Garage Days

Formed in 1981, Villa 21 transformed slowly from a new wave band with influences from Birthday Party, to a neo garage band standing between Rocky Erickson and the Stooges.
They left 4 EPs and 3 LPs before they split with the last 3 (Electric Poison-1987, House of the Damned-1988 and Hellucinations-1990) being some of the best raw rock albums of Greek discography. Their singer Kostas Fever Pothoulakis died in a car accident in 1993.



House of the Damned from their EP with same name - 1988

Formed 1983 in Athens, The Anti Troppau Council were a short-lived band but with a loyal fan club. They left just one LP, A Way Out (1986, produced by Nikos Papazoglou) and several tracks on compilations. They broke in 1987 just before the release of their second album (which was never released). Two of their new songs were included in the Cicadas compilation.





I Believe from the A Way Out LP - 1986

The Mushrooms were formed in Thessaloniki in 1984. They released 2 albums (Taste of-1986 and Scarecrow Princes-1989) both produced by Nikos Papazoglou. They also appeared in Cicadas compilation with 2 songs and finally disbanded 1991 with their guitarist Asclepios Zambetas joining another group of Thessaloniki, Trypes. Their vocalist Pluto died in 2004.






Sleeping in the Lizard's Mouth from Scarecrow Princess LP - 1989
 

News and Gifts from Nowhere

The Last Drive
We have already discussed about the unique ability of The Last Drive to keep changing their sound and evolve their music.
From the early garage days to today’s psychedelic sound the band never sounded outdated.
This month the Last Drive released an EP with 4 new songs: News from Nowhere
Let it go, Butterfly 69 and Black rain sound like if Ron Asheton plays lead guitar with the Clash of the London Calling era. The 4th one, Child of the sky, is a nice rock psychedelic ballad.

BLML
Earlier this year another pleasant surprise hit the fans of the Last Drive family. The group of Karanikolas, (guitars and vocals on The Last Drive) Blackmail, released a new album after more than 10 years. Although the band members remained the same (with the addition of a piano/keyboard player), they changed their name BLML (a shortcut of Blackmail) and released their album The Gift, marking a significant shift in gears and sound but not in inspiration.

BLML offer a true Gift: 11 new compositions orchestrated with guitar, bass, drums, keyboards and viola. The changes are obvious and welcomed: the compositions are generally slower compared to the Blackmail albums, which provide a “breathing space” for the musicians  and the voice of Karanikolas. There are changes in tempos and dynamics which allow for nice combinations (for example the sharp voice of Karanikolas over a sweet piano arrangement before guitars shift gears and lead to a dynamic crescendo)
The vinyl was sold out within the first weeks and re-released.

The Last Drive

In the 60s and 70s there were Aphrodite's Child, in the 80s till today it's the Last Drive!
If there is a band that continues to keep Greece in the world wide rock map it is them (counting also the bands influenced by their music plus the bands that derived from their members).
The Last Drive started in early 80s to release their first EP, Midnight Hop, in 1985 and first album Underworld Shakedown in 1986.

 Their song-craft in creating memorable songs and their unique live performances gained them an always expanding fan club.
At the time their sound was a garage-psychedelic-rockabilly mix to be evolved with every new release.

In 1988 they release Heatwave with producer Peter Zaremba of the Fleshtones. The band is already known in US and Europe where they tour with success and they appear in garage compilations of the time.

In 1989 they release Time EP recorded in Berlin. The 3 songs are to be included later in the cd release of their next album Blood Nirvana with producer Paul B. Cutler of Dream Syndicate, Green on Red etc.

Here's Have Mercy from the Time EP of 1989



The 90s continue to be a success with tours all over Europe. In 1993 they release their next album, F*head Entropy, again with Paul B. Cutler as producer.
Last album for the 90s is Subliminal released in 1994 and the sound has evolved to grunge-neo psychedelic. Subliminal can easily take a place among the best grunge albums of the era.

Here's The Drop from Subliminal album



Last Drive suspend action as a group for a while to work on several side projects.
George Karanikolas, the guitar player, formed Blackmail and released 3 albums.

Here's Bad Reputation from Life after Death album of 1993



In 1998 Alex K, singer and bass player and Thanos Amorginos, guitar player formed The Earthbound with a more desert rock, surf orientation. They have released 4 albums and are still active.

Here's I'd do it Again from Brotherhood of the Dog album of 2004



Finally Last Drive were reunited in 2009 for live performances and released a new studio album in 2010, Heavy Liquid.

Here's A Glass of Broken Dreams from Heavy Liquid



A new unreleased song you can find here

Last Drive web site: www.last-drive.net