King

Leggendario doppio album ispirato all'ultimo libro della Bibbia (Apocalisse di Giovanni). Un classico esempio di concept in cui progressive, psichedelica, rock e folk si fondono alla perfezione. Vangelis (tastiere), Koulouris (chitarre), Roussos (voce, basso), Sideras (drums) al top della forma.

This album is among the most superb prog records of all time. It was a strange move for Aphrodite’s Child, since all of their previous releases had been straight forward 60s pop with romantic lyrics. They had huge success in Europe in the late 60s, and it laid the foundation for both Vangelis and Demis Roussos solo careers. At the time of working on this album, the relationship between the band members had completely fallen apart, so Vangelis took the task of composing and producing the album himself, only getting the rest of the band in when he needed their services. Frustrated after prostituting himself for several years doing commercial pop music, Vangelis went for a full scale double album, based on a concept by Costas Ferris, who also wrote a concept book and all the lyrics, based on Saint John’s Revelation.
The concept is firmly rooted in the 60s, and it’s about a circus troupe performing a show based on the Acopalypse, while the real Apocalypse his happening outside. The record company was shocked when they heard the album, and Vangelis had to fight for two years before they agreed to release it, and only after he had done serious editing on the track “[Infinty Symbol]”. The album was outlawed in several catholic countires, but it was well recieved critically, and the album is very often on lists of best prog albums of all time, both in magazines and among other artists. Oh btw, Enigma sampled half their debut album from this record.
The Good
The playfulness of this album is amazing. The music is a combination of progressive rock, jazz, psychedelia, pop and even traditional Greek music. With track lengths varying from 10 seconds to 19 minutes, you would think the album is disjointed. Nothing could be further from the truth. From the opener “The system,” where the lyrics literally tells us that we got the system to fuck the system, we jump straight in to the tour de force rock track “Babylon,” where Roussos’ voice soars over the powerful backing track. From there on it’s a journey through a wonderful tune that will stick in your head for days (“the Four Horsemen”), ambient soundscapes (“Aegian Sea”), instrumental jams (“the Battle of the Locust”) and wild jazzy moments (“Tribulation”). And that’s only the first CD!
The two major moments on CD2 are a track which takes its title from the mathematical symbol for infinity and “All the Seats Were Occupied.” The first one is a track where the Greek actress Irene Papas fakes an orgasm for five minutes (the unedited version was 39 minutes!), while Vangelis walks around the room banging a drum. It’s a track that’s interesting, to say the least, and it’s not the kind of track you would bother your neighbours with. The latter is 19 minutes with rock, latino, Indian music and loads of guitar and percussion, spiced up with the occasional outburst of horns and saxophones. It’s a full on jam session, but what really makes the track is that it quotes sections from the entire album, and it all portrays the vision of the end of the world beautifully. It ends in a cacophony of an explosion, and the album ends on a calm note, which comes as a relief at this point, with the track “Break.”
The bad
This is among my favourite albums of all time, so there’s not really anything bad to say about it musically. The music has not dated in style, in fact, it sounds more relevant these days than ever, but the sound quality is bad at times. This is probably due to bad cd mastering. The album comes on two CDs, and that is unnecessary since the album doesn’t last more than 73 minutes. A remaster would be most welcome, but until then, get this album and devour it.
You can trace Pink Floyd's "The Wall" double concept album to a great number of influences, just as you could "Dark Side Of The Moon". Alongside the usual suspects, such as Genesis's "The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway", Aphrodite's Child's "666" (1971) is a rarely recognised ur-text which undoubtedly had a hand in the conception o

