I took this out on loan from my local library many moons ago. Back when you could actually do such a thing. It grabbed me hard then, its never let go, and I've loved it ever since.
I took this out on loan from my local library many moons ago. Back when you could actually do such a thing. It grabbed me hard then, its never let go, and I've loved it ever since.
Our friend Scrotum Scissor is well informed (as always). Some more info on the bands he mentioned:
Axis their second album is a must have! Really awesome stuff, but sadly only released on CD as a bootleg.
Because there are hundreds of bands called Axis, the LP (or the boot) should look like this:
Peloma Bokiu: Very good Proto Prog/Psych with a strong Santana influence (I think there is a recent 2LP reissue out there, no idea if it legal (saw a CD also))
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pvikD4rlPJA
Poll: The stuff I heard is more in a Psych direction, but at least this band gave birth to Akritas and Kostas Tournas.
Iraklis Triantafyllidis: There is a legal CD out of this Album, get it when you can find it (stay away from his other Albums)
Pete & Royce: Both of their Albums had a recent legal CD release (2on1 I think) nice melodic Prog (somewhat to soft for me)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BzHOyNPDlT0
Socrates (Drank the Conium) - Phos is a killer Album (and has a Esoteric release) this one features Vangelis too!!!!
Their other Albums are more heavy Psych (but good)
Kostas Tournas (ex Poll): Has one very good Album (Aperanta Chorafia) with orchestra and rock band (he has many more (but stay away))
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wU4Rlsmwgws
Apocalypsis: a band that had two Albums in the very early 80s (slightly Neo Prog but not bad at all)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h-GqpwwZryQ
I know Stamatis Kokotas and Dimitri Poulikakos but can't put them in a Prog context (Singer/Songwriter)
Last edited by TheH; 04-20-2014 at 07:07 PM.
Yup, Stamatis is mostly song-oriented, though intelligently arranged such. And Poulikakos became well known as a satirical lyricist/poet, journalist and performer/agitator/singer, but his '76 release Metaforai Ekdromai o Mitsos features material initially created by his original group, Hexadactylos - and this is very good, aggressive and politically charged progressive jazz-rock (think Floh de Cologne, Maajun, Plastic People, Komintern and the heavier stuff by AreA). Unfortunately, as with the second Axis, this has never been properly reissued and vinyl originals are very hard to come by nowadays (whereas Axis ones can actually be found).Originally Posted by TheH
"Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
"[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM
I have just never made it through this thing. It could be time to revisit it...
A great release by the Music Bazz label. I prefer the first album to the 2nd but they are both worthwhile. I'd describe it as a sort of garage symph.
If we are going to talk about Socrates, I think we might as well acknowledge their importance to Greece as a hard rock group. Phos is fine, but that's not the sound that had people dancing in the aisles, this is:
Yup...
I alsi haven't heard it in ages, and to be honest, I'm not yearning to.... yeah, there were some good (even excellent) parts to the album, but for the most of it, I guess it escapes me as to why this should be considered a timeless classic.
my music collection increased tenfolds when I switched from drug-addicts to complete nutcases.
Stamatis Kokotas has nothing to do with any rock related concept. He is a typical example of the popular urban (not traditional) bouzouki driven style laika.
On the other hand Dimitri Poulikakos is considered as the grandfather of greek rock. His album "Metaforai Ekdromai o Mitsos" is a wonderful, mediterranean take on the Frank Zappa style in the era of "Chunga's Revenge". Probably to my ears, the second important greek progressive album after "666".
For the general info, I am copying an article I have written for the belgian Crohinga Well fanzine, some 22 years ago. Some lines should have been re-written (in retrospect) but I think it sums-up to an almost accurate extent the local scene.
Greetings to all you Crohinga-reading dwarfs around the planet. The following story deals with what is supposed to be "psychedelic" Greece; we shall try dodging any mention of the local tradition of cultivating hallucinogenic weeds such as datura and mind-expanding sativa and stick to mere music. One thing that cannot be overlooked in surveying the Greek underground is the political situation of the past decades as it was a determinant influence on the local music scene (among other things). The presence of the military junta during the late sixties and early seventies has been quite a deterrent, having prevented a musical development concurrent with that of other European countries. To complete the picture, there was the obvious hostility of the Greek communist party towards the "cultural imperialism of U.S. patterns of life" that was added to the overall paranoia (yet another illustration of the fact that fascism and so-called communism are juxtaposed totalitarian brothers instead of opposite ends of a line, L.). The main reason behind such attitudes - be it from the left or the right wing - was the alternative outlook of the youth movements in those days, with revolutionary and subversive aspects that denied the traditional structures of a bourgeois-based society (and it's common knowledge they prefer subservience to subversiveness, L.).
Also, there is a general opinion that Greece is a country of ancient glamour, sun and warm seas and all of that typical travel agency bullshit ... here I must say that after two years residence in Belgium I assured myself of the fact that there is a marked absence of essential differences between Greece and the rest of the western world (apart from the fact the we all stay up late almost every day) and I'm sorry to disillusion anyone of you who looks upon Greece as a rather exotic place to live in ... (surely no one who has seen newscasts about air pollution in Athens can ever entertain that thought again, L.).
Before plunging ourselves into the story I would like to remark that I've chosen to feature only the bands which in my opinion are of real interest to the underground music addict. This is something the reader shall have to take into consideration. There is a certain lack of sheer psychedelic acts, due primarily to the fact that instrumentalists versed and educated in ethnic and oriental-influenced music tend to turn rather towards pure ethnic folk music than to follow a more electrified path (although in my opinion some of the best psychedelic music comes from precisely this combination of influences; as Teodore and Mike put it: "there is a psychedelic element in Greek music that can be traced back to the early days of the twentieth century; according to us the Greek "rebetika" songs from the twenties have a definite psychedelic tinge to them. Year after year more folk and traditional elements entered into Greek music, but the psych feeling was always there", L.).
