Re-Play

Rembetico remains a source of inspiration. Rembetico covers replayed and reformed as reggae, surf, latin, pop, rock, electronic.

Dirty Fuse is a 5-piece instrumental surf band formed in 2008.
In their latest, 3rd release, Surfbetika,  they explore, or to better put it, “surf up”, 7 classic rembetico songs dated from 1925 to 1938.

You can find more info and listen to all the songs in their web site: http://www.dirtyfuse.com/


Dirty Fuse – Sunset Beach from their 2nd release Dirty Fuse. Original by VasilisTsitsanis.

Formed in London in 2005, Trio Tekke have released 2 albums. Reggetika of 2009 is a collection of rembetico covers in the form of acoustic reggae.
Their second album Samas (2011) introduces original songs plus some rembetico covers, keeping the same principle: a new approach to rembetico, keeping the essence and mixing the sound with jazz, blues, reggae.
http://www.triotekke.com

Trio Tekke – Pente magkes ston Perea. Original by Giovan Tsaous





This great, minimal, electronic version of Mahera Edoses was part of the theatrical play Kokina Fanaria of 2013.
The cover belongs to Demosthenis Grivas and voice to Eleni Kokkidou.
http://www.dimosthenisgrivas.gr/

Demosthenis Grivas – Mahera Edoses. Original by George Lafkas.

Vassilikos, ex-singer of Raining Pleasure, released Sunday Cloudy Sunday in 2013, paying tribute to Vasilis Tsitsanis.
Vassilikos performs and reforms 12 songs of Tsitsanis with great respect but also with talent and imagination. The outcome is a high standard pop album.
https://myspace.com/vassilikos


Vassilikos – Gioulbahar. Original by Vasilis Tsitsanis





Imam Baildi, with 2 albums up to date (Imam Baildi -2007, Cookbook – 2011) mixing up old popular songs and rembetico with electronic sounds, loupes and new orchestration.
From their forthcoming album another Tsitsanis cover this time as a mambo!
https://myspace.com/imambaildi

Imam Baildi – Argosvinis Moni. Original by Vasilis Tsitsanis

Gadjo Dilo were formed in 2009.
After many live performances they released their first album Manouche de Grec (2013) combining rembetico with gypsy swing.
https://myspace.com/gadjodiloband






Gadjo Dilo – Peftis se lathi. Original by Vasilis Tsitsanis

Started in 2007 as a live gig in a bar restaurant in Athens, The Burger Project managed to become a cover band with a loyal audience and appearances all over Europe.
Their covers span a wide range from disco and punk to pop and rembetico.
http://www.burgerproject.gr/
download free album here: http://theburgerproject.bandcamp.com




The Burger Project and Matoula Zamani – Tsiggana. Original by Nick Fatseas/Alex Tsavalas

Jazz Bouzouki

They call him “phenomenon”. Michalis Paouris has a target: to make bouzouki famous as a leading jazz instrument. He is not the first to play jazz bouzouki but certainly he is impressive. To quote Al Di Meola “His technique is ridiculously fast! So it reminds me of me when I was 25 years younger…”
Born in Athens, he started playing bouzouki at 8 and he has released 2 albums up to now.



The Rosenberg trio & Michael Paouris - Minor Swing (2012)


Al Di Meola - Peo Alfonsi & Michael Paouris in Athens


Silencio from his latest album Disharmony

Check blog, FB, YouTube


Nikos Tatasopoulos was born in USA and is the son of bouzouki soloist John Tatasopoulos. While in US he studied classical piano and jazz guitar. He started playing the bouzouki at the age of 3 and toured extensively with his father. At the age of 19 he returned in Greece and since then he has collaborated with many great Greek artists.

Minor Swing


www.nikostatasopoulos.com/


Manolis Karantinis is a bouzouki virtuoso with 2 personal albums and numerous appearances in works of great Greek composers and singers. His style incorporates elements of rembetico, Spanish music and jazz.

Bouzouki in Spain

www.karantinis.com/en/


George Hristidis is another bouzouki prodigy. In 1982 he released the album From East to West (Ap' Anatoli se Dysi) with Mimis Plessas covering Greek and international standards.

Carnaval (Luiz Bonfa)

Diamantis Hiotis is the son of the famous Manolis Hiotis. He is a multi-instrumentalist and inventor of the bouzouki with 5 strings (his father invented the bouzouki with 4 strings which together with the tuning made the jazz playing possible).

Diamond Tecckilla



Harry Lemonopoulos, born 1923 in Katerini, Greece and died 1975 in US is considered one of the best classic bouzouki players. Although he started as a violonist and guitarist he took bouzouki to another level.

