With over 1,000 vehicles on display and approximately 70,000 visitors through the door, it’s safe to say that Retro Havoc is now the biggest car show in Malaysia’s history.
I’m honestly frazzled to put things into words, because for 2023 – the 8th annual Retro Havoc – I attended as a special guest. When Blake and Ron covered the event in years past, I did so as a regular visitor. But this time around I was able to go behind the scenes and see firsthand how Retro Havoc is curated and organized.
Retro Havoc typically holds a launch event at the venue in Selangor one day before the main festivities start. During this pre-event for media, the hero cars are announced. For 2023, four builds were celebrated – a Mk1 Ford Escort, wide-body Toyota Supra, a Star Road-kitted Datsun Z, and a custom W202 Mercedes-Benz all the way from Thailand.
From this time through until well after midnight, all the show cars are loaded into the event, which is held in a shopping mall underground carpark.
It’s crazy to think that over 1,000 show vehicles (960 cars and 50 bikes) were positioned in The Curve’s B2 carpark in such a short space of time. I had planned on capturing the entire load-in, but after learning that most cars arrive late at night and knowing that I had a very early start the next morning, I headed back to my accomodation for the evening.
But not before I took a super-quick look at that bright pink Z…
Known as Devil Pinko, this is Malaysia’s first S30Z with a Star Road Fighter V1 body kit. RTG Works is around 85% through the build, with just wiring, exhaust fabrication and some suspension fine tuning left to do.
Its owner, Farah, opted for a Nissan VH41DE engine swap over building up the Z’s original L-series, so it should perform very nicely with a V8. Hopefully I can revisit this car for a full feature once it’s done.
The Calm Before The StormOn show day, my plan was to capture images with no crowds around, while mentally preparing myself for what was to come once the doors opened and tens of thousands of visitors streamed in.
During this quiet time, all of Retro Havoc’s special guests – Daijiro Inada (Option magazine, Tokyo Auto Salon, D1GP), Shoji Inoue (Star Road Japan), Khyzyl Saleem (The Kyza), Ichiraku Toshiya (1048style, Kamiwaza, Fuelfest Japan), Lulut Retro (Kustomfest Indonesia) and myself also cast our votes for our favorite cars of the show across a number of different categories.
I was really impressed by how quickly the Retro Havoc team were able to physically pull the whole event together. It showed just how good their planning is, with everything organized to the nth degree.
It was so cool to see such a wide variety of vehicles. Most were from the 1970s to early-’00s era, but older cars and plenty of late-model machines also attended. On top of that, there were participants who brought builds from as far as Thailand and Singapore.
Two cars that immediately stood out to me both had motorsport-inspired liveries. The first was this FC3S RX-7 wearing the Mazda 7B7B’s iconic Le Mans colors.
The other, parked right alongside, was this ST185 Toyota Celica GT-Four, looking resplendent in white with classic Castrol WRC stripes.
I can’t pinpoint what exactly drew me to it, but I really loved this factory wide-body Mitsubishi Starion. Perhaps it’s the aggressiveness, or the black wheels over yellow paint combo. Or maybe, just the fact that it reminded me of how Mitsubishi used to make such cool cars.
Sticking with Mitsubishi for a moment, there were a handful of Pajeros and even a Dakar Rally-inspired kei Jr. version.
And then this lineup. The Proton Arena is a Malaysian hero and a rare find these days, so to see three of the car-based pickups parked together (and another on show elsewhere in the carpark) was a real treat. No, they didn’t come looking like this; all have had Lancer Evolution facelifts.
I have to make special mention of the Thailand group, who always bring their A-game to Retro Havoc. The crazy, custom wide-bodied W201 Mercedes-Benz returned this year with a twin-turbo setup and a roof rack. Seriously, how much wilder can this thing get?
Vintage BMWs are popular enthusiast cars in Malaysia, and Retro Havoc 2023 had a nice selection of both well-preserved and customized (read: slammed) examples.
Let The Madness BeginA car show without people is not a car show. Whether you’re a hardcore enthusiast or just someone with a passing interest in cars who happened to see the huge billboard for Retro Havoc along the freeway, everyone is welcomed at this event.
With so many vehicles, I quickly realized that I wasn’t going to be able to see everything, or spend too much time in one place. There was never a dull moment, that’s for sure.