The late sixties were characterised by political oppression from the authorities and by a strong folk movement (oriented towards the political left) that sought its identification in the traditional Hellenic roots. A lot of male and female folk singers were known throughout Greece but the outside world remained virtually oblivious to them. The names of two of them shall turn up again later in this story: Giorgos Romanos and Dionysis Savopoulos (there was another Savopoulos too, Panos Savopoulos; no relative, but his two albums sound more like they were influenced by the sound of Giorgos Romanos). Most of the bands that existed back then, however, mostly played cover versions of English-sung hits and their overall approach was orientated towards light pop and beat. They were called The Rabbits, The Stormies, The Teenagers, The Knacks, etc. and weren't exactly psychedelic bands, but they did show that a certain mood was present. A great part of the vinyl production was in the form of singles and many of the bands sunk into oblivion after having issued a couple of them.
Some noteworthy names of the period are Gus And George, who issued a beat/psych 7" on RCA Victor as early as 1966, and Bill And Psychedelic Band (or Bill Z And His Band, as they were also known) who brought out a psych- influenced single called "My Lady" b/w "I Am in Love" in 1967. Tammy And The Sounds were a band with a female singer that released two albums and many singles, some of which showed a west coast-inspired approach. And lastly there were The Persons, who released three singles marked by a heavy, garage-type psychedelic style. MGC was the purest rock band of the period. Led by Jim Polytimos on keyboards they were famous for their wild concerts and the excellent interpretations of classics like "Purple Haze" and "Sitting On Top of the World". Unfortunately they never got a deal to record an album so that the only traces that are left of their prowess are three singles: "Blame the Talent in the Family" (1966), "I'm Gonna Cut my Head" (****I'm not sure I read this correctly***) and "Foxy Lady" (both 1968). Dimitris Poulikakos, the mentor of the Greek rock scene, was one of their lead singers before quitting them in favour of the legendary Hexadactylus, of whom more shall be told when we tackle the seventies.
The most famous Greek band of the late sixties was undoubtedly Aphrodite's Child. Two of their members are well-known even today: Egypt-born singer Demis Roussos (who also played the bass guitar, trumpet, bouzouki and organ, by the way) and keyboard wizard and multi-instrumentalist Vangelis Papathanassiou, who hailed from the town of Volos (situated in Thessalia, roughly mid-way between Thessaloniki and Athens); drummer Lucas Sideras (born in Athens) completed the 1968 line-up. They moved to France very early in their career and issued a string of singles that climbed the hit-parades virtually all over the world (their staying in France was due to the great strikes accompanying the upheavals of May 1968; the band were actually on their way to London). Most of their music was pop-oriented but the psychedelic seeds were there manifesting themselves in songs like "The Grass Is No Green", "Don't Try to Catch a River" and "You Always Stand in my Way". Their oeuvre culminated in the release of "666", on the famous Vertigo label. This double album was inspired upon the Apocalypse of St. John and is one of the great psychedelic masterpieces of the period. The influences that can be found on it range from Byzantine church music via oriental-style improvisations to progressive/psychedelic continental rock.
After the release of the album (apparently, everyone thinks this was in 1972; I'm convinced it was recorded in 1970, L.) the band members went their separate ways: Lucas Sideras released two rather good albums (and is still active, apparently, playing with a band called Diesel), Demis Roussos dived head first into cocktail-lounge music with "We Shall Dance" (1971) (although I must say there are one or two b-sides of his singles that still bear the mark of his previous career, "Lord of the Flies" for instance, and according to Teodore and Mike there are some great songs in the traditional style on his first album, "On The Greek Side Of My Mind", L.) and Vangelis went on to become one of the great popular keyboard wizards of the seventies. But his first solo outings were of a different nature, with "Hypothesis" (recorded in May 1971,at the Marquee Studios in London), "The Dragon" (recorded one month later, same place) and the all-but-forgotten "Fais Que Ton R...ve Soit Plus Long Que La Nuit". The former two feature Michel Ripoche (the violinist from a French band called Zoo who was also present at the recording of "666") ex- Aphrodite's Child guitarist Arghiris "Silver" Koulouris and some British session men (to wit Brian Odger, Mick Waller and Tony Oxley) playing some very fine jazz-influenced ("Hypothesis") and progressive ("The Dragon") music, while the latter is a rather militant political statement, produced and composed by Vangelis, making use of inscriptions culled from Paris walls in May 1968. All three albums came out in 1971, a year that also saw the release of a single by Alpha Beta, with two songs on it: one was called "Astral Abuse" and the other "Who Killed". Like "Dragon" and "Hypothesis" it came out on the Byg label. In case you're wondering what this suicidal ugly duckling is doing in the midst of these glorious Greek swans, let it be known to all of ye that Alpha Beta was none other than Evangelis O. Papathanassiou in person!
Two years later "Earth" recaptured some of the splendour and mood of "666", while on 1974's "Entends-Tu Les Chiens Aboyer" (released on the very small Vampir record label, distinguishing itself by a very bad quality of vinyl - even by French standards, L.) the first inklings of the keyboard extravaganza that was to come reared their head. The next one, "Heaven And Hell" was the one that brought Vangelis (he'd dropped the Papathanassiou with an eye towards commercial feasibility) in the picture as far as the public at large was concerned.
And while we're at it: Aphrodite's Child weren't the only Greek band trying to make it abroad; there was Axis, for example, a band that was actually formed in Paris (in 1970). Like their more illustrious compatriots they succeeded in breaking into the hit lists, with a Greek traditional called "Ela Ela" (I recall seeing them on t.v. in the early seventies, with drummer George Hatziathanassiou joining the rest of the band front-stage bashing a huge drum strapped to his belly, L.). They recorded three albums, the first of which contained some fine heavy organ, while the second saw them moving into the twilight zone between progressive music and hard rock. Axis disbanded in 1974, after the release of their third album that failed to make it commercially, in Greece as in the rest of Europe. Organ player Demis Visvikis and bassist Dimitris Katakouzinos joined Demis Roussos' backing band.
