Tobacco, written for his wife and other women workers in a Piraeus tobacco factory, was one of the first recordings by Dimitris Gogos and it is a classic: bouzouki, guitar and a passionate voice singing lyrics like: “And in the end you go partying with dudes in the tekes, because you like baglamas, bouzoukis and hookahs.”
Gogos excelled at Piraeus-style rebetiko, but he also presaged the post-war rebetiko style with deeply-felt melodic, love songs. He wrote other songs in other styles, including the syrto Ksekinai Mia Psaropoula, which has become a mainstay of Greek island music (nisiotiko).
Gogos went blind in 1941, but continued to perform in clubs and folk festivals, and he was instrumental in the revival of live rebetiko in the Plaka in Athens in the 1970s and ‘80s.
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