February 29 2016

"Probably the most useless post on this blog", I said exactly 4 years ago on my February 2012 post (in Greek). Since this day is special, in the sense that it only comes once every 4 years I decided to go out and take some photos and turning the date indicator on my camera on. Well, once you go out and do all these things you realize that it's a normal day just like any other, but because of its "rareness" I decided to document it by posting the photos I took on this blog. And that's what I decided to do today as well. I even turned my camera's date stamp on (again).

Last time, I just went around a couple of places, but this year, I decided to take it a step further and become a tourist in my own city. So, I started from the same places but then continued downtown to the Acropolis, and then popped around next door into the Acropolis Museum and finished by going all the way around the "sacred rock" of the Acropolis, as it's called ending up in a second hand record shop.

So what's so special about leap years? Well, first of all, February has 20 days instead of 28 (duh!), which means that the year has 366 days instead of 365. (A friend of mine suggested that the 29th of February should be a holiday "a day dedicated to astronomy or something like that"). Leap years are also the years on which the Summer Olympics and the US Elections take place. So there you have it...

By the way, do you also want a video from this day? Well, here it is:

On a more serious note here are 2 others featuring musicians. The first one playing Pink Floyd's "Wish You Were Here" in the Athens Metro, and the second one playing classical music outside the Acropolis Museum. Enjoy!

 

A Broken Frame - Then And Now (The Extras)

The release by Marsheaux of "A Broken Frame", a track-by-track cover of Depeche Mode's original 1982 album was one of the major events in contemporary synth-pop last year. Back in August, I published on this blog a side-by-side review of both albums based on their vinyl versions, my original DM one which I had bought back in the day and the Marsheaux one which I had received earlier in the year. Since then Marsheux have released the CD version which came with lots of extras. It's a double CD, and CD1 also features covers of the B-Sides from the Depeche Mode singles from that album: "Now This Is Fun" featuring James New on vocals (b-side of "See You") and "Oberkorn (It's A Small Town)" (b-side of "The Meaning Of Love"). CD2 has extended versions of all album tracks. The "extended mix" was quite an important feature for some of us who grew up listening to music in the 80's and could be found on the 12 inch versions of the singles released. It was not a remix that sometimes is completely unrecognizable compared to the original song, often without vocals as was the case from the 90's onwards, it was a longer version, using elements of the original track. We got a taste of these on the bonus CD that came with the first, white vinyl edition featuring extended versions of "Leave In Silence", "My Secret Garden" and "The Sun And The Rainfall", but on CD2 of this edition we get everything. And some songs really come out on their own in these versions, most notably "Nothing To Fear" and "The Sun And The Rainfall".

Now that I had a CD edition of the Marsheaux version of the album a question started bugging me: "Shouldn't I get a copy of the original DM on CD?" It seemed that I should, but which edition? By browsing through Discogs I decided that the best choice was a 2006 edition featuring a CD and DVD. The CD featured the album and the DVD featured on its video portion a documentary about the making of the album and on its audio portion the complete album on a 5.1 mix, the b-sides (which Marsheaux included on their own CD1) plus a live concert from that era.

As you can see,I did photograph them side-by-side as I did with the vinyls on last year's post, although in this case the two designs do not exactly match as they did on the vinyl versions.

There was one more extra Marsheaux had in store for us from "A Broken Frame": A single! Their choice was "Monument", it came out on CD single and its design was similar to the "Leave In Silence" single from Depeche Mode. DM's "Leave In Silence" featured "Leave In Silence (Longer)", "Further Excerpts From : My Secret Garden" and "Leave In Silence (Quieter)" (on the 12'') whereas Marsheaux's "Monument" features "Monument (Shorter)", "Monument (Bigger)", "My Secret Garden (Better)" and "The Sun And The Rainfall (Lighter)". And in my own opinion this version of "My Secret Garden" is indeed a better one. They also filmed a video of "Monument" to accompany the single.

Finally, I decided to gather together all the other items related to "A Broken Frame" from my collection in one photo: The 7'' and 12'' versions of "See You" and "The Meaning Of Love" from Depeche Mode, the bonus CD given with the first white vinyl edition of Marsheaux's album plus an extra CD slipcase of "Monument" I received with my order of the single with different colours (a misprint perhaps?). And it's also worth noting that there is an instrumental version of "A Broken Frame" out there that is included as a CD-R in souvenir boxes sold at Marsheux gigs.