Another Greek expatriate was George Romanos, who had come on the scene in the mid-sixties, adopting the image of the lonesome troubadour. His first two albums, released in 1967 and '68, are nice collections of folk ballads. In the early seventies he changed his style into a Byrds-influenced fuzzed-out melodic psychedelic sound and issued the excellent album "Duo Mikra Galazia Aloga" ("Two Small Blue Horses") in 1970 (I've got another from around the same period (judging by the cover photos) called "George Romanos In Concert & In The Studio", the studio being Columbia, same as on "Two Small Blue Horses". As far as I can tell by the (Greek) liner notes, George was helped out by Vangelis Papathanassiou!, L.). In 1971, George Romanos moved to France where he seems to have been seen playing with members of Axis; in 1974 he issued a fourth (fifth?) album there, called "Dans Le Grenier", on which the emphasis lies on the bitter-sweet edge of his melodies and the surrealist lyrics. For quite a long time (almost a decade) Romanos was nowhere to be seen but then he came up with two more albums in the eighties, having partially reverted to his ballad-oriented style, but mixing it with progressive and psychedelic stuff.
To close off this slightly oo-la-la chapter there's Stamatis, a Greek singer who recorded "Beautiful Lies" for the Philips label in 1972. The album is a mixture of acoustic and electric rock, once again consisting mostly of perfectly sung and orchestrated quiet songs and ballads, in a similar vein to Strawbs or very early Genesis. Some French musicians participated on the album, as well as Arghiris Koulouris and Lucas Sideras of Aphrodite's Child.
Meanwhile, back in Greece the seventies heralded an explosion in the Greek underground scene; not only in music but also in all other forms of art as well as in political activism a stream of radical innovation was omnipresent. The principal expressions of this phenomenon were the gradual change of several quarters in Athens toward becoming freak hang-outs (Plaka and Exarchia Square) the turning into rock clubs of many traditional folk music taverns and in general the adopting of alternative attitudes by the most advanced of the younger people. Thus a small radical core began to show its presence nearly everywhere in the big cities, spurred on primarily by the fall of the military regime but also by an obvious desire for change. Having to face a new, uncontrolled phenomenon, the conservative Greek society showed a hostile disposition, with the mass media printing slurs against the new movement and approving of the autocracy of the suppressive forces. As was to be foreseen this behaviour did nothing if not strengthen the cohesion of the alternative scene. A space for free and virtually limitless forms of expression was opened and many bands quit their previous mainstream direction and jumped on the alternative bandwagon. Unfortunately the record companies were loath the issue rock music, not necessarily from a political but rather from a commercial point of view: they assumed that there wasn't enough of a potential audience for the genre to make it worth their while. The majority of the groups disappeared without leaving any recorded traces.
Some of the more serious underground bands were captured on vinyl, however, like on the "Live At Kyttaro" album that gives a very nice cross-section of what was happening in Athens in the early seventies. The recordings on the album date back to 1971 (I think) but it was only released in 1980 (on the Lyra label) and it features some convincingly shouted pop material from Despina Glezou, a folk-influenced protest-type song by Damon & Fidias, a free-form piece by the infamous Hexadactylus, Dionysis Savopoulos with Stella Gadeda and his band Bourboulia, and last but by no means least a ten-minute track called "Elektrikos Socrates" by Socrates Drank The Conium.
We'll go over the latter three bands in some detail, starting with Socrates.
Socrates was formed (as Socrates Drank The Conium) from the ashes of garage band The Persons in 1969, around bass player and singer Anthony Tourkogiorgis and John Spathas, an excellent guitarist, with George Trandalides on drums. Over the years, they turned into Greece's most expressive rock band. Their first two albums were issued in 1972 and 1973 respectively and contained some very fine blues and early hard rock, with the band shortening their name to Socrates in the process. On their third, "On The Wings" (1974), they incorporated some elements of Southern rock into their sound, while for their fourth effort - recorded in London - they drafted in Vangelis Papathanassiou (who had turned down an offer from Yes to replace Rick Wakeman!) whose keyboards helped turn "Phos" (1976) into a progressive underground masterpiece. For their last two albums they went back to the straight and narrow path of just plain old rock, with a few funk elements thrown in, although the quality of their music remained at a high level. Socrates disbanded in 1984 and its musicians now pursue successful solo careers.
Dionysis Savopoulos was probably the most influential individual in the history of Greek alternative music. His ethnic approach to rock is unique and ranks him among the sacred monsters of the genre. He began way back in 1966 with "Fortigo" a record that was markedly influenced by the songs of Bob Dylan, Woody Guthrie and Jacques Brel. In 1970, Savopoulos turned to a completely personal sound, blending protest ballads, rhythm'n'blues, psychedelia, straight rock, jazz, Greek traditional music and ethnic tunes from all over the Balkan into an awesome progressive idiom. His long song on "Live At Kyttaro" is most impressive and one of the best cuts on the album. Members of other important Greek bands (Iraklis, for instance) popped in to give him a hand occasionally and his cooperation with Stella Gadedi was prolonged well into the seventies. Practically all of his albums up to 1979 are works of an untiring genius, but sadly his musical offerings of the eighties show an almighty drop in quality accompanied - alas - by a change of attitude in his political views as well.
Hexadactylus arose from the ashes of MGC. With the charismatic singer Dimitris Poulikakos as main man they proved to be one of the principal bands of the period. They developed a personal musical style leaning towards Frank Zappa's Mothers Of Invention (with some wild vibraphone playing by Dimitris Polytimos) and soon acquired a devoted following. Apart from this live track, only two singles were left behind by this freaky, jazz-influenced band: "The Kids Are Alright" and "Aneprokopos", both released in 1971. In 1976 EMI Greece released "Metaforai Ekdromai - O Mitsos", credited as a Dimitris Poulikakos solo album; it's considered to be one of the three best albums to come out of Greece's underground scene in the seventies, having successfully captured the spirit of the age.