Selection from Gypsy Melodies (Tsitsornia) from the album The Golden Fingers of Harry Lemonopoulos
 

Interpretations of Rembetico

Babis Papadopoulos has a long history as a guitarist in the local scene. Initially as guitarist of Trypes and then as Thanasis Papakonstantinou guitarist in Laikedelika, Babis has marked a whole era with his electric guitar riffs.
In his second solo album, Ap’ti Spilia tou Drakou (From Draco’s Cave) of 2010, he uses an acoustic quartet (guitar, bass, bouzouki, piano) to re-interpret some classic rembetico standards.

Here’s Marcos Vamvakaris song O Sinahis

Vinicio Capossela provides his own interpretation of Rembetico in his 2012 album Rebetiko Gymnastas.
13 songs (rembetico covers and originals) which keep the basic rhythmic patterns of rembetico but with a fresh sound which constitute a really contemporary pop listening.
The arrangements belong to Pappos, Massalas, Chatziiordanou who also contribute playing bouzouki, baglama and accordion accordingly as members of the band which includes Greek players while Kaiti Dali interprets Misirlou.

Here’s Marcos Vamvakaris classic composition Fragosyriani, with Italian lyrics by Capossela, re-named as Contratto per  Karelias

D. Charles Speer, aka David Charles Shuford, member of No Neck Blues, Enos Slaughter, Egypt is the Magic and others, decided to deep dive into the Greek hasiklidika rembetica (songs about the effects of hashish) in his 2011 album Αργιλέδες (Arghiledes).
D. Charles Speer played all the instruments, overdubbed and produced the album which ranges from close to original cover to distorted, overdubbed, psychedelic interpretations of rembetica or even original compositions. 

Here’s Harmanis, a song which originates from the same titled song of Markos Vamvakaris, to become a truly psychedelic folk, eight minutes and a half trip.




And as the main reference here is Markos Vamvakaris let’s not forget Tom Kaza’s project XITZAZ and their interpretation of Fragosyriani presented in older post here.

Blues and Rembetico

There have been many discussions, several articles and some books around a possible connection between the blues and rembetico. I assume that the reason for such a comparison lies in sociological factors primarily and musical similarities secondarily.

It is true though that when it comes to music itself the similarities are not so obvious. Not as the ones someone would find between country music or hillbilly or even rock music and the blues. As of the effect that the music has over fans of the specific genres, one could find more space for discussion but again: they are two separate genres with only some things in common but in any case a long history, a cultural impact and an interesting artistic outcome when these two worlds meet.
So in this post we’ll stick to the cultural exchange from the listening pleasure perspective without trying to prove any existing or not connection. Nevertheless some similarities exist.

So both the blues and rembetico have their origins at the end of 19th century. The lyrics are simple and have to do with everyday life – most often – of lower class. Desperate love, hard work, poverty, war, illness, jail, drugs etc are common themes for both worlds.

The most common example of a connection between blues and rembetico is the comparison between the blues song “How dry am I” released in 1921 and “O Boufetzis” (the buffet-chef) by George Batis from 1932.
Here’s the original version...

...and here's the two songs combined



The same song performed in blues style with steel guitar by Zorz Pilalis here:

Another interesting example is "Diana’s Blues" by John Stamatis “Sporos” or Yiannis Stamatiou “Sporos”.
Sporos, born 1936, was one of the greatest bouzouki players. He lived in US from 1957 to 1979 and played with many orchestras in Las Vegas, San Francisco, recorded with Hrach Yacoubian orchestra and his fans included Elvis Presley, Harry Belafonte, Frank Sinatra and others. They say that his success was so big that made him a cover on the Time magazine in 1963 (I searched for this but wasn’t able to find anything to confirm).



"Diana's Blues" from album Musical Reflections


Stelios Vamvakaris, son of master of rembetico Markos Vamvakaris, is a composer and bouzouki player who actively works and explores the relation between blues and rembetico. He has collaborated many times in live performances and discography with blues master Louisiana Red.

Stelios Blues is from “One Day at Night, Athens Blues” movie soundtrack of 2000.



Here you can find one of the most famous rembetico songs, composed by Yiannis – Jack – Chalkias who lived in US, covered by guitarist Babis Papadopoulos in his album “From the Dragon’s Cave” of 2010. Papadopoulos was the guitar player of the famous Greek rock band Trypes. He has released two very interesting solo albums with acoustic improvisations over folk, rembetiko and traditional music.

"Teke Minor" (To Minore tou Teke) 



Last but not least one of the greatest covers of folk-rembetico music by Spiros Soukis. Soukis is a singer-composer-guitar player who lives in US since 2003. Back in the 80s he played with Greek rock legend   Pavlos Sidiropoulos and in the 90s he formed That’s Why with whom he opened for live shows of Pixies and Peter Green.

Check his blues cover of Vasilis Tsitsanis song “Sorceress of Arabia” (Magissa tis Arapias)



Soukis is offering some songs (including this one) on his site so you can check: www.soukisblues.com