Thanks again to Zisimos for the interview!! Just a few weeks ago we were talking about his band One Night Suzan that just got a retrospective compilation on Make Me Happy. As he has been in many great indiepop bands I asked if he’d be up to do another interview, this time about The Crooner. And he was up for it! Very very happy about this. Now I am hoping for the next one, Impossible Tymes? the Make Me Happy label? We’ll see! Now it is time to learn more about the superb The Crooner!
++ Hi again Zisimos! Thanks again for doing a second interview! How are you doing? When was the last time you picked up your guitar?
Hello Roque! Just returned home after a great trip to South Korea and Japan…plus the One Night Suzan retrospective compilation LP has just been released by Make Me Happy, so I’m really happy about it…And as a matter of fact I’ve been playing some guitar now and then, but mostly improvising on chords that I love…
++ Last time we were talking about One Night Suzan and today I want to talk about another project you were involved with, The Crooner. You were telling me that the main difference between them was that The Crooner is was mostly you coming up with the ideas and then sharing them with Makis P. How did that relationship work? And how did you two meet in the first place?
Actually, Makis and I met back in the early ‘90s, when he and some other friends formed Next Time Passions, one of the best Greek indie bands! We played in some gigs together, and discovered many common musical ideas and influences. So we formed Impossible Tymes, a psych-pop trio, together with Elias, another good friend and member of Next Time Passions…Very soon the need to release our bands’ music led Makis and me , together with graphic designer Christos L., to the creation of This Happy Feeling records. Makis also helped with the recording and production of the Crooner 7’’ EP “Sounds from the Valley of Love”…It was at this point that we realized we make a great team, so we started working on the Crooner project as a duo, Makis being the keyboard & programming whiz, bass player, sound engineer, co-writer and co-producer… the rest is history, as they say…
++ Then The Crooner was also a more “open-minded” electronic version of pop as you said. I was wondering what different influences were part of the band, what made you go in that direction?
One reason was that we started expanding our musical horizons, listening to stuff like jazz, bossa, lounge, ambient, drum’n’bass, house, and more…Also, we needed a rhythm section, so we started relying on programming and computers…and finally, we were excited by the “new” technology of sampling, which allowed us to incorporate some samples from obscure but favourite tracks into our own songs, either as our basic beat, or in order to create a warmer and more exciting sound…
++ There were also female vocals on the songs, by Eirini and Natasha. How did they end up being an important part of The Crooner? Had they been in other bands?
Some of the main influences on our sound were 60s/70s lounge music, Italian soundtracks and bossanova…In all these kinds of music, we can hear amazing female backing vocals and “pa pa pa” melodies…So, naturally, we wanted to achieve a similar effect in our own songs…The girls were very good friends with beautiful voices! Eirini was my girlfriend then, and we’ve been together ever since ! Natasha actually formed Berlin Brides some years later, a really good and popular electro band!
++ Oh, and I was wondering about the name Eirini used to use Miss Honeybeetle, do you know the story behind that?
Well, she was, and still is, a very sweet girl (honey) and a fan of psychedelic pop (beatles) , so she came up with this clever pseudonym…
++ So what sparked The Crooner to start? When was it? Was it originally some sort of bedroom project, or was it always going to be a collaboration with Makis P.?
Originally it was a bedroom project, just me -and my guitar- playing more acoustic and jazzy stuff (in the tradition of Everything but the Girl, or Felt) that I couldn’t play with One Night Suzan. This was in 1992, I think…
++ What’s the story behind the name The Crooner?
‘’Crooner” is a term used for some 50s-60s singers (like Frank Sinatra, for example) who would sing ballads and love songs. I used it as a form of tribute, as a way to explain that my music was NOT rock music, but also as a form of irony…plus I liked the sound of it!
++ For The Crooner, where did you usually practice?
Makis had created a home studio in the basement of his home. It was the legendary Sunnyside Studio, where all the Next Time Passions and Impossible Tymes songs had been recorded! This also became the Crooner rehearsal and recording studio!
++ Your first release was a 7″ on This Happy Feeling titled “Sounds From the Valley of Love”. It came out in 1994 and included 4 songs. I was wondering if these were the first ever recorded songs by the band and where were they recorded? Was it much different to record them compared to One Night Suzan?
Apart from some solo acoustic stuff I’d recorded on cassettes, yes, these were our first “official” recordings. They were recorded in another studio where Makis used to work as a sound engineer, and not Sunnyside. The difference was that we recorded every instrument separately, while in most of the Suzan recordings the whole band played together, and then added some extra elements.
++ And is that you on the sleeve photo?
Yes.
++ It would take 4 years for your next release, the “Heaven Airlines” album. Why did it take so long? And do you think there was an evolution of the band’s sound between the 7″ and the album?
