Album Rating: 2.5

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@NightOnDrunkMountain — I don't think there's a strict rule when it comes to threads; for reviews, I get it. This is not a Greek site, so main forms of text (reviews, news etc) have to be in English. But for shoutouts or comments (for a Greek album nonetheless), I don't think it's an issue. It's not like we're saying anything offensive

Idk maybe a Mod/Staff can shed some light on this

Μην ανησυχείς, και να βρισουμε οι μλκς δεν θα το καταλάβουν χαχαχα

-- so main forms of text (reviews, news etc) have to be in English

Not necessarily, reviews/comments can be written in Greek, but then expect only Greeks to interact with both.

Album Rating: 2.5

That's true Voivod (and honestly how wild would it be to have an all-Greek review on Sput), but the idea crumbles into pieces when you take into account Sput's lack of foreign character support. Greek accent marks are permitted in threads (!), but not in reviews and it'd be weird reading one without them.

In any case, how weird (in the best way possible) to know that there's a Greek community here + μην διστάσετε να προτείνετε κανέναν δίσκο - αφού άκουσα την ετήσια δόση μου από Αργυρό, θα ήθελα να καθαρίσουν λίγο τα αυτιά μου

Meanwhile, the Poles don't give a sign of life lol

Good review. I feel zero incentive to listen to the record, but I can see myself checking out the original versions of these songs to get more into the Greek culture.

"the idea crumbles into pieces when you take into account Sput's lack of foreign character support"

This compelled me to edit Polish special characters into a review to check if Sput would register them. I was certain I'd see a bunch of �s, but somehow, everything worked as intended. I don't know why.

Album Rating: 2.5

Good review. I feel zero incentive to listen to the record, but I can see myself checking out the original versions of these songs to get more into the Greek culture.

Thank you @arthropod + do feel free to check out the original compositions; they don't come close to the genres you gravitate towards, but it's cool that you want to get into this culture.



Meanwhile, the Poles don't give a sign of life lol

uhm can we please have *every* single European user of Sput jump in this random Argiros thread lol

and also re. Polish special characters: I think it might be because Polish still uses Latin characters, as opposed to Greek; so even with the accent marks that you guys have, it's acceptable.

-- Meanwhile, the Poles don't give a sign of life lol

Find an album to review that a lot of Poles may care for, even tangentially, and the results may surprise you.


-- Greek accent marks are permitted in threads (!), but not in reviews

That's simply a matter of the right font at the right place, don't know if it's doable by the site owner though, because there are no Greek mods to moderate content here atm.

Να κανουμε τοτε ενα petition για σενα Γιανναρε!

A local news outlet recently joked that the share of panigiria on the Hellenic GDP should be measured and accounted for.

No wonder.


-- This compelled me to edit Polish special characters […] everything worked as intended. I don't know why.

As far as I know, Sputnik can host a multitude of languages




-- Να κανουμε τοτε ενα petition για σενα Γιανναρε!

No time to do that unfortunately, real life has me chained and thrown in a dungeon doing chores 24/7

we really got an Argiros review in Sputnik before GTA 6

"A local news outlet recently joked that the share of panigiria on the Hellenic GDP should be measured and accounted for"

hahahaha

αφου σταθερα πλεον οδηγουμαστε σε σημειο που θα μας χρεωνουν και τον αερα που αναπνεουμε...

@in flames

Can't count how many times I've seen posts such as this on the net 😅

-- Whether his pivot is inauthentic or not and whether he's leeching off of those folk artists whose careers actively depend on those festivals or not is definitely subjective

It's not subjective when the prospective audience is moving towards those festivals.

Why (Hellenic) Gen Z is going to panigiria en masse (in Greek)

https://www.protagon.gr/apopseis/i-nea-eksodos-tis-gen-z-einai-to-panigyri-44343423662

Album Rating: 2.5

@Voivod: "It's not subjective when the prospective audience is moving towards those festivals."

A: Sure, he is undeniably grabbing from that culture; positioning himself as an artist of that ilk is definitely strategic - not only because it could win him a new audience, but also to keep up with what his current one seems to gravitate towards. As you pointed out, the release date of this album is rather suspicious, but the new aesthetic signifiers he's applying to himself and his music are also adding insult to injury. So when it comes to how he presents himself and his album, the inauthenticity of it is definitely there. But

B: I feel like he's going for that genre less out of a need to leech off of it and more because he has nowhere else to go, if that makes sense? His major demographic (teens to young adults) is an audience with mostly clear genre preferences: either the drab trap/pop-rap (and anything of that kind) that has been regurgitated and consumed back again for years up to this point and refuses to escape the bowels of the Spotify charts or the pleasant, listless laiko-pop that is very fun in the moment and overexposed on the radio but won't possibly be remembered as good once a few years pass by. Argiros has positioned himself, for the most part, as a serious laiko-pop artist, but that genre is overcrowded, with zero gas left in its tank and staying with it isn't quite sustainable. And even though he LOVES to surround himself with artists of the former genre (his latest collaboration with a rapper is currently getting more streams than anything off of KABANES) and indulge in it (the title-track even has a second version that just has trap snares and hi-hats on it, for fuck's sake), he would never make it as a solo singer with that kind of material. I think he just had to map out a different direction for himself if he wanted to win a few more years in his career and this genre seems like the most logical step for him for many reasons, including "the prospective audience is moving towards those festivals".

(1/2)

Album Rating: 2.5

C: The article points this phenomenon out but fails (obviously) to give it a substantial explanation - for example, I don't buy the explanation that those young people seek out music scenes that are out of their ordinary tastes. If so, then why not have that audience move towards rock/metal festivals? For my money, nostalgia plays the biggest factor here; younger people seek an era that they never got to experience and older people seek an era that has defined their youth and the music and culture in those festivals thrives on nostalgia and therefore attracts those demographics. Argiros leans on that nostalgia, but so half-heartedly that I can't quite call it a volte-face into "traditional Greek music". Au contraire, if he was leeching off of the culture and wanted to grab a piece of that pie, he would be singing in those festivals along with veterans of the scene and belting out timeless classics and creating new, more traditional renditions of his biggest hits - but he doesn't do that. He just dropped 17 covers and a new single that has the surface-level signifiers of a Greek island tune (nisiotiko), but no follow-up there, no attendance in any festivity - he will just keep selling out venues abroad (another Royal Albert Hall concert?) and singing his biggest radio-hits. As I said before, he's still churning out collaborations with artists who are firmly in the trap/pop-rap scene and that approach to musical identity (=doing everything all at once) is so sporadic and non-specific that I do call inauthentic, but for different reasons than yours. I don't believe he outright jacks anything from the Greek folk scene; I just believe he doesn't know what he wants and just drops what will be received well: the "traditional" stuff will get praise for being Greek enough, the "modern trap/hip-hop" stuff will get streams for being cool enough. Both suffer, as a result.

(2/2)

Album Rating: 2.5

(Never had a comment be so long that I had to split in two, sorry for the long block of text)

Imho, the major controversy of the article is this:

Gen Z is hungry for genuine social interaction with other people in a panigiri, and at the same time its main aim is to produce original content for the social media, therefore communicating with friends and random audiences therein.

The reason is that having a camera and film stuff automatically makes one an observer and not a participant of the social event being filmed. The most blatant example in this respect, is people filming concerts with their phones and obstructing the view of concert participants in their rear.

As for the how and why of releases such as this one, the ulterior goal is to maximise live concert dates around the country and abroad, irrespective of the repertoire sung, because that's where the money is at.