Apart from all the members of Hexadactylus (who were Dimitros Poulikakos himself, Lakis Diakogiannis on sax, Nikos Politis on guitar, Antonis Triantafyllou on bass, Leonidas Alachadamis on drums and Dimitris Polytimos of vibes and organ) just about the whole Greek music scene was present on the album, with lots of members of other bands participating in the project. A few random examples: Vlassis Bonatsos of Peloma Bokiou was there, Nikos Tsilogiannis of Bourboulia, Costas Doukakis and John Spathas who had played guitar on the Socrates albums as well as Socrates drummer George Trandalides, Pavlos Sidiropoulos of Damon & Fidias and Spyridoula, and quite a number of persons who had worked on the Iraklis albums. And to join both ends of the circle Dimitris Poulikakos in his turn sang on Iraklis' double album "Se Allous Kosmous" that was released in the same year as "Metaforai Ekdromai".
Iraklis Triandafyllides began his career in the sixties, playing in a beat band called The Saints (who had one single out) before going on to join D.N.A. in the early seventies. In 1973 he formed a band of his own (Lernaia Hydra - named after a monster out of Greek mythology) with which he recorded two singles as well as the double album mentioned earlier. It's not only one of the best but also one of the rarest Greek releases. The two records he released in the eighties are rarities as well. His work is mainly characterised by ethnic and psychedelic elements and dreamy atmospheres in a folk/psych style using many traditional Greek instruments. Nowadays, Iraklis owns several clubs and recording studios; he released two albums in the early eighties as well as a single-record reprint of "Se Allous Kosmous" in 1988.
This seems as good a place as any to mention that Giannis Giokarinis, who say and played the bass on some of the Iraklis albums, played the keyboards for Ilias Asvestopolous, whose "2002 Pola" album was released on Pan-Vox in 1974. Bass player Giorgos Fillipidis and violinist Giorgos Mangklaras were two other musicians who were both featured on the Iraklis albums. Their names were also to be found on an album by one of the figureheads of the Greek scene: Stavros Logarides. In the early seventies, Logarides founded Poll, a soft-rock, folky-psychedelic, hippie-ballad band, clearly influenced by the likes of The Byrds and Crosby Stills Nash & Young. The other two members were Kostas Tournas (who used to be with a garage band called The Teenagers that released one single in 1966) and Robert Williams (I think he's the same guy who recorded "Nosferatu" with The Stranglers' Hugh Cornwall in 1979, and who went on to play for Captain Beefheart and The Tremblers, L.). Poll only existed for two years but they managed to release two albums (in 1971 and '72). Their easy-listening ballad style made them very popular with Greek audiences, although the songs they wrote were rather light-weight. After the split, Kostas Tournas went on to record a progressive psychedelic concept solo album (whew, L.) in 1972 while Stavros Logarides started up another band, called Akritas. Incidentally, Poll would briefly reform in the early eighties, and come up with a live reunion album (they really were taking the CSN&Y thing to the limit, weren't they, L.).
Now Akritas must surely rank among the best groups ever to have hit the Greek scene, if one is to judge by their - admittedly very rare - eponymous debut album. The LP is chock-full of underground progressive rock akin to the sounds that can be found on albums by Aardvark, Arcadium and even Emerson Lake & Palmer. Apart from Logarides, other people in the band were keyboards player Aris Tasoulis (ex-Despina Glezou), guitarist Dimis Papachristou, drummer Giorgos Tsoupakis (who in the eighties went on to play with Panos Dracos) and organist John Papadopoulos). Sadly, apart from a single, this 1974 release was to be their only re-corded output, for soon after this excellent band split up due to general indifference. A part of that era's rock press is on record as describing Akritas' music as "music for Chinese people", because of the intrinsically difficult and complex rhythmic patterns they wove. Interestingly, the lyrics to "Akritas" were written by Costas Ferris, the very same one who had also worked for Aphrodite's Child on their "666" masterpiece.
After the demise of Akritas Stavros Logarides seemed to fade from view, but he did come up with a solo album in 1978 (recorded in the Studio Era, in August of the same year). The LP featured the nucleus of Akritas (Dimis Papachristou and Giorgos Tsoupakis) as well as a some guest musicians among whom members (or former members) of Iraklis, Socrates and Hexadactylus could be spotted.
Teodore and Mike's favourite band from the early seventies was Peloma Bokiou, who released one album (in 1972) and four singles. They were made up of ex-Bourboulia guitarist Nikos Daperis, drummer Takis Marinakis (who also played with Dimitris Poulikakos), keyboard person George Stefanakis and "they had the best Greek male rock singer in our opinion, named Vlassis Bonatsos" (T+M). If the group is known to record collectors at all, it's not so much because of their organ-based psychedelic hard rock sound mixed with traditional Greek folk influences, but rather because they were mentioned in the credits on German band Agitation Free's "Malesch" album.
As it happens, the latter's sound greatly influenced one of Greece's most extreme psychedelic bands, and another favourite of Teodore and Mike. Like them, they came from Piraeus; they were called Gazuama Sinchartas and featured fuzzed-out guitars and a completely stoned-sounding instrumentation that blended traditional music with a heavy psychedelic sound, leaning towards Pink Floyd, Amon Düül II and Egg as well. They issued one great single ("Anypsosi" - 1971) but sadly there's nothing else left of this monster band.
There were connections betwixt Peloma Bokiou and some other fairly well-known Greek bands and musicians as well: singer Vlassis Bonatsos helped out on Stelios Fotiadis's mellotron-drenched "Kainourgia Mera" album (released on Lyra in 1975) where he was in the good company of Despina Glezou, the female vocalist who was featured on the "Live At Kyttaro" lp. She'd been in another band with Stelios Fotiadis before that, called Nostradamos; their sole album appeared on the Zodiac label in 1972.