Socrates will probably never get inducted into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. But while other groups were becoming well known in the free world, this Hendrix-style blues band was playing to standing-room-only crowds in a small club in Athens, during Greece's military dictatorship, a period when even Rolling Stone albums were hard to find, and for a time illegal.
by Matt Barrett
Socrates was Yannis Spathas and Antonis Tourkoyorgis on guitar and bass respectively. During the period that they were playing in the Kitarro Club they went through several drummers including George Trantalidis, all of them terrific. In Athens during the early seventies, when the 1967 military dictatorship was still in control, there were a number of rock clubs in the area around Victoria Square and in the Plaka. Poll and Morka played at the Elaterion. Socrates and Exidaktilo played at the Kitarro. As Dorian Kokas, the founder and leader of Morka told us one night "We used to race through our set and play everything fast so we could get out early and go to the Kittaro and catch the last set of Socrates." Musicians loved Socrates.
Socrates sounded like several bands that were popular at the time, Jimi Hendrix Experience, Deep Purple, Blue Cheer, and Black Sabbath come to mind now when I hear their music from that early period, though the majority of their material was original. There were songs that were crowd favorites such as "Close the Door and Lay Down", "Starvation" and "Underground", but often the highlight of the evening was when they did their Hendrix songs like "Voodoo Chile", "Message of Love" and "Red House" or jammed on songs like "Kansas City" with singer Jimi Quidd (later of the NY Dots) and Greek-American blues guitarist John Kronis.
Spathas played a Fender Strat, long straight hair hanging down almost to the guitar, he was motionless except for his hands which effortlessly ripped out the most fluid, solos and riffs. He always hooked the chord to his amp over the bottom cutaway so he would not step on it and pull it out during a solo, I suppose. It was sort of his trademark in a way and we would watch him tune up and wait for him to do it which meant to us that the music was about to begin. He would play some mind-boggling riff to make sure the volume was right or the guitar was in tune and they would be off. Antonis Tourkoyorgis played bass and sang and if Spathas gave the appearance of being introverted he was the complete opposite. He was also a great bass player. The powerful sound this little three-piece band with their stacks of Marshalls put out in the Kittaro kept us coming back night after night. In all honesty I have to say that to this day I have not heard any band, three-piece or more, fill as much musical space. Seeing the Who in 1976 I found myself comparing them to Socrates. OK, the Who is the Who. But apart from the personalities, the songs I knew and the flamboyance, were Townshend, Entwhistle and Moon as good a band as Socrates? No way. Led Zepplin? Nope. You'd have to ask someone who had seen Hendrix or Cream to make the judgement about those bands but I can't imagine anyone being better than Socrates on a good night and as far as those nights in the Kittaro went I don't think they ever had a bad night. They were too good to have a bad night.
What made them so remarkable was the guitar playing of Spathas. Even today listening to the solos he played in 1972 I still can't believe the music he was making. Brent Lambert of Kitchen Mastering, quite a guitar player himself, after hearing several Spathas solos from thirty years ago said "If this guy had come to America he would be a guitar hero and everyone would know his name." If you liked the way Hendrix, Ritchie Blackmore, Jimmy Page and Eddie Van Halen play you will love Spathas and if you play guitar yourself you will wonder "If this was thirty years ago and he is still playing how good must he be now?"
Socrates made two albums as a three-piece, both pr

www.athensguide.com/socrates

Il lavoro si apre con STARVATION che pur tenendo una solida base rock blues risulta molto intrigante grazie al muro tastieristico di VANGELIS che dona un tocco mediovalistico al pezzo, trovo qualche similitudine con gli YES di TORMATO del 1978. Da non trascurare anche il fatto che questo lavoro ha preceduto di due anni l'uscita di TORMATO. Proseguiamo con QUEEN OF THE UNIVERSE che si apre con un giro acustico di chitarra, accompagnato da un pacato cantato, che poi interagisce con degli ottimi suoni spaziali di tastiere che dopo qualche passaggio sfociano in un pregevole assolo molto cosmico degno della migliore scuola teutonica (vedi ELOY e affini). Anche in questo caso trovo molto interessante la commistione tra elementi acustici e sinfonici. Intrigante. EVERY DREAM COME TO AN END è probabilmente uno dei punti più alti del lavoro, tutto suona perfetto nessun suono è fuori posto. Si parte con delle note pianistiche semplici ma efficaci poi la band subentra e le tastiere ci fanno volare in alto ancora di più quando JOHN SPATHAS tesse un assolo chitarristico da antologia…impossibile non sognare ed emozionarsi di fronte a tanta sensibilità artistica. In questo caso comunque la presenza di VANGELIS per la riuscita del pezzo è fondamentale. Da inserire nella storia del progressive mondiale! Atmosfere da ballata acustica e dai sapori di parecchi secoli fa caratterizzano THE BRIDE sembra di trovarsi in mezzo ad una festa di corte. Ottimo brano. La breve KILLER risulta da subito come una rock song tirata e corposa, trovo alcune somiglianze con i LED ZEPPELIN del periodo PRESENCE/PHISYCAL GRAFFITI. A DAY IN HEAVEN mi fa ancora sognare mondi perduti o da scoprire con quel suo incedere elettroacustico che dona molta tranquillità, anche in questo caso il tappeto tastieristico di VANGELIS risulta importantissimo. Ancora un grande pezzo. TIME OF PAIN unisce ancora l'elemento acustico in una forma da rock song. Conclude in lavoro MOUNTAINS che parte ancora rockeggiante sempre con forti influenze folkloristiche (il nostro MAURO PAGANI ne sa qualcosa) ma è questione solo di un paio di minuti, la band cambia completamente direzione e ci eleva in una dimensione decisamente mistica, dove la tradizione greca sembra unirsi a quella indiana. E' la chitarra elettrica a farla da padrone in questa notevole jam sonora il tutto e condito con qualche nota tastieristica e percussiva. Musica che libera la mente, la purifica. Ancora un grande brano, a questo punto iniziano ad essere tanti. Grande lavoro per questi SOCRATES molto vicino al capolavoro, consigliato a chi vuole diversificare la propria discografia inserendo anche la Grecia tra i paesi musicalmente interessanti.