Latest news with #Greek-language
Japan Forward
5 days ago
- Entertainment
- Japan Forward
Haru Nemuri Releases New Album 'ekkolaptómenos' — Where Political Rage Meets Pop
Underground Japanese musician Haru Nemuri has become popular in spite of the music industry. With a strong DIY spirit and highly literate lyrics that carry heavy political statements in a country where most music is consciously apolitical, Haru Nemuri (real name Haruna Kimishima) has built a following at home and around the world. A potent blend of punk, Goth, industrial, dark-pop, and riot grrrl, Haru Nemuri's music is driven by rage, which is uncommon in Japan, resulting in a visceral and exciting sound with surprisingly deep production. Seeing Kimishima's small frame bent over with fury as she lets out a blood-curdling scream, her live shows are a mesmerizing spectacle. And yet her anger and frustration have led to love and success, with multiple overseas tours and collabs with Western artists like Jaguar Jonze, Pussy Riot, and Frost Children. Now, Kimishima is back with a brand-new self-produced album, "ekkolaptómenos," released on August 1 on her own label of the same name. The Greek-language title refers to birth, and the songs on the album are hypnotically amniotic, expansively multiversal, subatomic, confrontational, and very angry. "I wanted to try completely self-producing the album myself because I felt my skills had grown in the past few years since my last album [2022's 'Shunka Ryougen']," says Kimishima. "So I decided to go the DIY route. The result is a sound that is totally me." While Kimishima is known for rap and spoken-word sections in her songs, on "ekkolaptómenos" she sings more. The album draws on her electronic music base, with layered production that lets her voice shine through. The result is an album that is dense, rich, and just a little sweet, like a poisoned chocolate fudge cake. Cover artwork for the album "ekkolaptómenos," whose title is a Greek coined word that "signifies both the act of hatching and being hatched simultaneously." "I wanted to have a proper go at singing," she says. "I think it's a much more pop sound — much poppier than I had intended at the start. But when I played it to people, they said it's not pop at all!" The songs' lyrics draw on themes familiar to the doom-scrolling generation: a nihilistic treatise on the difficulties of fitting into society and the modern prison of digital surveillance — a swirling vortex of religion, hardship, and death. And yet, these caustic, carcinogenic sentiments leave a strangely life-affirming and hopeful impression, aided by the catharsis of her music. "Living in society as a human being, it's very difficult to simply exist," explains Kimishima. "The behavior expected of you is extreme. If you were to suddenly start dancing in the middle of Ginza Crossing, people would think you're strange — but shouldn't you be allowed to do that if you want to? I'd like to destroy the frameworks of society, government, and religion, and simply exist in a state of being myself. "If you know the rules, you have the option of breaking them. You really can dance in the middle of Ginza Crossing." This may seem like an overtly anarchistic message. But do we really have to accept the constraints of modern life? Having grown up in Japan, Kimishima points out how first-world society is designed to promote an industrious lifestyle where work is everything. We are workers, consumers, and not free human beings. That's not a new observation, of course, but Kimishima is representative of a generation that feels suffocated by it. "Our cities are designed to promote the rules of society," she says. "There are very few spaces where people can just sit and do nothing. Cities are designed so that you leave your home, go to work, and then go home again. It makes people forget that they have the option of choosing to skip work that day, and they become trapped. "I want to remind people that they always have the option to suddenly take a day off work and go to the beach! This is something that music can do." Kimishima illustrates her feelings of frustration in the song "supernova," inspired by the writings of Galileo Galilei. His groundbreaking scientific discoveries were construed by the Catholic authorities of the 17th century as heresy, only finding true understanding decades or centuries later. Kimishima craves the same understanding, even if it comes too late. "Yes, I'm able to turn my emotional unbalance into music," she says. "But I'd rather be unable to make music if it meant I could live life in comfort instead! When a star explodes, viewed from afar it looks bright and beautiful, but it's still an explosion, and from the perspective of the star it's a destructive event. And that's how I feel." "Supernova" is not the only clash with Catholicism on the album. Though not a religious person, Kimishima attended a Protestant middle school and high school in Japan, where daily church