SEA + AIR – EVROPI (CD)

15,00

SEA + AIR are a married duo with a pan-european outlook. Evropi is their second record of what they call ‘ghost pop’: this term doesn’t seem to refer to hauntology, but rather the resurfacing of instruments and styles of old Europe in the midst of full-blown pop songs. Evropi is released on the Glitterhouse label.

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Description

600 shows, 22 countries, 3 years of non-stop touring across a changing continent. A show in Lisbon close to a demonstration turning into a riot. Side rooms full of smoke and stacked money in Italy. Meeting Ukrainian fans with a foreboding of an upcoming war. And a married Greek/German couple in the thick of it.

Eleni Zafiriadou and Daniel Benjamin aka SEA + AIR found themselves in the right place at the right time. While touring their debut “My Heart’s Sick Chord” both recognised the significance of these scenes they found for an album about Europe reflected in the eyes of young people across the continent. Instantly they started writing new songs on the road: morning by morning in countless showers, night after night in scary hotel rooms in nameless cities and during months of driving. Due to a lack of recording equipment and music theory a big idea occurred: How about composing an album completely in your mind? Using the brain as a natural filter: only unique and catchy ideas survive the night. Combined with their relationship to Europe and Eleni’s personal history it became the story of a family that hadn’t had a home for generations. The story of a journey from Asia Minor to Greece, Germany and back across Europe: Pop music used to be dangerous and thrilling, disturbing and rebellious. That’s the main difference between pop and Schlager music. Even if these days might be over SEA + AIR are not willing to give up this raw spirit. They show that pop music can still be surprising. Nowadays as so much music is staged and brought to market as art, even the lyrics of Evropi seem to be rebellious: Simple stories about three women of the diaspora. Stories about life, love, peace and understanding.

SEA + AIR define their songs as “Ghost Pop”: A mixture of long-lost Mediterranean melodies and exotic instruments telling a story of their own. Influenced by Pontic music and Rembetiko, traditional Greek intruments like the Lyra or the Bouzouki are used and already the opener “We All Have To Leave Someday” leads to an adventurous musical journey.Daniel and Eleni experiment with Byzantine singing and the rhythmic and emotional freedom of an age-old music tradition captured by Elenis spaced out voice in “Flowers From The Distance”.

SEA + AIR love playing with extremes and sexual stereotyping. Daniel’s falsetto voice and Eleni’s androgynous singing confuse the listener, leaving it unclear who’s singing the lead on “Mercy Looks Good On You” and “HaHaHaHaHa”. The orchestral “Lady Evropi” is a forseeing vision to the situation in Greece describing its dividing relationship to Europe. SEA + AIR make the grade to compose an amazing and individual album about continental Europe that fits no genres. Despite the refusal to try to suit everybody and to be governed too much by Anglo-American influences Evropi still manages to reach the international pop audience with its catchy radio songs like “Should I Care” or “Peace Begins At Home”.