Matisse were formed at the beginning of 2000 by John Masouras (bass guitar) and Andreas Ioannou (guitar) at one incidental meeting, when they realized their common passion for British and American alternative music. They started writing songs and at the same time searching for new members, which didn’t take too long- therefore in the initial line up we can find Petros Tsolis (drums), Aris Siafas (vocals) and Katerina Kastana (keyboards). They chose their name from an advertising poster of the famous painter Henry Matisse and started rehearsals.
Sharing the same love for American and British alternative music, they started writing their first songs and play their first gigs in many clubs. They kept playing live in places that were ‘friendly’ to their sound – underground clubs in Athens and other smaller cities around Greece - while playing as support bands to groups like Drugstore, Reamonn, Frank & Walters, Puressence, Shed 7. In the winter of 2002 Matisse started to send their demos in any known and unknown record company. Sony Music took interest in them and singed them, which was rather unusual taking into consideration the times and the sound of the band. The result of the live experience and the cohesion they had acquired as a band led to the release of the EP ‘4’ in the summer of 2003 that contained four songs and got very good reviews. Around this time and after many rearrangements on line up, people left and people join…- Greggy K took the place of in guitars and composing.
After recording for 9 months, in the summer of 2005, Matisse returned with their first full album with a new sound that poised between alternative and electronic influences and powerful, direct lyrics. With songs such as ‘She Smiles’ (album’s biggest radio hit), ‘Τhe Gospel’ and ‘Let Me Go Home’, remixes by local specialists as bonus tracks and covers of ‘Cosmic Dancer’ (T-Rex) and ‘Fragments of Life’ (Roy Vedas) their debut album, Cheap As Art stood out and became one of the best releases of the year. Cheap As Art was the album that put Matisse on the map -it was also their first step aboard since it was released in Poland by indie label Dream Music. Matisse promote the album with many concerts around Greece and also they were the opening act for Garbage and Marilyn Manson in the Rockwave Festival.
2 years after the release of Cheap As Art, Matisse left behind the cheerful sounds and the sensitive ballads and returned with more rock and mature moods, with new songs under the riddling and mocking title Toys Up(2007). A strong rock, dark and –according to them- more raw new sound describes this album that consists of 11 songs exactly as they wanted them to be. Toys Up consists of two covers as well: a rather special version of She Bop, a classic Cindy Lauper song and a full reconstruction of ‘Mi mou milas gi agapi’ , an all time classic greek song composed by Yannis Spanos; with a new approach and a new title as ‘Gas’ , the song had the guest vocals of Dimitra Galani, a female icon for local music for the last 40 years.
During the recording of their second album they touring as opening act for Kaiser Chiefs in their 3 concerts in Athens and Thessalonica. While wanting to keep in touch with their fans, Matisse used the internet in the best possible way: it was the first time for a Greek band to offer the track by track hearing of a whole album through myspace and was a huge success.
Toys Up was released in May 2007, the fist single “Call Me, Call Me” makes a great impression and a new era starts for Matisse: they open for Tori Amos and James in the Fly Beyond Festival while the prepaid phone card What’s up by Cosmote had the song “5 Seconds Of Love” as the music theme of their commercials. In autumn of 2007 we had the final rearrangement in the line up after the departure of singer Aris Siafas. Alex Kavvadias, a Greek-Australian was the new person in the band. After that, the band worked with BSB, a clothes brand for which they ‘messed’ again with “She Bop” giving a darker and more electro sense to the song and started touring Greece and England at the beginning of 2008 for 40 live shows. During the same period Toys Up was released in Scandinavia and Russia, writing a new page in Matisse’s history.
In May 2008, Matisse participated in the collection GREEK CINEMA REVISITED, for which they covered two cult movie themes. In winter of the same year they offered their song ‘Killer Kids” for the new TV campaign of the Fashion Targets Breast Cancer, thus contributing musically to the sensitization for the breast cancer prevention. At the same time they were in the studio recording their new album.
In summer 2009, they redefine themselves and make their come back with the album Rock ‘n’ Roll Mafia-which was recorded in Athens, Los Angeles and London.
In contrast to the intense guitars of their debut and the dark mood of Toys Up, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Mafia is a brighter and more straightforward pop & rock album with many backing vocals, extra musicians, impressive orchestrations but all these without leaving the distinctively ironic mood in lyrics (i.e The Fear, Murder Me etc)
The album’s title ‘trigger happy’ first single distinctively stands out from the other songs. With the participation of a brass band, the emphasis in mandolin and an almost ‘theatrical’ performance by Alex Kavvadias, the Rock ‘n’ Roll Mafia sets the band’s new mark. The French guru of electronica, Kid Loco made an impressive remix on the song.
But the differences don’t stop here: for ‘Today’ they worked with Johnette Napolitano (former cult singer for the Concrete Blonde) who participated in lyrics as well, while in ‘Sunday Morning’ they have one more guest, the rising star Lenka. In ‘Rebels’ the sitar makes a strong present in the orchestration, in ‘I Like’ they play clean cut rock’n’roll, in ‘Last Dance’ the indie sounds mix with club tunes at the end of the song, the horn section ‘parties’ in ‘Party Tonight’, while the album closes with the a string quartet which fills the melancholic lyrics of ‘Mary’ with a grotesque romanticism and an exquisite performance. It is also imperative that we mention the great number of talented musicians who participated in the recording of the album offering a truly special colour.
The album was mixed and mastered in London and Athens with the assistance of two music legends: the Grammy-nominated Chris Tsangarides (Depeche Mode, Concrete Blonde, Judas Priest) who mixed 8 out of the 12 songs in the album and Ian Cooper (Oasis, Fratellis, Nick Cave, Verve) who did the mastering. The rest songs were mixed at Ska studios in Athens by Aris Christou, who was in charge of the recording and production process, while Antonis Villiotis was the A&R man for the band.
Hiya, thanks for being a friend - I enjoyed visiting YourSpace :-) Keep it up May your life be full of love, light and fun... hugs SOREN - Beats for change - NYERTUN
re paidia kataplhktikh doyleia to not alone! alex tromerh ermhneia,grhgorako apla latreiaaaa sygxarhthria super douleia,kathe kainourio k kalutero! epishs megalo zhtw gia to video,xarma ofthalmwn! filia,Fotini
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