services were part of the syllabus, leaving her with a strong sense of faith and an interest in the heavy hand of religious dogma. Take the new song "indulgentia," a bold track built around a sample of a hypnotic South Indian chant, with lyrics that reflect upon medieval viewpoints on sin that remain part of modern society. In the Middle Ages, the Catholic church sold "indulgences", which essentially meant paying for the absolution of sin and release from purgatory after death. This practice is now seen as a corrupt means of exploitation, but the concept of sin is still very much a part of life. "Sin, criminality, and law are a major part of society, but are the things we consider illegal actually always bad?" questions Kimishima. "The line can be arbitrary. Like, in some countries, abortion is illegal — but why? This completely violates the rights of a pregnant person. It may be illegal, but is it really bad? The punishment doesn't always seem to match the crime, and I feel we need to reckon with that. "People may be arrested for having a dependency on drugs, but couldn't we care for them instead? Sin is an unavoidable element of life for some people, so why should we shun them? I want those people to feel understood." This lack of humanity in everyday life is what drives Haru Nemuri's music. They are eternal problems, yes, but that is also what makes them timely — and why they resonate with so many fans around the world. I first saw Haru Nemuri in 2018 at Moshi Moshi Nippon, a festival in Tokyo that aimed to showcase artists with global appeal. Immediately after that, she played her first overseas show in Taiwan. Since then, she has gone on to frequently tour in North America, Europe, Asia, and beyond, finding sympathetic music lovers who share her worldview wherever she goes. "Japanese audiences don't necessarily respond when I talk about being an anarchist or a feminist, but when I say that overseas, the audiences erupt in cheers! In Japan, the common belief is that it's safer not to talk about politics. But during the recent mayoral election in New York, some of my favourite New York-based musicians were posting every day on Instagram telling people who to vote for." Her dense lyrics are filled with meaning, but they are written mostly in Japanese. How do audiences get beyond the language barrier to understand their meaning? "Sometimes fans tell me they are learning Japanese just so they can understand my lyrics — but my lyrics are not really great material for beginners!" she laughs, as her manager points out that even native Japanese speakers may struggle to penetrate them. "Even if people can't understand the lyrics in detail, I think they can understand the emotion," says Kimishima. "When I play overseas, I try to explain in English the message I want people to take away between songs. I want to make sure everyone is on the same page before I start screaming. But music is the common language." Despite so many of her songs carrying dark and nihilistic messages, on stage, Kimishima is almost quite cheerful and seems grateful to her audience, acknowledging how music has allowed her to find her tribe. "I feel alive on stage," she says. "I usually detest my body — I wish I had endless stamina and didn't get tired so easily. I'm small, and people look down on me, which I hate. I get exhausted from overthinking, and I wish I was invincible. "But when I'm on stage, I can forget all that. I'm filled with adrenaline, and I don't think about feeling tired or in pain, and I can do all the things I want to do. That's when I feel invincible." Still, that feeling of helplessness is part of what defines Kimishima and her music as Haru Nemuri. I ask her what cuts through the pain to give her hope, and she pauses for a long beat. "Hope... To be honest, it's tough," she eventually replies. "With the recent rise of populism and nationalism [around the world], things have gotten pretty bad ... I had a good education, and it would never occur to me to do something deliberately to hurt another person. "I wish everyone could be happy. But looking at reality today, it seems like I'm in the minority. The majority of people are afraid of others who look different from their group. I don't know why. Every day it seems strange to me. Why can't people get along with their neighbors? "When I meet like-minded people who want to fight and protest these things, that's what gives me hope. We have to create an environment where we can be happy. For the right to simply exist, we must be prepared to fight." Haru Nemuri's album "ekkolaptómenos" is out on August 1. She will perform at the Shindaita Fever in Tokyo on August 8, followed by a nine-date North American tour from September 12. Her Japan tour resumes on October 7 through the end of November. For further information, visit her website. Interview by Daniel Robson Read Daniel's artist interviews and his series Gamer's World on JAPAN Forward, and find him on X (formerly Twitter) .
