Psycho geography #7: Athens

I'm Pene – aka Thanasis Besinis – and I run the Professional Crap Dancers mobile party crew in Athens, Greece.

Professional Crap Dancers have been playing music for sweaty basements and sun-drenched rooftops for the last nine years or so – as well as bringing international guests to Athens such as Ray Mang, Haules Baules and Phillip Gorbachev. Also, I've been in the studio alongside DJ and producer extraordinaire Tonny Lasar making our own productions under the "Long Distance" alias with some of the results to be released (fingers crossed) real soon.

In the Athens of crisis more things are going bad than good but people are trying their best to get through with what they've got. Sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn't. In the end, I wouldn't change it for anything. These are some of the places that I spend my time in and here are a selection of sounds for you to enjoy;

Lonis Tattoo Studio

I'm a guy who loves his ink and Lonis is a true artist and a master of his craft – plus where else can you get a killer tattoo while Slayer is blasting through the stereo at 11:30 in the morning?

Kasseta Record Shop

Every Saturday morning this is a meeting place for music, coffee and tiropita. Dimitris who owns the place – as well as being the best DJ in Athens – also co-runs two record labels; Lurid Music (alongside Alex Hobson) and Isigude Records (alongside Giannis Tzotzos).

Kyrios Xou

A former Narcotics Anonymus centre turned into one of the best bars in Athens where the girls are pretty, the booze is cheap and the music is ace.

Pop Up

The thing with this bar is that it has two separate rooms. In the front they're serving coffee and cocktails and in the back room they have a killer soundsystem and they're throwing parties. (The photo is from the time we had Haules Baules destroy the place).

Mosaiko

It's not all about the centre of Athens so, when I'm looking for a place to have a really good drink and feel a bit of the sea breeze in my face, I head South to these guys.

Find out more about Professional Crap Dancers here.