Peloma Bokiou's keyboard player, Giorgos Stefanakis, played on one of Mariza Koch's albums (in 1973; Iraklis guitarist Giorgos Filippidis was present as well, and so was Socrates drummer Giorgos Trandalides; this is starting to look like a Greek super-group, L.). She was a legendary female vocalist with a tremendous voice who came out of the folk movement. During the seventies she started to take an interest in a more electrified sound and integrated progressive rock, medieval and free jazz elements in her music, making for a style close to Area, Fairport Convention and Gryphon. Albums like "Dio Zygies Paignidia" (1974) - a true monster release - "Mariza Koch" (1977) and "O Kathreftis" (1980) are perfect examples of how progressive folk music should sound. She continues making music to this day, issuing albums and appearing live, and still has a huge status in the underground.
Incidentally, keen amateurs of eastern-tinged folk and folk rock can also get out their wallets and go look for a private label release called "Times Of Spring", by Eleni Mandelou. The album was made around 1980/82 but it appears to be quite hard to find as only 500 copies were pressed.
The Vavoura Band, formed by John Drolapas (guitars) and John Vavouras (bass, vocals) in 1976, was a hard rock formation that was very famous for its destructive live shows. Their musical style tended towards Jimi Hendrix, Cream and Golden Earring. Apart from the 1981-released single "The Junkie" they have a few tracks on compilations. Delta (from Saloniki) and Mauve were two other hard rock bands of the same period, who shared an album on the Pan-Vox label, with the latter tending more towards straight hard rock, while the former incorporated some progressive moves into their music.
Maybe the most unknown Greek band playing hard rock psychedelia in the seventies was a group with an extremely puzzling name: Ta Tessera Epipeda Tis Yparxis (or The Four Levels Of Existence to all you non-Greeks out there). They made one LP in 1976, on a very small label (called Venus) and in a very limited edition. The album almost immediately disappeared and was never released again. Surprisingly, the sound is somewhat akin to that of Spacemen Three! (I've heard bits of it recently and I must say it does sound like a killer, L.).
Apocalypsis played symphonic progressive music, based mainly upon the operatic vocals of singer Yannis Palamidas, the complex keyboards structures of Vassilis Dertilis and the excellent guitar work of Achilles Spyrou. Their first album came out in 1980 and showed a marked Genesis influence; it even sounds somewhat like the scourge of the Belgian symphonic circuit, Machiavel! Nevertheless, the band built quite a large following as it was famous for its theatrical live shows, using weird costumes, masks and other visual effects that had the fans flocking to their concerts. Thus, they were chosen to support several foreign bands who came to play in Greece; they also headlined several concerts with another Greek band called Schmetterling in support (the latter released one single during their existence and they had one posthumous progressive album out on a private label in 1986). Although Apocalypsis' debut record did well, the band sort of fell apart during the recording of the follow-up. This second album ("No", 1982) tended more towards straight rock and didn't do as well as the first, commercially speaking, by a long shot. Apocalypsis finally disbanded in 1984 and its members have turned to more lucrative musical horizons since. The most successful of them was their keyboard player, Vassilis Dertilis, who formed the duo Bang and appeared in the Eurovision song festival (aaaargh!; funnily, the same happened in Italy, with early seventies prog rocker Franco Battiato, who also appeared in the dreaded "contest"; which, I'm glad to say, Belgium only won once; and us Flemish folks didn't have nothing to do with it, L.).
With constant line-up changes around basic front man, guitarist and singer Pete Tsiros (including at one time Apocalypsis' keyboard player Vassilis Dertilis as well as their singer Yannis Palamidas) Pete And Royce developed a lyrical ethereal progressive sound close to the British mellotron school comprising Cressida, Barclay James Harvest and Spring. "Suffering Of Tomorrow " (1980) is a limited edition independent monster album full of remarkably melodic climates and undoubtedly the essential Greek progressive album of all times. Their second offering is somewhat more unevenly balanced, as folky progressive influences are blended together with funky mainstream sounds. They too disbanded due to general indifference.
The most authentic freak and a thoroughly uncompromising personality of the Greek underground scene was Nicolas Asimos. Songwriter, poet and comedian, he started out doing protest-type folk ballads influenced by the traditional rebetiko style, but he soon turned his attention towards rock and acid rock. As the owner of an underground shop, the organiser of some legendary happenings and various free concerts on the streets of Athens, and an active member of the anarchist movement he often found himself in prison or even the psychiatric ward (funny how all those uniformed dickheads always try to pretend everyone else is insane; classic case of projection, if you ask me, L.). Nothing could bend the tireless vigour of Nicolas Asimos, however, lest it be his deep disillusionment after the general decline of the alternative scene in the late eighties. He committed suicide in 1989. His musical legacy consists of a number of demo tapes that were released in the seventies (they're still available, by the way) and two albums that were recorded in 1982 and 1988 respectively; there was also a posthumous "tribute" release in 1992, called "To Falimento Tou Cosmou".
All in all, the seventies marked some strange days one for Greece. The colonels got the boot in 1974 and the country was trying to make up for the lost years. By the end of the decade the media had outgrown their days of censorship, but nothing much was happening in the underground. All this notwithstanding, it was in the closing days of this particular cycle, in 1979, that one of the most important Greek rock records was released: musically, "Flou" (that was its title) was very close to "Sticky Fingers" by The Rolling Stones, but there were some great psychedelic songs on it and it features some excellent (Greek) lyrics as well. It was made by a band called Spyridoula that counted Pavlos Sidiropoulos among its members. The latter is the representation of the pure, uncompromising rocker. He started off in the sixties, collaborating with many artists of the local folk scene and (with guitarist Pantelis Deligiannidis) forming Damon And Fidias, a folk duo who - as mentioned above - were also featured on the "Live At Kyttaro" album. He kept active in the folk movement throughout the seventies, playing with Bourboulia and other artists, and joined Spyridoula in 1977. During the eighties Pavlos Sidiropoulos got a few solo projects going and released "En Lefko" (1982) and the brilliantly-titled "Zorba The Freak" (in 1987). He'd become somewhat of a cult figure in the mean time and his reputation in the underground was strengthened by his unique live shows. Sadly, he died from a heroin overdose in December 1990, when he was about to start recording a new album.
