Ils s’appellent Lefteris, Vasilis, Dimitris x2 et Kostas x2, ils s’appellent aussi No Clear Mind, leur premier album s’intitulait Dream is Destiny. Un temps, ils ont congédié leur groupe comme des artisans de ses ambiances sentimentalo-festives. Ensuite, ils se sont enfermé et ont fait de mélancoliques et langoureuses mélodies issues de films comme on revient à ses premiers amours avec plaisir et nostalgie. Ils se sont retrouvés, mais ils se sont égaré aussi. Ils ont multiplié les apparences tout en restant eux-mêmes. Décision hasardeuse et exposition risquée, c’est un pari réussi.
Ils reviennent. Ils s’appellent toujours No Clear Mind, leur deuxième album s’intitule Mets. On a voulu savoir ce qui s’était passé depuis. On a voulu connaître la situation de cette Grèce qui n’en finit plus de se déchirer. On a beaucoup causé. De politique, de tournée, d’avenir, de voyages, de ces morceaux grecs qui les ont influencés. De musique tout compte fait. Voilà ce qui l’en est ressorti.
Puck: Can you describe the band in three words ?
Lefteris: No Clear Mind
Puck: How do you consider the music scene in Greece ?
Lefteris: During the past ten to fifteen years there have been many bands active in Greece that represented different music genres but I could hardly say that there is a music scene which as a whole can be considered uniquely local. In other words, one could argue that most Greek bands mainly try to recreate music that has already been heard abroad rather than produce something more personal and in a way unique. Of course there is no such thing as »parthenogenesis » in art, but it is important to always try to include elements of your personal aesthetics and perhaps tradition in your work. Unfortunately, as Greek mainstream has been consumed by this repetitive culture of always looking outwards and not inwards, anything that isn’t part of this frame get’s easily marginalized. Nonetheless, there are local bands, aware of this situation that have managed to bring originality into their music. In my opinion some of these bands are Misuse, Gravitysays_i, Electric litany, Moa Bones,Your hand in mine, Egsun.
Vasilis: There is one local artist that really excels in everything he does and is in fact totally original in his work and that is no other than Giannis Aggelakas. He’s probably the only one who manipulates Greek language in such a way, really beautiful lyrics and his collaborations have been very successful blending Greek folk tradition with the sound you’d expect from a contemporary artist. There’s also a lot of experimental stuff going on, with so many projects happening you can’t really keep track. Other interesting projects are Baby Guru, Acid Baby Jesus and King Elephant. In general there are a lot of nice things happening but mostly in the underground, Greek mainstream is really awful.
Puck: Is it not difficult to exist as a band/or making music nowadays?
Lefteris: Like everything else, if you’re committed to something you love, you make it work somehow. Perhaps it is easier right now in Greece as no one has a lot of work to do, so we devote ourselves to music. Making a living out of music is appealing, utopia nonetheless.
Puck: Can I have your point of view concerning the situation of your country.
Vasilis: You can’t really understand to what extent we have been stripped of our liberties if you don’t try to execute your civil rights. ’Politicians’ who haven’t even been elected and our P.M. ,who is a banker by the way, make decisions showing a complete lack of ethos and self respect. I can’t really speak for everyone but it seems all the decisions taken these years have wrapped us into this negative feedback loop making matters worse in every circle. Regardless of who is to blame for this situation we’ve come to (which is a very long story), we have really forgotten how it feels to live in democratic terms. Traditionnal media challenge our intelligence day after day, distorting reality in such a unethical way while the use of violence, both physical and economical apart from asymmetrical is reminiscent of older times. I would dare say we’re on the verge of totalitarianism, as people and government have clearly lost all connection. At the end of day, depriving a 80 year old woman of her pension and electricity for the sake of banking institutions is bound to cause chaos someday, if not today then tomorrow.
Puck: In which way does the government help you out to make your music possible ?
Vasilis: That’s funny. I think Bankers are not music lovers. The only way i can think the government has ever helped anyone here, is by constantly putting us in such a situation where we need to break out. They urge us into creating a parallel universe in which to place our lives and surround it with some meaning and potential, rather than what we experience everyday in the real world. Music can offer this to people and in a sense this is exactly what defines our work and our incentive
Puck:Â Are you signed with a label?
Lefteris: No, at least not yet but we’re thinking of giving it a try, yet we also like the prospect of using more direct platforms like Bandcamp. We released our first album for free. Some of our tracks have been released in various music collections.
