Arkas - Some funny stuff to make your day!

Taken from "Meta H Zwi" by famous cartoonist Arkas, three pages of this work, just to have a laugh:

What the f*** with all this EMO thing!

Emos has been around for more than a decade, but they became more apparent the last couple of years, becoming a fad among teenagers, especially here in Greece. A style originated in punk, now has gained a wider range of fans and it's difficult to define it, as soon as there are different kind of emos around. For example, you can find a hardcore emo, who has become emo not for the fad, but he believed this way of life is the most appropiate to him and the most common type of all, the emos who decided to adopt the emo thing just to be in fashion and to follow the trends of their era.

How can you tell if someone is Emo or not? The answer is: by his/her style. Emos wear tight jeans and dark clothes. Boys have a long fridge which covers one or both eyes, girls on the other hand, can also have their long hair brushed in a way they look like modern descedants of 18th century madams (sic). Both men and women use a black make up around their eyes (look like goths in that way) and they always look upset and pathetic. Some of them claim to have bisexual preferences, in some cases they are getting self-injured or even have suicidal tendencies.

Emos in Greece is a common site at Sintagma square in Athens (see the photo above) as the squares marble staircase serve as the gathering place for most Athenian emos. Starbucks is another location in which you can also spot them. They listen to some teenage oriented rock bands such as AFI, Alexisonfire, Brand New, Coheed and Cambria, Fall Out Boy, From First to Last, Funeral for a Friend, Hawthorne Heights, My Chemical Romance, Panic! at the Disco, The Red Jumpsuit Apparatus, Senses Fail, Something Corporate, The Starting Line, Story of the Year, Taking Back Sunday, Thursday, The Used, Tokyo Hotel and Underoath

What's your opinion on emos? Do you like them? Are you an emo yourself? If not, will you embrace that fashion or you dispise it?

Forgotten NY - A lost metropolis uncovered.

Kevin Walsh, a native New Yorker borned and raised in Bay Ridge, Brooklyn, was always fascinated by the ancient ads and streetlamps as well as the negleted centuries old houses found in New York.

Armed with a plain camera and an apetite of uncovering the mysteries of the vast american metropolis, Kevin started to tour and photograph parts of it. With the material he collected each time, he created a website to exhibit this and let New Yorkers and NY fans all over the world the hidden mysteries and history of their beloved city through photo-covered tours. As a result, since 1999 he covered and presented many parts of NY, from Riverdale, Bronx to Tottenville, Staten Island and from Inwood, Manhattan to Far Rockaway, Queens.

His attempt finally was justified, Forgotten NY was named one of Forbes' Best City Blogs sites, and in good company: Gothamist and Newyorkology. FNY has been profiled in all of NYC's daily newspapers, and has been mentioned by name in columns by the New York Times' Christopher Gray and David Dunlap and by the New York Sun's Francis Morrone. It has twice been named to the Village Voice's Best of NYC list, most recently in 2006. It has also been cited by PC Magazine's Top 99 "Undiscovered" websites.

You can find a brand new tour every week, plus the so called "Forgotten Slices" contributed by FNY correspodents, covering 2-4 block area of selected NYC neighborhoods each time. You can find a new "Slice" two or sometimes three times a week.




Personally, I'm a huge fan of this page and I'm visiting it many times per week. If you are interested in NY and its history, neighborhoods and mysteries just click to: http://www.forgotten-ny.com/

MERRY CHRISTMAS TO ALL THE READERS OF THIS BLOG - MAY 2008 BE A HAPPY AND PRODUCTIVE YEAR FOR YOU!

Best Wishes,

Your Blogger, John

Matthew Dekay event impressions, pictures and videos

Matthew rocked us yesterday - an extensive and quality 4-hours long progressive house set straight out from Holland. We got there around 1.15 a.m., there was a high school party going on when we arrived, it was a little bit of disappointment to see 16 or 17 year olds dancing with some commercial rnb tunes, when you expect a proper warm up for an event of its kind. At last, the school party was over and as a result the Au Bar's resident dj Petros Odin started the warm up for Matthew Dekay. He spinned some smooth progressive tunes till around 2.30 a.m. when Matthew got on the decks. He was good tempered and friendly - he smiled several times at us and in return we encouraged his perfomance. I was jumping all the time and this resulted in having an annoying pain and swelling in my feet, but it doesn't bother me at all. I had a special and amazing night! So below I post some pictures and videos from last night:

The videos:

Corfu's current detailed weather conditions online!

