Meditasi drummer Raja Azreen Raja Talib had asked his bandmates to dress head to toe in black for the show, and with guitarist Rosli Ahmad unwell he was the one insisting the performance go ahead. Then, during the second song of a planned 10-song set at the Teruntum Rock Festival in Kuantan, Pahang, Malaysia, on July 18, 2026, the drums went quiet. Frontman Bakaruddin Daud turned toward the riser and found the 56-year-old Malaysian musician, a friend of decades, slumped over his kit. He never regained consciousness.
“I rushed towards him, but I could feel that [he] was gone,” Bakaruddin, also known as Burn, told the newspaper Berita Harian, speaking in Malay. The song was “Begini Aku Begitu Engkau.” He called his bandmate’s name and patted him, he said, and got no reaction.
Bakaruddin said he helped get Raja Azreen backstage, and that the drummer was already cold to the touch. Across three days of rehearsals in Raub, Pahang, he said, there had been no sign of anything wrong — “absolutely no signs of sickness,” in his words. The one thing he had noticed was how thin his friend had become.
Out front, the crowd understood quickly that something had gone wrong. Fans were alarmed as they watched the scene unfold before the stage, Burn said. Shock and deep sadness were how he described his own reaction to losing a musician who had been in his life for most of his adult years.
Taken to the Hospital After the Collapse
Respiratory assistance was what medical staff provided after Raja Azreen was rushed to the nearby Tengku Ampuan Afzan Hospital. There was no response, and he was pronounced dead at 10:58 p.m. His brother said the hospital’s medical report gave heart complications as the cause; no official finding has been released.
Despite the breathing support, the drummer never regained consciousness after the collapse, said his older brother, Raja Azman Raja Talib, 61. His heart had already given the family cause for concern. Heart problems had put Raja Azreen in the hospital in June, Azman said, and he did not stay a short time.
Two Hospital Stays and a Diabetes Diagnosis
There were two admissions in all, according to his brother, the first running two to three weeks before he was readmitted. Raja Azreen had recently been diagnosed with diabetes, both Azman and Burn said.
His health had improved enough, though, for him to return to what he loved most away from music. Sports were a passion for Raja Azreen, and competitions drew him back as soon as he was on his feet again. He took part in a BMX competition before travelling to Kuantan, Azman said, and went directly from it to the festival.
“It is possible that extreme fatigue took a toll on his heart,” Azman said.
His bandmate saw no hint of distress in the drummer’s manner before the set. Reunited with friends at the festival, he was visibly happy, Burn said, with no signs of illness or low spirits in the hours leading up to Meditasi’s time onstage. Minutes later he was gone, midway through the second song of a set the band had played versions of for years.
Raja Azreen never married, and when he was not performing he lived with and cared for his mother, Raja Amnah Raja Osman, 86, at the family home in Ulu Yam, Selangor. He had previously run a bicycle shop. The band’s hits include “Bidadari,” “Hukuman Pada Pesona” and “Biar Pedih Kasih Memanjang.”
Metal Wizard, Then Meditasi
Meditasi has been part of the Malaysian rock landscape for four decades. It formed in the mid-1980s in Kampung Gali Hilir, Raub, Pahang, under the name Metal Wizard; accounts of the founding year vary between 1983 and 1986. The group later took the name Meditasi — Malay for “meditation” — which the guitarist is said to have found in a dictionary. Raja Azreen was a longtime member rather than one of its originators, joining the Malaysian rock group around 1990, after the band had recorded its first album. He was not a founding member, as some reports have suggested.
The group’s studio albums are the self-titled 1990 debut, “Bidadari” (1991), “Realisma” (1992) and “Demi Rindu” (1995).
The band’s breakthrough came during the golden era of Malaysian rock in the 1990s, when Malay-language rock bands filled stadiums and dominated cassette racks across the country. Driving guitar rock and the power ballads that defined the era for a generation of listeners built the group’s following. After going quiet for years, Meditasi reunited in 2015. On Spotify, the catalog was pulling in about 46,000 monthly listeners in late August, a mix of fans old enough to remember the 1990s and younger arrivals finding the songs through streaming.
The 2015 reunion returned Raja Azreen to the drums beside Burn and guitarist Rosli Ahmad, and to a festival circuit where Malaysian rock veterans still command loyal, loud crowds. Teruntum was one more stop on it.
Burn Brought Him Home
The frontman and his drummer had been friends for decades, and Burn said the death affected him deeply. It was Burn who brought the body home from Kuantan, according to Azman, and who performed the funeral rites — the task falling to the bandmate who was onstage beside him when Raja Azreen collapsed. He was buried at the Sungai Tangkas Islamic cemetery in Bangi, Selangor, on Sunday, July 19.
Meditasi’s next move remains undecided. A conversation about the band’s future is one Burn said he and Rosli have not yet had. On one point, though, he was firm: performances will continue, because that is what the band believes Raja Azreen would have wanted.
Burn noticed one more thing afterward. Raja Azreen died on July 18, 2026 — the same date, 20 years on, that Meditasi’s bassist, Yan, had died in 2006. For now, the way he lived has drawn more attention from Malaysian rock fans than the shock of how he died: a BMX competition, then straight to a festival to play the songs that made his band’s name.