New York Times
26-06-2025
- New York Times
Housekeeper Arrested Over Wildfire That Scorched Greek Island
A 35-year-old housekeeper was arrested in Greece on Tuesday in connection with devastating wildfires that tore across the island of Chios this week, officials said. 'She'd been smoking,' Vassilis Vathrakoyiannis, the spokesman of the Hellenic Fire Service said of the housekeeper, who he said was a Georgian woman. Five blazes, the first of which broke out on Sunday, collectively consumed more than 11,000 acres of the island. A news release from the fire service said a foreign woman had been arrested on the north of the island, near where the last of the fires sprang up on Monday. The blazes razed huge swaths of the island's forestland, forcing the evacuation of more than a dozen villages. Firefighters from across the country were rushed to the island on planes and ferries to battle the blaze; more than 400 were eventually deployed. As Greece approaches its summer wildfire season, the Chios fire was a reminder of a grim reality for the nation, where furious wildfires have become a regular part of life, especially as climate change has made the country hotter and drier. Chios is one of the largest islands in the Aegean Sea, known for resin-producing mastic trees which hardly grow anywhere else in the world. Used for things like pharmaceuticals, beauty products and liquor, the trees are a critical driver for the local economy, and a draw for tourists. While not as popular as some other Greek islands, Chios sees an influx of visitors during the summer months, also the height of wildfire season. The trees have been periodically threatened by wildfires on the island, including in 2012, when a wildfire destroyed more than half of the island's mastic tree population, causing a global shortage of the valuable resin. The fires this week damaged some of the island's trees, according to local media, but did not burn the southern part of the island, where the majority of the mastic trees grow. Three of the blazes started on Sunday; another two began on Monday amid sweltering, windy conditions. Firefighters had contained most of the fires by Thursday, as winds calmed. Soon after the fires began spreading on Sunday, fire officials deployed investigators from the fire service's Directorate for Combating Arson Crimes. The scope of the fires, and their presence in multiple, unconnected areas of the island, suggested to officials that they did not begin naturally. 'We will not hide behind words: When fires break out simultaneously in such scattered locations, we must speak of suspicious activity,' said Giannis Kefalogiannis, the country's Minister for Climate Crisis and Civil Protection, in a Greek-language statement on Monday. Niki Kitsantonis and Matina Stevis-Gridneff contributed reporting.
The Guardian
01-03-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
The Summer With Carmen review – crisply observed Greek film-making comedy
Well this is a delight. A playfully meta Greek-language film about film-making, set largely on a gay nudist beach near Athens, The Summer With Carmen is so breezily sun-kissed and adorable that you could prescribe it as a cure for seasonal affective disorder. Or you could, were it not for all the full-frontal male nudity and cottaging. As the waves lazily lap against the buttocks of hopeful strangers checking each other out, best friends Demosthenes (Yorgos Tsiantoulas) and Nikitas (Andreas Labropoulos) have other things on their minds. Nikitas, a former actor turned aspiring writer-director has been approached by a producer looking for a new project. The criteria – fun, sexy, Greek, queer, low budget – seems like a perfect fit. Nikitas just needs to come up with an idea. Demosthenes suggests the events of a past summer – with a break-up; a hook-up or 10; and a small, worried-looking stray dog named Carmen. And through a series of deft flashbacks and some peppy, irreverent on-screen inter-titles, the tale unfolds and Nikitas's screenplay takes shape. The story itself is fairly insubstantial – some bickering, plenty of family drama and just a hint of personal growth for self-absorbed beefcake Demosthenes. But the lively telling of it is where the considerable charm of the film lies. Director Zacharias Mavroeidis strikes a deft balance, between gently mocking his two central characters and celebrating their enduring bond; between sentiment and saltiness; between adhering to the rules of screenwriting and skewering them. But for something as frothy and seemingly frivolous as it is, the film also delivers crisply observed characters and fully lived-in relationships: Demosthenes's scenes with his impossible-to-please, drama queen of a mother are so stingingly perceptive, they make your eyes smart. In UK and Irish cinemas