You may have noticed the new element I added yesterday at the bottom of this page - it's a weather sticker which show us the current weather conditions in Kanalia, three kilometres away from Corfu Town in detail. This sticker updates every few seconds from the amateur (or private) weather station web site which, as the weather station itself, was set in January 2007 by Nikos Tsiolis and provide current values for temperature, humidity, pressure, wind direction, average wind speed, wind gust speed, dew point and percipitation. Also, you can find graphics and records from the very first day the station opened. If you want to view all those data provided just double click:
http://www.corfuweather.gr/en/

Matthew Dekay live @ Au Bar Corfu this Friday! + a special Psy event for Xmas!

A great Dutch producer and dj is coming to our little island to please us with a night full of cool progressive and techno sounds straight from Holland. His name? Matthew Dekay! As always, I will post some pictures and videos in this blog so stay tuned!

A brief bio taken from his MySpace account:

Matthew Dekay is one of those artists impossible to pigeon-hole. You’re as likely to find his tunes in the record boxes and CD wallets of Sasha and Deep Dish as you are in Eric Morillo and Victor Calderone. This ability to transcend genres is what makes this hugely talented Dutchman stand out from the others, and means he is one of the most consistent and respected artists in dance music.
Like so many great producers, Dekay was classically trained as a child. He leapt out of the orchestra pit, turned his back on a successful pop career and now has his feet firmly planted on the dancefloor – and for that – we should be eternally grateful. If you wanted stick a label on Dekay, then ‘progressive’ would be the most obvious, yet that doesn’t do justice to the sheer breadth and diversity of his sound. As far removed from monotonous, dull prog that damaged the scene so much, Dekay’s music is forward thinking, full of life and most importantly – you can dance to it, as easily as you can listen to it!
Dekay’s work is admired across the board. Through his epic DJ sets, Matthew has built up a truly global following, conquering territory after territory. Demand for him stateside is what dreams are made of, and over the next 12 months you’ll witness Dekay doing the US like no- one else.
With such an ear for quality, it was only natural that Dekay would turn his hand to A&R and set up his own label DK Records. The label was responsible for breaking the massive Perasma – Swing 2 Harmony; that went on to be signed by Ministry Of Sound and appear on countless compilations worldwide. In September a re-vamped and re-mastered DK Records will be unveiled, and with it several sibling labels to boot!
After a critically acclaimed mix CD, ‘Trousy’ on Armada in 2005, Matthew’s long overdue and hotly anticipated debut artist album is on its way. Being a perfectionist has its downfalls, and ensuring the end result is flawless is the reason behind the delay of this long player. With a slew of hugely impressive productions already to his name, 2007 will see Matthew stepping up several gears with first time collaborations and a hell of a lot more.
It’s an exciting time for Matthew Dekay, and for those who consume his unique and pure sound. As the remainder of 2007 unfolds the world is watching and waiting with baited breath.

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Oh, I should not forget to inform you guys about a very special event which will take place in Hector's club at Ipsos. Hold your breath: Bamboo Forest live at 25/12!! All psychedelic trance fans should be there! Don't miss it - such names usually ain't come over here - so do your best!

Canaletto: The Thames River and St. Paul's Cathedral, 1747

This is a really cool painting by Canaletto (Antonio Canal), an Italian artist who was born in Venice but lived in London for many years and provided us with some very interesting mid-18th paintings depicting London in the Georgian era. This is from 1747, I found it in a Mozart biography (yes, little Wolfgang spent one year in London as a child where he played for the court and he wrote his first symphony). The line running through the middle of the image is the space between two pages.

Just snowed for a few minutes in Corfu! A rare phenomenon indeed!

Now we have like 3 degrees Celsiou, it's pretty cold for us (hey you from Northern Europe and America don't laugh - Corfu has a pretty mild and wet climate). I posted a couple of photos - the first shows the deep grey snow-ladden sky and the second the snow falling taken from my apartment's balcony.

Corfu Town's High street Christmas Lights were lighted today!