Spyridoula marked a sort of rebirth for the Greek rock scene, although the basic tendency in the eighties was one of complete differentiation: a garage scene developed itself, a heavy metal scene, a punk scene ... and psychedelia was coming into its own again as well. Lots of bands tried to stick closely to the patterns of the musical form, in order to try and ensure the promotion of their albums through the international channels inherent to their particular scene. Lately, almost all musical trends can be found in Greece, from grindcore and death-metal to electro-pop, and literally hundreds of bands were formed. The main feature of these new musicians was a desire for professionalism, to try and match the foreign acts they supported when the latter came to play in Athens or Thessaloniki.
A most regrettable tendency was the gradual disappearance of progressive and art-rock bands in the early eighties, because of the general aversion to that kind of music generated by punk and new wave musicians (two musical formats that were very popular in Greece in that era) as well as the decline of what was considered to be the typical freak underground. Many of the musicians that had left their footprints in the sands of time of the seventies disappeared, turned to commercial music for zombified mush-brained consumers or enroled in trivial, good-time folk bands. A few of them took an interest in free jazz and experimental music, moving away from rock forms and laying the foundations for a new scene which continues to exist to this day (in spite of general indifference).
In addition to these new perspectives came the creation of several independent labels, upon which tons of releases followed. The last part of this article deals with the bands that can be considered to be a part of the new psychedelic rock scene, including some garage and hard rock formations that have classic underground aspects in their music.
And speaking of classic underground, there was one band who reached back to the roots that had spawned Greece's first genuine psychedelic masterpiece: The Apocalyps of John on which Aphrodite's Child's ground-breaking "666" album had been based. They called themselves P.L.J. Band and their debut album, recorded in Athens in 1981, was most impressive. "Armageddon" (based also on the prophecies of Ezechiel) contained music that was extensively based around the Byzantine scales (as used in Greek Orthodox church music) and featured a decidedly oriental guitar sound. The album was a masterpiece and is perhaps the most sought-after Greek record. There's something dodgy about the band, though: they were never interested in the underground scene and there were a lot of ulterior (commercial) motives to their products. Their second release, "Termites", was distinctly inferior to their debut, but it got them an audience, so they went mainstream, changed their name (into Termites) and went on to make four disappointing albums that were all equally successful!
Mousikes Taxiarchies fell into the same trap. They started out as an excellent comedy freak band, led by a charismatic front man called Jimmy Panousis. Because of their provocative lyrics and their extreme live shows that caused them quite a number of problems with the authorities they soon became famous in underground circles. Their two albums (1982 and 1984) are perfect examples of their unique musical style, sounding sometimes like the Bonzo Dog Band or the early Mothers Of Invention. Because of practically nonexistent sales figures they lost hope and changed direction, to become grievous caricatures of their brilliant earlier incarnation.
In 1984 (the Orwell year) Adisos came up with a lone album called "Aretes Mai Alla Deina". Two years earlier Panos Dracos popped out of nowhere with an album of the kind most people thought extinct by then: a "classical rock ode" (it says so on the cover) based on the adventures of Odysseus and called "2,000 A.D. Or B.C.". The record had been recorded at the PDR recording studios in Athens early in 1982 and it was sponsored by the manufacturers of one of Greece's major export products: the Metaxa Brandy Corporation (you know, the ones you can always spot right at the midway line whenever there's an international football match on tv, L.). The best-known member of Panos Dracos' backing band was drummer Giorgos Tsoupakis, who used to be in Akritas before that. Some other pretty obscure stuff was made by Dimitris Papadimitriou, who did a lot of albums and film soundtracks, some of which are in the purest cosmic progressive form. And while I'm at it, there was Dalton's Family, who issued an extremely rare album called "Enxiety" on their own private label in 1981, and Carma, who had a progressive fuzz-drenched album out in 1985, yet another private release. Probably the best-known Greek album of the new decade, on the other hand, was "Odes" featuring actress Irene Papas on vocals and Vangelis on just about everything else (this was in effect their second collaboration, for Papas also did quite an impressive amount of moaning on "666"). They made another, lesser-known album together (for Polydor) in 1986.
Vertigo, the label that had picked up "666", signed a few other Greek bands in the early eighties: Syndromo, an excellent funk rock band with ethnic influences, for instance. Formed in 1980 by singer and guitarist Nick Ginis they issued their eponymous debut album in 1982. It distinguished itself by a very energetic sound and some very well- crafted, melodic bass lines. Sadly there were numerous line-up changes after this and the band gradually slipped into oblivion. Another Vertigo signing was Thessaloniki's Northwind, led by vocalist Theo Doulamis. They were mostly influenced by the British "heavy" sound of the early seventies and on their 1982 album "Northcomin'" with its sharp- edged fuzzed-out killer guitar sound echoes of Black Sabbath, Gravy Train, Clear Blue Sky and Free can be distinguished. It sold quite well, despite its awful production. The band split soon after, but there was a revival album in 1987, featuring a more commercial FM rock type of sound. The Polyaulos label (the one the Iraklis albums came out on) came up with another heavy band, called Vice Human, who released one eponymous album in 1984.
