Hamelin. King Garcia

Hamelin is a Medieval German town on the river Weser where a famous fairytale by the brothers Grimm plays out, the rat catcher of Hamelin, or in English the Pied Piper. He lures all the rats in the town with his recorder, but then the good people of Hamelin refuse to pay. He takes his revenge by playing a different tune, luring all the children of the town, who disappear forever. This allegedly happened in the year 1284. This moment was the starting point of a 1970s Dutch children's tv series called 'Sir, can you tell us the way back to Hamelin?'. It stars the recently deceased singer Rob de Nijs who went on to have another 50 years as a successful singer, having started in the early 1960s as a twenty year old.

So much for history. Hamelin is the debut album of the Athens, Greece based band King Garcia. It is a (symphonic) metal band like no other. It has a clarinet and saxophone playing front man, who can be called a modern day Pied Piper. His playing, combined with the band, lured me alright in a way that would never have happened had the band had a singer like almost all bands of this elk. It sets King Garcia totally apart from all else I know.

Promo photo

King Garcia is Alex Orfanos – Trumpet & Clarinet, Kamil Kamieniecki – Drums, Kornilios Kiriakidis – Bass and Kostas Konstantinidis – Guitar. They have all played or still play in other bands, like Mother of Millions, POEM, Tardive Dyskinesia and Bandallusia, all bands I had never heard of before. With Hamelin that changed. First there were two singles, 'Sweat' and the title track 'Hamelin', and that made certain that I would want to listen to the album as well. 

The album is a glorious affair. King Garcia is able to make a song rock, hard in some points, but also turn the same sequence into having so much atmospherics because of Alex Orfanos' contributions. Part is how his instruments are recorded, creating all this space around his sound. The other three do what can be expected. Huge, very busy and loud drums, a big bass allowing the drummer to place his fills while keeping things tight for the band. The guitarist plays deep sounding power chords and shreds his guitar in the overdubs. Where the usually a singer place his vocals, now this extra musical layer is created by the woodwinds. It makes King Garcia unique. In a way the album reminds me of the German band Neánder, that has three guitarists and a drummer, making unexpected musical sequence possible as well.

Together the foursome, with assistance of Konstantinos Lazos - Gaida & Kaval, Iakovos Molybakis - Percussion and some samples, make Hamelin exciting listening, a whole album long. Where usually I'm not one for instrumental albums, King Garcia managed to capture my attention and keep it. Hamelin is an album that you should check out.

Wout de Natris - van der Borght

 

You can order Hamelin here:

https://kinggarcia.bandcamp.com/album/hamelin