
Bingkai Karya-Pamungkas will release his latest album titled “Hardcore Romance” in August 2024. Before moving on to that, he has released the lead single from his fifth album, “One Bad Day.”
“One Bad Day” serves as the blueprint for the album “Hardcore Romance,” showcasing Pamungkas’ music explorations. This song also shows his reflective process of the difficulties he has faced over the last several years.
“I was actually having trouble creating songs when I was writing ‘One Bad Day,’ as I hadn’t written any in almost three years. The last time I wrote was for the record Birdy, which I composed while traveling alone during the pandemic,” said Pamungkas. That was the last time he was able to complete a formal songwriting session.
This single is the alpha and omega of Pamungkas’ latest album. Though it was originally composed for the piano and meant to be the album’s opening piece, it was actually the last one finished. This song, in general, discusses embracing a negative experience that we all eventually encounter in our day-to-day lives.
Starting as a piano ballad, Pamungkas decided to turn “One Bad Day” into an alternative rock track with a lively arrangement featuring massive guitar elements. Pamungkas admits that this single is part of his exploration of the guitar. He deliberately used a Stratocaster as the mainstay, seeing it as a journey back to the roots of modern rock music.
Challenges
In the creative process of working on this single and his latest album, Pamungkas faced challenging situations in his music career. It was a gamble on his existence and musical track record that brought him into the spotlight of the main stage. Instead of getting stuck in the formulas of his previous music, Pamungkas built a new musical entity, and “One Bad Day” became a crucial piece in this context.
As the tradition of his previous work, Pamungkas recorded every part of this song by himself. In the songwriting process, arrangement, and playing all the instruments, to mixing. Pamungkas does this to maintain intimacy in his creative process. This also revives the spirit of Pamungkas as a bedroom musician with limited resources, doing everything on his own.