Taking us from the first half of the new decade to the second is Last Drive, maybe the most well-known Greek band throughout Europe because of their tours with Dizzy Satellites and Dead Moon. They began in 1980, playing rockabilly, as witnessed by the single "Midnight Hop" (1985). Some of the members briefly joined Blue Light for their debut gig at the Pegasus Club. A year later they signed with Hitch-Hyke Records and issued an album, "Underworld Shakedown", which shows the band exploring garage rock paths. "Heatwave" (1988; produced by Peter Zaremba) and the mini album "Time" (1989) show them in a more psychedelic mood. Ever-versatile they changed their style into high-energy rock for 1990's "Blood Nirvana", acquiring international distribution through the German Music Mania label. They did live shows with The Wipers, The Gun Club and The Jesus & Mary Chain and hopped on the grunge bandwagon for their most recent outing, "Fuckhead Entropy". Somewhere along the line, some of Last Drive's members were involved in a neo-psychedelic project called To Fos Kai I Skia Tou that was released on a mini album.
Thessaloniki's heavy garage band The Mushrooms was one of the first of the genre to come to the attention of audiences outside of Greece, with their 1986 release "Taste Of ...", a mixture of psychedelia and the heavy sound of the eighties. They're also of interest for the label that signed them: their debut album was the second record to come out on Pegasus (for those of you who won't rest until they know: the first one was "A Way Out" by The Anti- Troppau Council, who shall go down in history as the band that started the famous Athens scene around the legendary Pegasus Club). This independent little firm would go on to become the purveyor of some very fine Greek sounds indeed (read on ...). The Mushrooms came together in December 1984 "having already played with other groups, they joined forces in a more psychotropic effort" it says on the liner notes. Although they didn't gig very often they played with The Dream Syndicate, The Chills, Robyn Hitchcock, T.V. Personalities and Died Pretty when those bands visited Greece. After changing guitarists and gigging more regularly both in and out of the country they started work on a second album that saw the light of day in 1990 (as the sixth Pegasus release) but sadly they disbanded a year later.
Another high-energy garage band with psychedelic overtones was called Villa 21; their name was taken from the notorious ward where the famous anti-psychiatrist David Cooper held his experiments on incurable mental disorders. They were led by ex-Parthenogenesis guitarist Costas "Fever" Pothylakis and started out as a duo in late 1982 with Adda Labara on synthesizer. They released a first single on Creep Records in November of same year, after which they were joined by the label's owner, Babis Dallidis, on drums. He'd previously been with a band called Square Roots and brought in their bass player, Andreas Papadopoulos, to round off Villa 21's line-up that recorded the second single on Creep Records (in May 1983) plus the album "A Ghost On The Move" (releeased in December of the same year).
After having played numerous very energetic gigs for a few years they became one of the leading bands of the Greek underground and received a number of rave reviews from the music press. In May 1985 they supported Nick Cave And The Bad Seeds on their Athens gigs; their last album for Creep was recorded in the summer of 1985 ("Men Of Clay", released in January '86) after which the band switched to the Wipe Out label for what must surely be their best effort, "Electric Poison", an album that starts off with the brilliant more-Hawkwind-than-Hawkwind "Future Suvivors", a true classic. The album was recorded in July 1987 (a year also also saw Villa 21 supporting The Membranes and The Wipers) and was followed by the "House of the Damned" EP (released in October '88, on Wipe Out). 1989 saw the band in search of a new record label, with gigs in Austria (at the Fritz Club in Vienna, supporting The Dentists in March) and a tour of Greece with Naked Prey. Their next recorded effort was an album on Penguin, released in December 1990 and called "Hellucinations", after which Andreas Papadopoulos was replaced by Flesh (ex-Sadistic Noise). And that's the last we've heard of them!
Their Wipe Out stable-mates The Melting Ashes were formed in 1986 and did a limited number of gigs enlivened by slide shows and audience participation before splitting up in the spring of 1988. Their only vinyl appearance had been on a rather low-fi sampler called "12 Raw Greek Groups". They had recorded a few demos in the last months of their existence, however, and Wipe Out decided to do a posthumous album in order to please the band's hard-core fans. "Green Fuzz 1987" was released in early 1991 and is well worth getting, even if it represents the hard side of the group rather than the psychedelic notes their music was shot through with.
En Plo were another band with a completely personal sound, drawing their musical influences not only from the likes of Savage Republic or 17 Pygmies but also from Greek ethnic folk music. Their first album ("En Plo", 1989, now deleted) is one of the best Greek underground records ever made. Swirling guitars, a very tight rhythm section and mind-blowing clarinet (!) give it an aura of melancholic research and the class of a real work of art. Unfortunately the band now seems to dwell in inertia, despite the recording of an excellent single recently.
While all these garage-type bands were rolling about on Greek stages, another band had quietly been practising their original sixties-sounding psychedelic folk/ acid rock variety. When they started making live appearances the first comparison that sprang to mind was with The Jefferson Airplane, inasmuch as their singer was just about the best female vocalist on the Greek scene - ever! I am of course referring to Evie Hassapidou-Watson and No Man's Land whose "Zalion" album was the fourth Pegasus release (issued in 1988). They became one of the biggest names on the local scene even though Evie left them in 1989 to form her own band. The follow-up to "Zalion", a mini album called "The Reality Trip" sounds totally different, capturing the band in a bluesy mood.
After the recording of "Zalion" (from November 1987 to January 1988) several members of No Man's Land cooperated with singer and guitarist Costas Constantinou and took part in the recording of "Exit 4", an album that was put together in May and June 1988 at the Blue Moon studios in Athens. Both bands shared bass player George Papageorgiades and drummer George Nikas (when Chris Triantafilopoulos wasn't playing for Purple Overdose). Evie Hassapidou-Watson sang backing vocals on "Exit 4"; the keyboards were played by Michalis Vassiliou. Costas Constantinou, who's considered to be the brain behind the band, defines his formation as an absolutely full-blown psychedelic band. They had a constantly growing reputation based on several legendary concerts that effectively led them to their deal with Pegasus. If their firstborn could be thought of as influenced by American organ-based psychedelia, then the follow-up, "Indigo" (1990) shows a shifting towards the British underground progressive sound, integrating influences from folk and medieval music not unlike bands of the famed Canterbury school were fond of doing.
