Album Review: Korfian - Propaganda (2022) - Guest Post by Dmitriy Churilov

  First of all, and because it cannot be said often enough:

нет войны | ні війні | No War

How to help the people in Ukraine

______________________________________________________

Picture Credit: Korfian

Korfian - Propaganda
Release Date: March 25, 2022
Label: selfrelease
Format: Digital
Duration: 23:13
Origin: Athens, Greece
Genre: Dark Pop / Gothic Pop

Greek multidiscipline creator Korfian unleashes his Propaganda upon the war-torn world - a deconstructed post pop album full of loud statements and pompous images.

Coming from the graphic designer background, Korfian subtly senses and transmits the militarist vibe, actively utilising the visuals in the process of arranging the uneasy landscape. Painfully relatable and concise, Propaganda gathers, processes and reinvents the doomed spirits of the last decade both lyrically and musically.

Send-off serves as an intro - a monologue, a manifest that sounds like something that could have been on a Parliament album in a pre-nuclear apocalypse setting. A surprising move that is more likely to be heard from some new-age and spiritual jazz act, but it does what it should, drawing the imagery and the overall feeling to develop throughout the whole release.

The next song, March Now!, sounds like a bastard child of Suicide and Laibach, as a pro-war protest on a goth party. Dislocated, minimalistic yet pretty full self-aware homages to classic electronic music and martial industrial tropes. Eerie and lifeless that is.

Nuclear Option is pretty much self-explanatory and develops the vector from the previous numbers. Discipline! You need some discipline, know what i’m saying? Vocals become more versatile though, with a pinch of Peter Murphy’s singing glued upon sterile keyboards and straight kick drum. Like they say - If you find resistance

You cease their existence
Remember to hold on to
Your Nuclear Option.

Worth is one of the poppier numbers of the album, straight from the Pitchfork reviews for the heroes of 2010s (like The Knife, Gazelle Twin and the “weird” pop division). A really short earworm that displays Korfian’s ability to write pop hits even if he disguises them well.

Sabotage picks up right where Worth left, conquering more territories of dark electro/goth pop. Slow paced, built on a basis of anxiety inducing bass and ominous keyboard tone, this track enters the second part of Propaganda.

Which starts with Efthini - a love song worthy of Coil if they ever made it to the big stadiums. Little remains here from the sinister sound of the first half of the album except some melodic choices and active vocal layering.

This leads to Ta Efodia, a full blown radio friendly track (while still rooting in EDM). This one is heavily infused with nostalgic pop and authentic folk romance. Bearing the familiar worried seal, Ta Efodia represents the softer part of Korfian, who is not afraid to display different sides of his personality. War is macho, but it’s only half of the truth.

The ultimate closer, Divine Plan is everything that fits for a funeral rave. Say, Elton John on DMT, Yeasayer in the concentration camp or Portugal The Man but in Bosnia. It’s energetic, it’s desolate, and it leaves you with that warm feeling of an old but familiar pain that feels like home. The way you get excited like a child, Talking about food and video games - really felt that, and I believe that this would have only been said by a person, who had experienced true love.

Propaganda is “used to influence or persuade an audience to further an agenda” - Korfian is conscious enough to use his creative output as a way to do just that. Grab your trusty parachute, try to survive and get ready for love, no matter if you want it or not. When Propaganda is done with you - you’ll be asking for more.

Text by Dmitriy Churilov

Korfian Online:
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Music from this release has been added to the following dynamic playlists:
MangoRotation
The Mango 100: Dark Pop / Wave
The Mango 100: Goth / Industrial
Sound of Greece: The Mango 100

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