Today is the celebration day of our patron saint, Saint Spyridon. Also is the day in which the massive Christmas decorative lights are being lighted for the forthcoming Christmas celebrations. Standing amidst the town's high street you are encircled by a constellation of million bulbs lighting the street from above (every single tree on the street has a network of bulbs thrown upon its branches). The effect is enchanting!

Here are three photos I took today evening with my K810i camera phone to get an idea of what I'm describing above.

Seven videos shot in London - from the Verve to Aqua...

London has long been one of the capitals of modern music worldwide- it has many recording studios, a vast number of recording companies are headquartered there and of course, many big names of music come from this city. London is a loved location for shooting movies as well as music videos - below I present you seven of the most well-known videos shot in London with their Youtube links:

Verve - Bittersweet symphony

Shot in 1997 in the Hoxton area of London (in Hoxton Street), it's a parody of Massive Attack's video "Unfinished Sympathy".



Pink Floyd - Another Brick in the Wall (part 2)

A legendary video for a legendary song. Filmed in London in the Lever street housing estate in Cleckenwell.




Beatles - Get Back

The Fab Four gave their latest open public performance on the 4 Saville Row's building's studio, where the Beatles recording company headquartered. That event was taped and provided inspitation for the U2's "Where The Streets Have No Name" video, which was shot in Downtown Los Angeles. Here is "Get Back":




Aqua - Turn Back Time

I never was fond of the Danish bubble-pop group Aqua which provided us with one hit wonders such as "Barbie Girl". In 1998 though, they released a quite good song written for the "Sliding Doors" film, starring Gwyneth Paltrow. The music video for that song was shot in the London Underground.



Princess - Say I'm Your Number One

Back in 1985, the fresh and new pop trio Stock Aitken and Waterman released Princess's first hit " Say I'm Your Number One" which became an one hit wonder. The song's video was shot entirely in London, in areas such as Notting Hill, Brixton and the City.



Pet Shop Boys - West End Girls

In the same year when the video for "Say I'm your Number One" was released, the famous british synth pop duo PSB released the video for their first hit "West End Girls", an hymn to the London of the 80s and its contrasts. The video features several good shots of London displaying us in brief how the city and its people looked before 22 years.



Musical Youth - Pass The Dutchie

Straight from Jamaica, a happy reggae tune sung by a bunch of youths with the Big Ben and the Houses Of Parliament in view behind them.



P.S. There is another one, Kelly Marie's video for "Feels Like I'm In Love" which hopelessly can't find in You Tube - it features unparalleled shots of London in the disco era - I will post it when a YouTube link will be available.

A blog for London and E

Few days ago I was surfing the net killing my time and I found an interesting blog of a Londoner which is about life in the English capital and features some news about what's going in England as well. Here is the url: http://diamondgeezer.blogspot.com/ or http://lndn.blogspot.com/, if you are more interested in his London stuff.

I found it very interesting, so I bookmarked it and I'm checking it every day as it is updated almost in daily basis. Congratulations Mr. Geezer for your really outstanding blog!

A protest against the new rise in electricity bills!

Shut your general power switch off for 15 minutes on Saturday 15th of December 12.00 p.m , to protest against the dramatic rise in electricity. More infos here: http://newinka.wordpress.com/ (in greek only).

I Want My MTV! MTV Greece on the way at last!!

Yes!! According to the greek sunday newspaper "To Thema" and some internet resources, MTV Greece is underway at last! It's something many Greek people and music lovers were waiting for many years. One of the most recognisable brands worldwide and the first music channel which had broadcasted first time from New York at the August of 1981, was a rebellion to the music industry and changed many people's lifestyle forever.

The greek edition is going to start broadcasting the spring of 2008, while some say it will kick off this New Year's eve! It took several months of negotiations between the brand with the greek investor, the shipowner Viktoras Restis to came to an agreement and finally the greek side gains the copyright. The MTV set a rule that the MTV Greece will be broadcasted to over the fifty per cent of the country, so I hope Corfu will be in the area of coverage cause it's the place I reside.

MTV Greece will broadcast international MTV shows such as Pimp My Ride, Dismissed and Viva La Bam as well all the MTV's awards, all greek-subtitled! I hope the music video part will be mostly international and less greek oriented with an emphasis to the quality of the programmes.

