Judith Gennett wrote this review.
Mix Värttinä, Ofra Haza, and Manu Chao in a bucket and set it on an Athens street and what do you get? Kristi Stassinopoulou’s Echotropia. Released in Europe in 1999, it has gotten almost unanimously good reviews that reference psychedelia, trance, and Jefferson Airplane. Echotropia is a mix of traditional Greek rembetika-inspired original compositions, abundant “ethnopop”production, and Stassinopoulou’s straightforward and earthy cabaret voice. She and her several co-producers use the mix of gimmicks and ethnicity in much the same way as Värttinä, so that they blend and the whole becomes more powerful than the parts — at least for some listeners!
My favorites here, defined mostly by good melodies and effective production, include the only Greek traditional song, “Trigona” and the original “Aeolos.” “Trigona” is from Epirus and is a slow, sexy scorcher with soaring violin and a heavy bluesy beat, including jangly belly-dance percussion. Maybe this could be called psycho-trance! “Aeolos” is a quick, strident song which could be placed as an intro track in a movie about olives and sheep. Balkanophiles will enjoy the Pirin-like “whees” on “Aeolos,” as well as the psych-folk dance music on “Sol Invictus.” Various tracks have echo effects, whispers, zournas, and electric guitar tricks, all in a solidly Aegean framework … and you can definitely envision drifting 
rembetik hash pipe fumes! Traditionalists and dancers will get a kick out of Echotropia, but the album will prove most durable for world music fans.
Los Angeles’ Ziroq is named after the Sirocco wind, which arises in the Sahara and blows northward to Spain and beyond. From its looks, Ziroq would seem more likely to be playing hip-hop than flamenco; in reality it is a Flamenco-North African-pop-rock-fusion band. Some find down-to-the-roots flamenco a little rough, but Ziroq’s flamenco is smoother, though just as fiery, as well as being fused to more familiar popular genres. Most of the flamenco aura is generated by Marcus Nand, a young man of Fijian-English descent who sings with just enough of that rough harshness to be charming. He also plays really passionate and energetic acoustic guitar. I once referred to Oregon blues musician David Jacobs-Strain as playing like a locomotive; Nand is quite a match! His most stunning and most rootsy track is “Prisionero,” sung in Spanish and with a jazz-rock fusion arrangement that is supportive rather than being intrusive. The first track “Tierra del Sur” is also good for its flamenco licks.
Other tracks center on North Africa, including the up tempo instrumental “Patio Del Moro,” on which violinist J’anna Jacoby alternatively keeps pace with ethnos and catches the high Moorish wind of improvisation. “Ziroq,” another instrumental, fuses flamenco and Arabic sounds; resembling a mix of Santana and Radio Tarifa, it accents a cultural play between Nand and Jacoby. Other tracks have English vocals and incorporate more pop. Like Echotropia, Ziroq is more an album for world music fans than for traditionalists, but it’s sure fun to listen to!
Both these discs are fun, but not quite the same. The production that makes Echotropia so effective weakens some of its ties with reality; the album is not so much centered on Stassinopoulou’s voice as it is on the atmosphere it helps create. On the other hand, though Ziroq seems thinner and lighter, the “American” music can be a little irritating. But Nand’s guitar and the enthusiasm he has for playing can cut through everything else like a severed electrical cable, with the lighter production just making it clearer.
(Tinder, 2001)
(Triloka, 2002)