The Big Nose Attack 69 Release Party

Finally, after last week's teaser, the day came. The day when The Big Nose Attack took over Gagarin. On their own. Well, not completely on their own, but with a little help from their friends, 7-Odds and Mr. Highway Band. But they were headlining. And all this after last summer's appearance at Rockwave Festival supporting The Black Keys and their triumphant return from a European and Greek tour, including a broken-down VW van. For me, it was also a chance to see Mr. Highway Band again who I discovered last year and a time to discover 7-Odds.

I checked in at Gagarin a few minutes after the doors opened. I did not want to miss any of the bands but I also wanted to get my hands on some Big Nose merchandise. My first BNA t-shirt, but most importantly, a copy of the new album, 69, on orange vinyl.

Mission accomplished, I was inside and on the first row waiting for 7-Odds. Now, the band name looked familiar to me. I thought I might have seen them live before, but it probably seems that they were one of the early support acts in one of the gigs I had attended and I missed them. Nevertheless they were very good, their sound did fit more with The Big Nose Attack (than Mr. Highway Band who came next) and they can probably be classified as my "new discovery" from this gig, the same way I discovered Mr. Highway Band last year. Oh, and they also played the Theremin onstage. (This blog has a history of Theremin mentions).

My last year's "discovery", Mr. Highway Band were next. I discovered them at their own festival last year, bought both their albums and I also saw them accidentally once on my way home from another gig. True, their sound is a lot different from The Big Nose Attack but it was great to see two of my favourite bands on the same night. So, it was a familiar set for me, including both of my favourite songs of theirs, "Revolution" from the first album and "Story Of My Life" from the second.

Under the sounds of the Wu-Tang Clan the stars of the night came on stage. Boogieman and Little Tonnie aka The Big Nose Attack were on, starting with "A Bite To Eat"

This was followed with songs from all three albums including the "hit" from the second one "Yeah! (That Girl)" and my favourite from the new one "Not The One" which I think could match That Girl's success as, in my opinion, it's catchy enough to do that!

Other highlights included a tribute to their childhood hero David Hasselhoff (Not!) where they played a cover of Jimi Hendrix's "Foxy Lady" and an I-Don't-Know-How-Many-Minutes-Version of "Wild Cherry" with Little Tonnie giving it his all!

There was not one, but two encores. One the first one, a theremin appeared! This was on "Don't Look Back" played by their producer Panos Tsekouras.

And on the second one Boogie Man got his little red electric mandolin (or is it a ukelele?) for the final song "Drunk Whore Blues".

They left the stage under the sounds of Stevie Wonder's "Higher Ground". Once again, Merlin's Music Box was there which means that the whole show is now on YouTube. As for the band, their bet seems to have paid off. The ground floor of Gagarin was quite full. Next time, they'll fill the upper floor as well.

SETLISTS:

7-Odds
01. Bad Thoughts
02. People Wanna See
03. Sex Wax
04. Parking Lots
05. Fine Disaster
06. 21 Minutes
07. Dusty Roads.
08. Alley Walk
09. Right Ahead
10. Run To Your Mama

Mr. Highway Band
01. In The Fire Of Time
02. At The End Of The Day
03. No One Can Bring Me Down
04. I' m Gonna Give You Love
05. Story Of My Life
06. Overdose
07. Cities Walk On Fire
08. The River And The Town
09. Revolution

The Big Nose Attack
01. A Bite To Eat
02. All By Myself
03. Under Your Spell
04. Yeah! (That Girl)
05. Grunting And Panting
06. Monday Morning Spaghetti
07. 50 Shades Of Shame
08. Let The Love Shine
09. Not The One
10. Adam And Eve
11. Left Alone
12. Foxy Lady
13. Special Sauce Called Love
14. Drunk And Gibberish
15. Wild Cherry
Encore:
16. Don't Look Back
17. Down With Me
Encore 2:
18. Drunk Whore Blues

FULL SHOW by MERLIN'S MUSIC BOX:
7-Odds
Mr. Highway Band
The Big Nose Attack