That's all for now, I hope I'll post further updates on that in one of the next weeks.

CJ Jeff impressions, pictures and videos!

Finally greek djs are doing their best to rival the famous foreign ones! Yesterday I had a really good time at Au Bar - we went there at 1.30 a.m. and we left at 5.45 a.m. while CJ was still on the decks! He played mostly energetic progressive house with some electro touches, showcasing a wide selection of tunes, from which the most outstanding ones for me were a remix on Depeche Mode's "Personal Jesus", a remix of Michael Sembello's "Maniac" (from the Flashdance movie) and Tracey Thorn's "Grand Canyon". Below are some photos and videos to get an idea of how the event was like.

CJ Jeff @ Au Bar - Friday 07/12

One more event by Au Bar! This time, Greek progressive house DJ CJ Jeff is gonna rock the decks! As always, this event is going to be broadcasted live by corfuland.gr (http://www.corfuland.gr/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=351) from 01.00 a.m. greek time up to 5.00 a.m. in the morning! If you're not in Corfu or for some reason you can't be there, check this link out!

P.S. I will be there too and I'll cover the event by taking photos and brief videos - I'll post them in the blog on Saturday.

A walk through some west neighbourhoods of Corfu Town

Today was a windy and quite chilly day for Corfu. This evening I missed a lecture of an English history professor on pirates (not really so interested in the subject, but wanted to go there to practice my English). So instead I decided to make a big walk through some of the west lying districts of Corfu town like Dasaki, Garitsa and Pagkrateika.

The route I followed is drawn below in a quick processed satellite image from wikimapia.org:



I passed the old Mental Clinic (which now houses the Department of Computer Techonology and the Sound and Vision one of the Ionio University). Across from the site, there is an old villa - do you think it's spooked?





There is a new mental clinic near the old one:



Right after the Mental Clinic is the British Cemetery or more formal "Commonwealth War Graves", which I assume was a cemetery for the British WW2 veterans. The site is quite small, but I like the grass and the tidy looks of it. Some pictures taken from the gate:















Following the road towards the Prison, I met the building of the 4th High School of Corfu, which is actually accross the penintentiary (like the High State prison in Koridallos, Athens, the Corfu one is near an educational facility - made in greece! lol).







Below, two pictures of the Prison itself:






An image of the Prison's external wall with the High School on the left.



Surrounding those two establishments, the Dasaki woods ("dasaki" means "woods" in Greek) is an area in where sometime stood the third fortress of Corfu Town (it's gone now - I believe the prison sits on the site - it was a lot smaller than the two other ones). I went to the western part of the wood where is a small football field. I saw a group of adults playing there:



The wood itself, has many tall trees. The most prevailing in that wood are the fir and the pine trees. The fact that the wood is situated on a hill, provides you with some cool views to the west suburbs of Corfu Town and their environs.






Now, something we should be ashamed of as Corfiots: The neglet of Dasaki... No further comments, the picture speaks itself!!



It's time to continue our stroll and head to the Garitsa district. Following a narrow descenting road, I arrived at the Garitsa housing estates, a group of flats built by the government for the poor families. There are two dinstictive types of buildings in the estates: the 4 or 5-storey flats and the two-storey row houses. Below are some images of how they look like.

-Flats:







-Row houses:



Walking towards the stadium and the aiport area, I decided to visit the Municipal Cemetery. It is the biggest in the island and most people of Corfu town were burried there. Below, the road leading to the Cemetery, Anapapsis street and a picture of the Airport control tower against the sunset around it.







The Cemetery itself is quite beautiful and serene. There is a chapel in where the funeral masses are being held and some really charming graves.







Nightmare on Elm street? Lol!



The Corfu Stadium is near the Cemetery. It's the home of the A.O. Kerkira F.C.





It was getting darker, so I made my way home through the Pagkrateika district (cheers to my friend Pagratis - he lives in that place which took its name from his surname).









The "Villa Rosa" or "The Pink Villa", a name derived from the color of the building, stands there negleted for several decades - It could be restored and provide housing for a museum or any other type of cultural establishment.





Finally, this big walk came to an end as I approached the outskirts of the town centre. Hope you enjoyed this post - more of this type will come soon!