Puck: We didn’t hear about you for a long time, why did you decide to start the band again ?
Lefteris: No Clear Mind never stopped being musically active. First of all, as a band we got involved with various music styles of expression the past eight years. We started off as a three persons band playing experimental electronic music combined with physical instruments. Quickly, other musicians with similar musical expression, joined the group and together we wrote some songs which can be found in our first LP Dream is Destiny rough takes. They also accompanied us in some of our gigs during this time. Later on, due to different reasons such as studying and working away from Athens some members had to leave the band. Vasilis and I continued writing songs and doing live improvisations on the musical concept we’ve been representing all these years. Most recently we participated in a music documentary called Vounorila produced by Orila records, depicting a DIY music festival with almost no audience taking place in an abandoned late 70s children’s camp in the middle of a forest in the island of Evia. At the same time me and Vasilis participated in a psychedelic folk band called Mother Tree. As you can see, we’ve been through quite a journey. Currently we are very happy rehearsing and working on some of our previous work with three new members. At the same time we’ve dedicated ourselves to the preparation, release and live presentation of our new album Mets.
Puck: Does internet help you to make you ‘famous’ ?
Vasilis: Internet displays such a momentum these past years it challenges us to shift our way of thinking. It is not so much what an individual transmits onto the web, it is what happens after that. People always want to communicate and speak their mind and therefore each one has become a « curator » of their own instead of just a receiver. We did not realize this until we found out that people we’ve never met, took initiative and made videos for our music, posted our work on their blogs and networks etc. It was a big surprise for us when we saw that two of our songs Dream is Destiny and Static have reached around 300.000 and 500.000 views as we speak. This process is so expansive, when people feel compelled to share with others a piece of work they enjoyed that at the end of the day your work reaches places you’ve never dreamt. Communicating like this totally overrides the old ways of thinking, and this naturally applies to much more than music. The funny side of this was that we were in a way absent from this « conversation », we didn’t know this was happening until we found out completely by chance. This surely took us by surprise, but the feedback we received later on was both encouraging and emotional and we suddenly had to redefine our approach towards our work. It turned out that a lot more people than we anticipated were into our music, which only made us wanna get involved more and more. Internet is invaluable as long as you embrace its openness, all this perhaps wouldn’t happen if we didn’t share our album freely.
Puck: What kind of influences do you have ?
Lefteris: The main characteristic of No Clear Mind is our constant need to create melodies that can express our feelings and thoughts better than words ever will. This musical expression was prompted by the major influence some musicians had on us. Some of these are Serge Gainsbourg, Radiohead, Pink Floyd, Sebastian Tellier, the Greek composer Manos Hadjidakis, Sonic Youth, Sigur Ros, Slowdive, Deus, The Velvet Underground, Greek folk music and sounds from the 60′s and the 70′s.
Puck: Can you give me a word about the release of your album Mets?
Vasilis: Well, after a very long time writing and producing the album, we finally approached the music form we envisioned from the start. I can’t really say what genre this album turned out to be, but i can tell you it is a vividly cinematic piece of work. The main theme in our compositions is the purity and melancholia of melodic lines like the ones of the 70′s era, think Manos Hadjidakis or circa 70′s soundtrack music. We wanted to approach the emotional intimacy of these early pieces of work and at the same time create something original and contemporary. There is  an underlying ambience and openness, subtle use of soundscapes and noise elements, a much more spacious sound of the rhythmic elements and pronounced melodic basslines. We mean to proceed with a digital release within March and then see into releasing it to vinyl or other formats. We’ve also been thinking of making a film based on the music of the album by collaborating with local artists.
Puck: Which artists are you into for the moment ?
No Clera Mind: Timber Timbre, Matt Elliott, Danger Mouse, Radiohead, Caribou, Grizzly Bear, The Brian Jonestown Massacre, Electric Litany, The Gentleman Loser’s and others…
Puck: What are your plans for 2012Â ?
No Clear Mind: Releasing our album, working hard on our live performances and traveling a bit. We want to visit different places and perform our music, we’re very excited to be invited to Hong Kong during the summer.
Thanks guys  and good luck!
No Clear Mind sortira son album Mets en mars prochain
Pingback: SIX D.O.G.S. | 6-8 Avramiotou st., Athens, Greece