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of money. I get quite upset about Greece. I think the hardest country I ever had to work with in terms of making an album in 35 years is Greece, followed by Ethiopia, followed by Mexico, followed by Syria, Syria comes fourth. It’s quite depressing and annoying for me that it was so hard to do stuff in Greece. Ahetas and other musicians had to explain to me, saying you don’t get how it works here, musicians have no status, singers have status, but musicians don’t, unless you’re number one… they have no literature, contemporary litera- ture, you name me ten great contemporary authors; they have no film industry, name me ten contemporary film makers; I can name two and I’m half Greek, remember, so I’ve got a vested interest in this. Name me the ten Greek musicians of the time, world class quali- ty, who are they? Let’s carry on, poets: I’m sure there are great poets in Greece, there always have been, but who are they?”
Ahetas interrupts, having patiently listened as a secret of Greece is being uncovered: “There are people in Greece but they don’t get exposure, that’s the problem… any Greek who tries to do things properly or tries to produce something or invent something, it does- n’t get support and he doesn’t get exposure. You get support from immediate friends, and you try and try and try but after a while you give up because you don’t get the exposure… There are writers, composers, painters, poets, musicians who are very good, but of course you cannot name ten of them, because you will never know them. But if you spend a lot of time, you will meet people and you go into another world and you think, how does that exist?”
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hen Dubulah and Ahetas set out to find musi- cians for their project there was scepticism, even from the musicians themselves. “That response, it was a very big surprise for us. As soon as we said you’re free to listen, and take the idea and put your own substance of what you think and what you want to express by the way you play or something you would not normally do because of the restrictions of commercial music or whom you play with, which big name you have to support and all that. Here you can be as abstract or as concise as you want,” Ahetas explains.
Ahetas and Dubulah agree that this is the most Greek thing they’ve ever done musically. Their idea was to show the depth and breadth of a musical and artistic culture reaching over thousands of years and the fact that there is a contemporary side to it which nobody knows about. It is all inside Xaos, the album, which after all is not chaotic whatsoever.
“Giving the people the freedom to react emotionally and intel- lectually without having to please, saying ‘you really are free to do what you want, you really are, go, do what you want, anything’, and you’re trusting them to come up with the right thing and that’s what great musicians can do if you give them the space to do it, as Jimi was taking about space earlier,” Dubulah says.
Xaos out now on Pomegranate Records via IRL. You heard a track on last issue’s fRoots 55 compilation.