Their most recent release was recorded at the Praxis studios in Athens in June 1992 but the resulting 7" single "2008 Old View" c/w "You Lose It" only came out last year on the Fifth Dimension label; apparently there's a new album scheduled for the end of this year.
Evie Hassapidou-Watson meanwhile had founded yet another West Coast-inspired acid folk band with its roots growing from the seeds that had been sown by the early Jefferson Airplane, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Pearls Before Swine. It gave Evie an opportunity to crawl out from under the shadow of Grace Slick's ghost and show what her voice was really capable of. The "Echo Tattoo" album of 1992 (Studio II Records) was among the best of that year with its soaring vocals, lyrical soundscapes and dreamy atmospheres. The follow-up album was delayed due to several line-up changes, but they're going to start recording again soon.
Jack Of All Trades was another band looking towards the West Coast, specializing in delicate acid rock with twin male/female vocals (Vicky and Nikos Barutis, if I'm not mistaken, L.) and fiery guitar solos (courtesy of Panagiotis Kuritsis. Their eponymous Pegasus mini album of 1990 was a very promising debut and contains four long tracks of hypnotic psychedelia. Unfortunately they disbanded some time ago after the sudden death of their guitarist.
1991 saw the release of a very interesting psychedelic record as well: "Epomeni Mera" by Erevos added many Greek folk elements and oriental influences to psychedelic songs. The album is like a mixture of traditional "rebetiko" music from the twenties or thirties with psychedelic elements mixed in and some great Greek lyrics. What comes out is an original cocktail of eastern and western music with a flavour of the past.
One of the most recent bands to have emerged from the psychedelic cauldron is Abaton, a progressive band presenting a dreamy atmosphere dominated by keyboards and mixed with ethnic influences, constructed around the use of traditional oriental and African instruments. Their music is mainly instrumental but they add female vocals in places, reciting poems in ... ancient Greek! Somewhat like Dead Can Dance on a more seventies underground basis. The first album, released in 1993, displays all their qualities and is considered to be one of the best of the nineties so far. A new album exploring the same sort of musical pathways was issued early in 1994.
There are of course other bands that are of interest, like The Dirty Saints (from Giannena, in the northwestern part of Greece) who have one album out that's full of garage/beat psych, or Lefki Symfonia who play a sort of new wave with psychedelic moods thrown in. Then there's Dilemma who have an album of Greek folk psych and (one of my personal favourites, L.) Mauro Toulipa, whose "Ta Logia Tou Anemou" contains Greek fairy-tale lyrics with folk/psych/ progressive music. (One of the weirdest we've come across is an acquisition of Marc Mushroom that's called (if I read it correctly, for it's embossed white lettering on a white cover) "Itan Einai Oa Einai M Ola Ta Chromata Stin Tsepi" which is quite a mouthful if you ask me. It was released in 1990 on the aptly-named LZD label and I'd love to get a copy for myself; and while I'm at it, there's an album I've seen described as "Greek acid folk industrial weirdness", which I'd like to hear; it's simply called "Number 1" and was made by a band called Optical Musics in 1987, L.).
To round off this little piece we could say that the Greek rock scene is probably on the up once again, with many records, some good new bands, international releases and the media having discovered the "indie" bands. Now let's hope psychedelic music will claim its rightful position on the airwaves and in the sales figures as well. This is Greece singing off with a psychedelic goodbye.
great article on the Greek scene!
heh... ironical that I should see this on easter...
reminds me of the origins of the word and traditions of "easter"
the 666 album Rocks too!
Why is it whenever someone mentions an artist that was clearly progressive (yet not the Symph weenie definition of Prog) do certain people feel compelled to snort "thats not Prog" like a whiny 5th grader?
Thanks, Spyros - great read! There won't be another new Genesis/Jon thread for at least three days after this!
"Improvisation is not an excuse for musical laziness" - Fred Frith
"[...] things that we never dreamed of doing in Crimson or in any band that I've been in," - Tony Levin speaking of SGM
Join me in my new thread where I post Moby Dick
Thank you, now I have one more album on my want list
Interesting page here with some background on the album :
http://www.vangelislyrics.com/vangel...-the-story.htm
It's been remixed plenty of times and yes some of those remixes still get played. Hearing this album for the first time was kind of a revelation in that sense, lots and lots of "so THAT'S where that sample came from" moments
Critter Jams "album of the week" blog: http://critterjams.wordpress.com
If memory serves, the 1st Enigma album sampled a few bits from 666 here and there.
If you're actually reading this then chances are you already have my last album but if NOT and you're curious:
https://battema.bandcamp.com/
Also, Ephemeral Sun: it's a thing and we like making things that might be your thing: https://ephemeralsun.bandcamp.com
Speaking of things that might matter to some folks 'round these parts....apparently an SACD & SHM CD release of 666 is en route: http://www.cdjapan.co.jp/product/UIGY-9561
If you're actually reading this then chances are you already have my last album but if NOT and you're curious:
https://battema.bandcamp.com/
Also, Ephemeral Sun: it's a thing and we like making things that might be your thing: https://ephemeralsun.bandcamp.com
Seems like the bit that goes "Ladies and gentlemen! The sound of thunder!!" has been sampled dozens of times. It's a great soundbyte!!
Critter Jams "album of the week" blog: http://critterjams.wordpress.com
666 is an awsome record. top notch
Seeing in bright letters 666, it's just not what I want to see on Easter. You can at least understand why a Christian would feel that way, right? Just because you don't believe in something doesn't mean you can't have a healthy respect.
Obviously you knew it was. I would have thought in the spirit of Easter, perhaps an album like the Jesus Christ Superstar soundtrack (there are a lot of fans of that on PE), or even Glass Hammer's Lex Rex would have been a better choice.
I have no probem with featuring this album any other time, it's supposed to be a prog classic. No, I've never heard it, the descriptions just sound too weird for my taste, but one of these days I will get around to it just out of curiosity.
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