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Twenty years after the huge success of 'Five Greeks in Hell', Trikont's
first Rembetika compilation, comes a new CD of early, rare and uncensored
recordings from the seedy underbelly of Greek culture, featuring such legendary
singers of the old Rembetika style as Anestis Delias, Markos Vamvakaris,
Jovan Tsaous, Jorgos Batis, Jorgos Katsaros, and many others. Rembetika is to Greece what Flamenco is to Spain, Fado to ortugal and Tango to Argentina. It originated during the late 19th century, becoming the folk music of the cities, sung by the social outcast, the criminal and the dispossessed, the so-called "rembetes" and "manges", in the illegal hashish taverns of the urban underground. Hard gut-wrenching songs of passion, drugs, jail, disease and death. The blues of the Greek peninsular.
Rembetika seems to be the Greek cultural equivalent to Spanish Flamenco,
Portuguese Fado, to Latin American Tango/Mambo/ChaChaCha/Cumbia or to
American Blues. Most of these wonderful songs on this double CD were recorded during the period between 1926 and 1937 when Rembetika was really 'hip' and 'big'. Then the dictator Metaxa and the Nazis took over: the lovely Ägais country and the whole Rembetika movement came to a complete standstill until the end of the war. Rembetika is the music
of the Greek underground. Songs about love, dope and survival. Publisher: Christos Davidopoulos, manager of the Optimal Recordstore in Munich, Greek, a passionate swimmer and Rembetika collector. |
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last updated: 26.10.2001 | top |