During the afternoon, the special guests’ voting results were shared and the winners announced. A custom Honda C70 motorcycle was also given away to one lucky show-goer, but not by the original method. Every one of the 70,000 spectators that attended were in the draw to win, but after calling out numerous ticket numbers with no takers coming forward, the Honda’s new owner was eventually decided by a dance battle. It was hilarious to watch, but also very wholesome.
Before I knew it, it was late in the day and I still had so much of the show to capture. However, there were just too many people to contend with. As Ron once said in previous Retro Havoc coverage, “you just have to step back and embrace the chaos.”
Retro Havoc 2023 ended in the way most other car shows do – one engine firing up, prompting a chain reaction. Let’s just say it got loud very quickly in the concrete expanse as owners slowly made their ways to the carpark’s exit points.
This was an event in itself, and provided one final opportunity to capture the show.
Once again, Retro Havoc exceeded my expectations. Alie, Farah and the team really did an amazing job. With a huge number of visitors this year and even support from the Malaysian government, Retro Havoc can only grow from here.
I feel extremely honored to have been a part of it. Retro Havoc 2024 really can’t come quick enough!
In the meantime though, there’s many more images for your viewing pleasure in the gallery chapter below.
Rick Muda
Instagram: ardskellig
this is the first time and yet most fun, epic event i participated! myself cant forget about the event till this day. all those cars, the crowd are super enjoyable. "calm before the storm" are actually the correct term to use. Thanks to organizers they have planned well and they did their best to warn those visitors about touching the participants' cars.
i registered as "personal participants" were parked at the very end of the car-park. i dont think medias walk all the way back to the end to cover all the cars there. But please, if anyone have any picture of a green Nissan Sentra, do hit me up haha.
BTW, all these pictures are AMAZING! good work Mr Rick Muda. Thank You
It was definitely a blast! Thank you for the kind words!
There was a lot to see for sure, I wish I had all the time to take a proper look of all the cars at the show haha.
The beautiful FC3S with 787B livery now has a broken spoiler (original RE Amemiya) thanks to monkeys running around the cars rushing to see some kid revving his car loaded with pops and bangs map
Car shows and concours are for low IQ people. This does not surprise me.
Anybody know much about that red Bluebird with the plate that reads "BCM9829"??
What generation/year/general info is that and stuff? It really caught my eye and I am really liking it.
its look like bluebird u11
U11 generation, the first FWD Bluebird. If I remember correctly, this particular car has a SR20 swap as well.
I see you fail to mention the amount of cars damaged or sat on or leaned on by the general public in your post, stuff that's all over social media.
This show is a real disaster waiting to happen with all of the idiots running around.
all over sm where exactly? found zero on IG, zero on twitter - only pictures and comments of people who had a great time. Found one lone blog post on google mentioning anything negative.
Well the vandalism incident was widely reported in local media, and lots of image circulated amongst local car enthusiast too, feel sorry for those who got their car damage in the event.
https://www.wapcar.my/news/from-missing-lug-nuts-to-broken-spoilers--how-ugly-malaysian-kids-tainted-retro-havoc-2023-68438?utm_source=facebook&utm_medium=organic&utm_campaign=68438-en-none&fbclid=IwAR2d9vUSfoEwIYkPHNiKJtSr8cj1fS2hG9Ri3V99HO2E3pXiYClHF68zzb0
I'd like to keep it drama free, apparently according to the police investigation and reviewed footage about the missing lug nuts. Nothing of that extent happened during the event. Entire event whole vibe was just awesome and pretty wholesome!
That was the sole item I found anywhere on google. Everything else I read on IG and Twitter mentioned how good the cars were, and the turnout, and general good time. Not one thing to the contrary except the linked "article"
well, u forgot to notice some of the special cars thr, among thm was an AE86 that was once compete in the FD USA years ago... owned by the legend itself Tengku Djan
It's in picture #116.
Rick
That's ALOT of pics! Wow! Love that copper color VW bus. What about interior pics? And thr 1973 Porsche Carrera. Love it! Very nice pics. Looking forward to going to some shows this year in the states. My MKIII is ready to go!
Liking that MKIII!
Unfortunately I didn't get to look inside, rushing through time to capture as many as possible!
looks like a great show! Thanks for the great pics!
I'm really digging this photoshoot. The colors are awesome, so much variety of shades, glossy and metallic. Love the pink on that EK Civic, and the bright yellow Datsuns. Just loads of bright colors that I just never see around here, everything here is so boring and lifeless. Heck even the parking garage is super bright and clean and lit up. Not to mention the variety of cars and the mods and the styles. Auto heaven right there.