The Power of Nostalgia
Things always come to an end, be it a story or essay in a book, a series that you love on streaming platform, a film in cinema, a relationship you once had, your prime life in 20s cause you just embarked the freaking 30s this July, or an inherited 31 years old bicycle that is no longer practical for daily usage. But we can always visit our memory though, and it’s called nostalgia.
In fact, we can still make money out of nostalgia though. Nostalgia is one of the basic emotion that is often being used in advertising strategy to create familiarity and mental availability. The Y2K aesthetic from the 90s for example, is on the rising thanks to the groundbreaking girl band from South Korea, NewJeans. Nokia had at some point tried to relaunch their 3310 smartphone with nostalgia but failed ultimately because apparently the key driver to buy smartphone is expecting progression in technology, not relooking to the past.
Nostalgia brings specific unique traits for Indonesian Music Festivals. The year of 2022 is the blooming era of music festivals thanks to the uplifted restriction about social distancing. Now when the pandemic is officially over, people thrive again for attending music concert, in fact FREAKING COLDPLAY will have their concert here in Jakarta! Music festivals are essentially focusing for certain genre. You have a dedicated music festivals for jazz, rock, electronic music, new wave-ish, indie, and alternatives. Aside from being specific or at least tied into one theme, you have, well, an inclusive music festivals that accommodate ALL GENRE music for ALL GENERATION in one event for couple of days. The thing is, because these festivals don’t want to be divided by genre, most people come to see this kind of festival because they want to experience with nostalgia.
Most of the performers are the star of the millennial era and they want to relive their youth again. Nostalgia bring the money in because if you see, these specific all-inclusive-music-festivals have been annually held by two different events yet occurred on the same month! One festival can accommodate up to 100 performers and it’s LIKELY POSSIBLE that the artists are booked for both events. The fact that these all-genre-for-all-generation festivals have been held for many years and haven’t lost their grip, it shows that the demands are still high. I think other than love and support to our local music, here’s my theory that explains the phenomena;
- Indonesian love nongkrong, even in music festivals. And usually, these all-inclusive type of festivals are swarmed with sponsored booth from many type of sponsor brands. They are filled with many high-involving engagement activities that replicate the vibe of PEKAN RAYA JAKARTA but add some music in the background. You can enjoy music from the main stage or choose to be involved in activities from the sponsored booth. It’s amazing right?
- The hype of the festivals create the urgency to drive FOMO feeling for most Indonesian. I think this explains why people don’t mind for example, to be able to watch same artist both in event 1 or event 2 in the same month, as long as they can go to the events, have good time with their friends, and you know, experiencing the hype altogether.
It’s amazing that nostalgia can channel people’s love for music and turn it into strong force to support local musician through these kind of festivals. The combination of nostalgia, social hotspot, and FOMO driver are really formula to create the ultimate cash grabbers. Even people don’t care if the line up are overlapping each other, because youngsters and millennials just want to meet their friends, sing along, and have a good time.
