The Raw vid of the day

I wrote a few things about the experimental band Raw here.

Being the musical vehicle for Giannis Papaioannou and Makis Faros, Raw were a very interesting act as you may hear.

I am posting here what Discogs has about Giannis Papaioannou:

“Greek artist, active in the Athens underground scene for more than 20 years now. In the mid 1980s he played bass for dark electro post-punk band Rehearsed Dreams, who released a full-legth album on the seminal Creep label in 1985. After some years living in Sweden, in 1992, along with fellow musician Makis Faros he set up Elfish record label. The two of them also formed Raw, an electronic duo that managed to record three albums (the third remains unreleased).

From 1996 onwards, he works alone, recording and producing as ION.”

(Click here for more).

The song I found on Youtube comes from Raw-Land and reminds me a bit of the English band Japan.

I hope you like it.

Since Rehearsed Dreams were mentioned above, I made a little search to find something from their album “Repulsion” that Creep Records released.

It was easy to find a handful of videos…

 

Mani Deum and Glimmer Void

I guess the big thing this week is the forthcoming “Dark Days Festival II” which will close the year 2009.

I posted in the past any available information for bands such as Past Perfect, Split Image and New Zero God so, today I will write about Mani Deum and Glimmer Void.

Both will be on stage on the first day and both have available releases.

Mani Deum is a 7 piece act that was formed at Corfu island during 2005.

Influenced by artists such as Current 93 and Nick Cave, they released a D.I.Y. cd a year later.

Their line up: P.- Vocals, guitars, music, lyrics, Manos.K – Vocals, guitars, music, lyrics, Evgenia – Piano, percussions, Melodica, Jason – Bass, percussions, Panos – Theremin, Nick – Violin, Viola and Mr.XIII – Drums.

The band participated in a number of compilations, such as: “Neo folk.It” , “Neo form III”, “The beast” and  opened so far for Allerseelen, Svarrogh, Paul Roland, While Angels Watch, Sieben, and Spiritual Front  and released a 6 track E.P through the Athenian record label Dead Scarlet, titled “Five Infected Blessings“.

You can trace them on MySpace here.

The Athenians Glimmer Void were formed in Athens, in September 2004 by keyboard/guitar player Stelios Mastrodiamadoglou, singer Thalia Makri and drummer/percussionist George Kokkoras in order to write dark/atmospheric music.

Soon, guitarist Vaggelis Babadelis, bass player George Skoufas and cellist Diana Rahmanina joined the band (Babadelis was later replaced by Dimitris Zannis).

Glimmer Void released their 5 track debut titled “Souls Parade”, in 2009, through Dead Scarlet Records.

They participated in the compilation “Gothic Visions” and were also featured in the sampler of the magazine “Dark Spy”.

You can find them on MySpace here.

 

Yiannis Kassetas & The Funk Wizards – FunkAbyss

As I mentioned before, Greece has wonderful jazz musicians.

Although this is not the right place (again) for jazz music as the majority of people prefer to shake their bodies on tables and wave their hips on bars in the tunes of some opa-opa song, jazz music blossoms in the underground.

The underground jazz audience might be outnumbered by the belly dancing lovers at this side of southern Europe but…jazz diamonds are released every now and then…

Before I start writing about Yiannis Kassetas and his band, I would like to mention that during the last two decades, most of the musicians that work at the Greek music clubs studied at Berklee college of music or at M.I. and most of them are jazz or latin music teachers…

But…for sure they have to make some money for the living too…if you know what I mean…

Yiannis Kassetas is a young sax and piano virtuoso who released his second album titled “FunkAbyss” about a month or so.

Two years after his first album, “The Truth About the Alien Invasion In Egypt” Kassetas and his band, The Funk Wizards strike back.

This time with the participation of sax player Jason Yarde and drummer Clarence Penn.

For those of you who are not familiar with these two musicians, Clarence Penn  played the drums for artists of the caliber of Wynton Marsalis, Roberta Flack, Dizzy Gillespie and Michael Brecker to name but a few.

Jason Yarde on the other hand is a member of Jack DeJohnette’s band but he also contributed in recordings for artists such as McCoy Tyner, Roy Ayers and Hugh Masekela Jazz Jamaica All Stars.

The Tracklist :

1. John Carpente’s Road Movie

2. Creatures of the Abyss

3. The Zen theory of Funk

4. Crystal Dream (intro)

5. Crystal Dreams

6. Giant Rainbow

7. Wildness

8. Sweetness

9. X-rcheia Blues

10. G. Rainbow (blue shades)

Some of the finest Greek jazz musicians came alongside Kasseta & the Funk Wizards in the studio: organ player Giorgos Kontafouris and tenor sax player Dimitris Vasilakis, Dimitris Sevdalis (Rhodes), Alexandros Drakos Ktistakis (drums) Basilis Xenopoulos (alto saxophone), Apostolos Sideris (bass) Dimitris Karalis (flute) Adadeji Adetayo (vocals and guitar) and Serafim Bellos (drums).

And since I am done mentioning the guests’ names, let me name the members of the Funk Wizards: Yiannis Kassetas (piano, tenor and soprano sax) Manos Lutas (el. bass and fretless bass) Kostis Christodoulou (Rhodes, synthesizers), Vaggelis Kotzabasis (drums) and Lucia Paleologou (vocals, she also wrote the lyrics for the track “Giant Rainbow”, the only track on this album that has lyrics).

Well worth checking.

 

New Zero God – Fun Is A Four Letter Word

“Fun Is A Four Letter Word” is the title of the debut studio album of New Zero God.

The Athenian band with a remarkable line up consisted by former members of  the bands The Flowers of Romance, Nexus and The Drops, as well as two current members of the band Past Perfect, released their album digitally here.

“Fun Is A Four Letter Word” is expanding from punk rock to post-punk and gothic rock, and immediately catches the listener’s attention with its 12 tracks.

Tracklist:

1. Bang Bang
2. Pain Called Pleasure
3. Kiss the Witch
4. Dead Inside
5. Lap Of The Universe
6. Fun Is A Four Letter Word
7. Eon
8. Strangest Of Fruits
9. Winners
10. The Love Hatesong
11. Spider Jack
12. Nightshift

The band performed live on November 26^th at After Dark Club in Athens, supported by the Greek dark wave pioneers Split Image.

New Zero God had most of their album tracks on their set-list as well as some of the Flowers Of Romance hits.

The New Zero God line up: Mike Pougounas – vocals, Dimitris “Sidheog” Steves – drums, B-Abyss – bass, back vox and E-Raptor – guitar.

“Fun Is A Four Letter Word” is scheduled to be released on CD during February 2010.

The band also announced the confirmed forthcoming gigs till February 2010.

Next gig on December 30 2009, headlining “Dark Days II” festival at Sin City Club – Athens.