To pick up on Vangelis is a stunning obvious move, though, so let’s look elsewhere….

Like most European countries, Greek has its own fair share of guitar music to call its own. On an international level, it’s probably the names of Rotting Christ and Septic Flesh that carry the most weight, but within Greece it’s more traditional forms of rock – progressive and alternative, mainly – that carry the flame. The temptation is to post something by Aphrodite’s Child – the band Vangelis got his big break in – but the post-punky Τρύπες (that’s Holes in English) have tended to be the ones most often mentioned by Greeks attemping to introduce foreigners to their sound, with their peak period of the late ’80s and early ’90s continuing to draw acclaim.

Yet we couldn’t talk about Greek music – or anything involving Greece, really – without taking in some of Greek’s unbelievable sense of history (one matched perhaps only by the Eypgtians). In fact, every time you talk about music full stop, you’re really referencing Greece – we derive the word from Zeus’ daughters, the Muses, and much of music’s integration into culture as a whole can be traced back to the way the ancient Greeks incorporated music into a vast range of social interactions. The localized forms of folk found then still have a following today, with musicians like Kostas Mountakis attaining a status little short of legendary, and a strong sense of tradition permeates forms like laiko and rebetiko. Stelios Kazantzidis, heard below, is just one of many singers that enjoyed a lengthy career making music in these styles, which also nod to the influence of the Turks and the north Africans the nation has enjoyed trade routes with for centuries.