As you know, during this period Makis and I were also rehearsing, performing and recording with One Night Suzan, Next Time Passions and Impossible Tymes. We were also running our record label, plus we were both working in other jobs, to make a living. So, the Heaven Airlines project took off in 1995, when our other bands had started to become inactive. Of course there was an evolution : the sound became much more electronic, as everything was now recorded on Cubase and Logic. !!
++ This album was released by Shelflife Records in the US. How did this happen? How was your relationship with the label?
This Happy Feeling and Shelflife had been in contact, because Shelflife were preparing their first release ( the ‘WHIRL-WHEELS” international pop compilation) and they were interested in our bands. So we sent Ed two songs by ONS and NTP, and we decided to record a new one for the Crooner, ‘Alberto Caeiro’. So we sent it to Shelflife, they loved it, and we started recording more songs for them…We were originally planning a single, but we ended up with 7 songs, so…we decided to release all of them as a mini-album.
++ Something interesting about the album was that it was licensed in Japan and the Philippines. Were you aware at the time of the interest of pop fans from there in your music? Or was this a surprise? Did you ever go to these countries?
We knew that we had fans in those countries, because we used to receive some fan letters from Japan and the Philippines, but we didn’t know they were so many that there could be an official release in those countries ! it’s also interesting that they wanted their releases to be unique, so each of these releases features some extra songs, which weren’t featured in the Shelflife mini album!! I was lucky enough to visit Japan a few weeks ago, and I was amazed !!
++ Afterwards you would release a second album, this time around on the Greek label “Pop Art Records”. Was there any reason to go local for this release? And how did you know Pop Art?
Pop Art Records belonged to a really good friend, Nektarios Pappas. We had helped him with his label’s debut compilation cd “Try a little sunshine” by giving tracks, bringing him into contact with some bands, and so on…When we had enough material for a second album, we were interested in becoming more popular in Greece, and Pop Art was in the same wavelength as we were…so it seemed like the natural thing to do.
++ You released two albums and just one single, I was wondering if you think the music of The Crooner was better suited for albums or it was just how things happened?
No, it just happened like that. I guess it was a period when everyone was into cds, but we also liked the idea of creating a musical environment for the listeners…Still, I think that many of our album songs, and also a lot of songs which were released on cd compilations, could have been singles…
++ You also appeared on so many compilations in the 90s and all the way to 2005 or so. I will ask you out of curiosity if there is one of these compilations that you really love, that you like all the bands and songs that appeared alongside your music?
Obviously, it’s difficult to choose…But surely we were very pleased when Bungalow Records chose one of our favourite songs, “Over the Rainbow”, for their Atomium 3003 compilation…
++ I have many favourite songs by The Crooner but I’ll pick one, “Alberto Caeiro”, I was wondering if you could tell me the story behind this song? Is it about Fernando Pessoa?
You are right, it’s a song about the alter-ego of my favourite poet, Fernando Pessoa. It’s a celebration of life, seen from Alberto Caeiro’s point of view…BTW, this was the first song The Crooner recorded on computer software, and there’s a different female singer -Paulina- who used to sing for another greek electro pop band, our good friends Sound Devise.
++ Speaking of Pessoa, what are some of your favourite writers? Have they inspired your lyrics in any way?
Some of my lyrics, especially during the One Night Suzan period, were influenced by British romantic poets we used to study at university, like William Wordsworth, for example. But in general I prefer novelists, like Thomas Pynchon, David Wallace Foster, Philip Roth, J.G. Ballard, Martin Amis and many more..
++ If you were to choose your favourite The Crooner song, which one would that be and why?
Sorry, I can’t choose only one…maybe a top-10 would be easier…
++ What about gigs? Did you play many as The Crooner?
We didn’s play many gigs, as we were mostly a “studio” group, but we played some great gigs in Athens, Madrid and Mallorca, where we took part in an amazing music festival!
++ When and why did The Crooner stop making music? Were you involved in any other bands afterwards?
After and during the Crooner period Makis and I recorded some stuff for Siesta records under another name, and also recorded more electronic stuff as Hyplar (we released an album, a 12’’ single for the French label Aquatic, and appeared in many electronic & lounge compilations…). I guess at some point we were beginning to get tired with the pop sound and wanted to explore other music directions…And as I told you, Natasha formed Berlin Brides…
++ Has there ever been a reunion? Or maybe plans to reissue all or some of The Crooner songs?
You’ll have to wait and see !!
++ Did you get much attention from the radio? What about TV?
Some radio airplay from specific radio stations, in Greece and Spain, and a couple of TV channels played our video clip for “Concorde baby”, but that’s all…
++ What about the press? Did they give you any attention?
There was no free press in Greece at the time, so there were few articles or reviews about us on ‘mainstream” music press. But there were pop fanzines that liked and supported us.
++ Anything else you’d like to add?
Pop is a way of life!
Thank you !
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