enough to witness, the Dutch-Indonesian outfit took stages by storm with a sound that simply isn’t replicated anywhere else.
What immediately comes across onstage is just how polished the band are, with each riff, note, and beat perfectly executed without ever losing the spontaneity that live music brings. Jordy Sanger’s surf rock-esque guitar playing is utterly mesmerising, but it is the ethereal vocals of Megan de Klerk that truly transport the audience to the psychedelic realm that Nusantara Beat create.
In a live music scene awash with identikit bands, you come away from a Nusantara Beat show struggling to find much to compare it to. Not only is their inherent sound, uniting the musical identity of Indonesia and the Netherlands together in one far-out rock and roll stew, so unique to the group, but the spectacle of their performance doesn’t immediately draw to mind any potential peers.
Psychedelic rock has never truly gone out of style since it was first carved out in the kaleidoscopic shadow of 1960s counterculture, and the acid-dripped sound has sprawled off into countless different subgenres, avenues of inspiration, crossing borders and constantly evolving. Even still, Nusantara Beat possess one of the most infectious, original takes on the psychedelic sound, and their quality in the current-day psych scene is second to none.
Whether their roots are in Amsterdam or West Java, the world at large should familiarise themselves with this unparalleled outfit.
