Sisyphus

The first solo release from accomplished musician Sofia Labropoulou takes its inspiration from a geographically and culturally diverse range of sources ranging from Arabic poems and Turkish folk tunes, through French absurdist philosophy, right up to a couple of punk classics from the Sex Pistols. In this collection of seven compositions she combines Greek, Ottoman and Western medieval styles using instruments including the kanun, santur and kemençe, a stringed instrument that has long been a staple of Ottoman classical music. The result is distinctively unusual and, at times, eerily bewitching (as in ‘The Demolisher’), drawing on concepts from The Myth of Sisyphus by Albert Camus. Contrastingly, Johnny Rotten and Sid Vicious provide the inspiration to ‘In the Beginning’, which takes raucous punk anthems ‘Anarchy in the UK’ and ‘God Save the Queen’ and reworks them into a charming nursery rhyme. Don't be misled by the bizarrely incongruous cover image showing what appears to be a gas-masked raver straight out of an illegal 1990s warehouse party. There's a calming and restorative, almost otherworldly, beauty to this album in which the eclecticism of the source material adds to the auditory and cerebral appeal.