Search - Kristi Stassinopoulou :: Echotropia

Lots to like!

Heidi M. Hawkins | Bellingham, WA: City of Subdued Excitement | 12/31/2001

(5 out of 5 stars)

"I often make a little label for my cd's, with the name of the artist, the names of tracks, their times, and beats-per-minute, if applicable. As a DJ, this is essential because I can mark my favorite cuts on this label without damaging the cd's liner notes. This is indeed anal-retentive, but as a DJ with a large collection of cd's, it is essential to keep it all organized and not count on my memory. When I was listening to Ms. Stassinopoulou's disc, I found myself marking more than half of the tracks as a favorite. Many artists have put together traditional languages and sounds with modern technology and big beats. Much of those discs sounds derivative of Enigma, with the same tired beats, or some monotonous techno thud stomping its way over the top of tradition and the sacred. If you feel like I do, you'll love this disc. None of the above cliches apply. I may never play this disc on the dance floor, but it's likely to get some heavy airplay at home. The sound is crisp, clean, and spans the high end to some luscious bass sounds. Stylistically it is beyond classification--a mix of Greek tradition, atmospheric, rock, and dance music genres. Very vocal oriented, but also lots going on rhythmically. I imagine her grandparents are proud of her! Check the samples and hear for yourself. This is a varied disc, and unique to my ears. Recommended!"

Effervescent Greek Voice/Rhythms Fuse into Soft Jazz

Erika Borsos | Gulf Coast of FL, USA | 03/13/2004

(5 out of 5 stars)

"The original styling of sound and voice combine into a very pleasant ambient music with echos from the past ... Yet, it is thoroughly upbeat and contemporary music . Anyone who loves smooth jazz and traditional Greek music will be knocked down by a feather when listening to Kristi Stassinopoulou. The instruments: sax, bass, zournas, violin, acoustic guitar, drums, djembe, clarinet, at times accordion -- produce music that is arranged and modified to enhance the feminine solo voice of Kristi, who often sounds like an instrument herself.The mystique of this newly styled Greek music is gradually revealed through the English translations of the lyrics. For instance, "We Are Flying", track #1 " We'll walk together on the moon, in another life, one night ... Darkness will alternate light, In time there will be no back or beyond ..." Or "Aeolos", track #2 "The sounds of snow like velvet drums, Heaven's angels ring for silence, Train halts in an empty station, Frozen landscape and there alone I stand ..." Combined with the music, these lyrics speak of another time ... another era ... something just out of reach ... a place of pure existence. Kristi's love of singing and sensitive interpretation of the lyrics infuse the listener with a contagious appreciation for this CD. My highest recommendations. Erika Borsos (erikab93)"

Echotropia: the ways of sound

N. Aggelopoulos | 05/05/2006

(5 out of 5 stars)

"It is difficult to define Kristi Stassinopoulou's music: it is a mix of indie and psychedelic guitars, electronica, drums and tambourines and several more exotic instruments played by her band all over a Greek folk undercurrent. It is a rare example of the artist having more of a say than the record company, the radio stations or the dj. It is almost impossible to place the music into a category. Neither folk or world, nor rock or ambient, it is an intersection of styles that have melted into a kind of musical Yeti. It comes close to the spirit of groups like Seize the Day or Haze that have a brilliance and innocence that mainstream groups with contracts and obligations to fulfill cannot achieve. Her voice is simple and unaffected but becomes very evocative when the Greek undercurrent rises closer to the surface. She sings in Greek but the sleeve notes are in English, with full translations.



Some of the content has more than a musical Greek undercurrent: Greek politics, language, folklore and a take on trends such as 60's psychedelia seen through a Greek eye. "Into the Fire" transitions into such an example as it gives way to the "Fever".



The first song "We are flying" is an example of a trippy if oversynthesized tune that fits its title. It is perhaps the main failing of this album that the synthesizers tend to get a little too much in the way of the music. An indie guitar with some psychedelic inflections sets an atmosphere that is carried over to the next song.



"Aeolos" is one of the more experimental tracks. It starts with a traditional musical theme but gives way into a strange rhythmical tempo driven by a bass and drums that evoke the train traveling from Athens to Thessaloniki that is at the centre of this song.



"Don't say I regret" is one of the easiest and simplest songs, beautiful in its simplicity and sadness. A rousing formless lamenting guitar runs through much of the song in a My Bloody Valentine sort of way but without covering Kristi's beautiful voice. A song you could listen to all day.



"Into the Fire" is like a different version of Lord of the Rings. The gypsy drum and tambourine almost fight against the electronica, and perhaps against the political dictatorship the whispers allude to, in a kind of a tag of war.



It transitions into "Fever", another song of contrasts with a near eastern sound and a hint of Jefferson Airplane. Sexual passion bursts from it but the undertones of centuries of Turkish rule contrast with the straightforward sounding lyrics.



"Sol Invictus" rides on the driving rhythm of Pontic songs. The theme of the invincible sun, with its pagan references to the winter's solstice and St John's fires, suits the strong rhythm. Stassinopoulou's singing is beautifully simple and confident. The synths are a little misplaced.



"Only love remains" begins with an unfortunate blaring of a synthesizer. It is a mix of near eastern and Indian motifs with a synthesized tanpura resonating in the background and some unnecessary electronica covering up the more interesting guitar work nearer the end.



"Trygona" is based on a motif from Epirus. Stassinopoulou's voice soars over it much like it soars over the Amorgos Passsage in her follow-up recording Secrets of the Rocks. The track follows the distinctive unmistakable pattern of Epirotic laments. A woman calls on a female blackbird (Trygona) and asks her if she has seen her loved one. A sonar-like sound runs through it as of someone having just discovered something unusual in an endless ocean of homegeneity. It must be the unusual beauty of Stassinopoulou's voice. She sings powerfully and the song ends annoyingly too soon.



"At the edge of the horizon" is perhaps the least unusual song, with an easy rhythm, air bells and an ambience reminiscent of Enya or Loreena McKennitt.



Majnoon is based on a Persian traditional song with Samarkand in its theme. Thankfully free of electronica, a fleeting journey on the silk road, a night ride across the Caucasus accompanied by the sound of a fiddle and a gypsy's drum.



"Drumming frogs" is the CD's masterpiece. It is filled with the surrealistic take on life of the refugees that flooded Greece post 1922, after the disastrous outcome of the Greek-Turkish war. They brought with them little besides songs with a dark, sometimes bizarre, sense of humour. They were sung as if in defiance of the death that ravaged their lives and reflected a seemingly illogical world that had betrayed them. In this case "the frogs play the tabla and the poplar trees shake the shakers". What is remarkable is that this is not an original song of the refugees but has been written by Stassinopoulou nearly a century later. The imitation is cunning. The tsifteteli tune is overdubbed by the calls of a gypsy advertising his watermelons over a loudspeaker in the inimitable Greek gypsy style: I cut them all, I run a knife through them all (it is fruits he's talking about) - in a similar vein to the bizarreness of the refugees' art.



"Rain is Falling" has a 60's Hammond organ running like an old memory through it. Sung in a minor scale, it is not really helped by the repetitiveness of the drum machine, though the rest of the electronic strangeness and the guitar cacophony at the end fit the broken hearted theme.



The final track "Beehives" on a Cretan motif combines the dizzying Cretan tempo with a buzzing of bees and some strong vocals from Kristi Stassinopoulou. A somewhat unusual combination of the driving sounds of the Cretan harp and zournas alongside an electric guitar and bass. "I laugh and whirl to the drunken sun" - it sounds just like it and a great way to sign off."