Tuesday, February 3, 2009

Benefit/solidarity live for the prisoners of the December riots In Greece.

After the December riots and in a critical time for the greek anarchist/anti-authoritarian movement,we decided to put up a diy punk concert to help financialy the prisoners at the old EMI record factory in Athens.The place is abandoned for years and it was a great opportunity to set up a show there because it served another cause,our despise for the music industry!
At the morning of the 31st of January we got in the building and started to clean up the floor and set up a stage.It should be noted that at the same day there was a fascist meeting in the center of Athens called by an extreme right wing organization,Xrisi Avgi (Golden Dawn),also at the morning there was also a demonstration called by anarchists so not a lot of people could be with us from the start at the EMI factory for helping and "guarding" the place.Most people were at the demonstration or at an anti-fascist meeting.However everything turned out ok,no cops or fascists showed up to the concert.
We were expecting about 300 people to show up and we were worried if the money collected from the show were enough! The speakers and p.a we rented costed 500 euros and the alcohol costed 250 euros,so we had spend a lot of money already! We were suprised when we figured out that after the show we had more than 1100 euros and about 400 people attended! Everything turned out really great!
About the show now,the bands that played were Asfyxia,Ysteria and Kalazaar.I play in Kalazaar so I'm not the one to say if the people liked our music or what we had to say (although I saw a lot of people enjoying our set!),by the way we play old-school anarcho-punk with some d-beat influences! Ysteria,a band from Alexandroupoli (north greece,close to the border with Turkey) played a really great set,I haven't seen them live for some years and was suprised to find out they're even better on stage than on the cd! They play old-school punk rock with fast songs and sing-alongs.The last band,Asfyxia,got the crowd going with their heavy old-school crust punk,they were out of tune sometimes because they hadn't a rehearsal for a long time but they were great nevertheless.
After the show a party started with some punk and metal music,at that time everyone had a smile on their faces and was having a good time.
All the money collected were placed in a bank account for the prisoners.
It was the first live we set as Athens Anarchopunk collective and I hope more will follow!

Solidarity,equality,anarchy and punk rock for the destruction of this rotten world (and its music industry!)
Athens Anarchopunk collective.

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