News, info and works of Greek-American interdisciplinary artist, Ithaka (Ithaka Darin Pappas); visual artist, music-maker, writer, photographer, citizen biologist & saltwater nomad (surfer). Lives between LA, CDMX and AkahtiLândia, Brasil. Ithaka official instagram: @_ithaka_ #sogetup #ithaka #ithakadarinpappas
In September of 2019, world-renowned electronic music journalist and editor Lauren Martin interviewed DJ Vibe (António Pereira), the iconic Portuguese DJ, for the Red Bull Music Academy lecture series. During the course of the one-hour long conversation the two spoke five full minutes specifically about the song “So Get Up” which undoubtedly transformed DJ Vibe’s personal career and in fact the entire electronic music economy of Portugal in the 1990’s.
When asked about the recording and the distribution of the song “So Get Up” and how it ‘changed everything’, Vibe spoke at length about now-deceased Kaos Records label owner/promotor António Cunha, co-member of Underground Sound of Lisbon, Rui da Silva and Rob Di Stefano manager of Tribal U.S.A. records which distributed the initial international release of “So Get Up” selling 80,000 copies).
He also speaks of DJ Junior Vasquez who had the recorded exclusively for a full year at the NY’s Sound Factory and created a buzz around the recording, but Dj Vibe fails to even mention the lyricist/vocalist, Greek-Californian Ithaka (Ithaka Darin Pappas), whose rerecording of his 1992 English-language vocal poem, So Get Up, The End Of The Earth Is Upon Us for Underground Sound Of Lisbon, certainly aided in the globalization of Underground Sound of Lisbon, Kaos Records, DJ Vibe, Rui da Silva and Portuguese electronic music in general.
Ithaka had originally written and recorded “So Get Up” on December 13th 1992 for Rádio Comercial – Lisbon, then in Februrary of 1993 recorded an electro version in Manchester for demo of his album project, So Get Up & The Lost Acapellas which was not immediately released.
Underground Sound of lisbon’s “So Get Up” enjoyed wide international success (#83 on the U.K. pop charts in 1994). But apparently, for marketing reasons, So Get Up was presented as a 100% Portuguese creation – even though the lyricist and vocalist was a Californian, briefly living in Portugal, and the song was written and recorded in English.
Ithaka Darin Pappas was largely not credited with his contribution on the new version of his own song.
Furthermore, both Underground Sound Of Lisbon’s label, (Kaos Records, Portugal) and their international distributor Tribal USA (EMI), headed by Rob Di Stefano, released several acapellas of Ithaka’s voice and lyrics without a visible credit, causing a snowball of anonymous bootleg versions and remixes.
In 1997, Stretch n Vern released “Get Up! Go Insane!”, principally using the hook lines of Ithaka’s “So Get Up”, becoming a #17 pop hit in the United Kingdom. “Get Up! Go Insane!”, was also used in a highly-visible Samsung printer commercial in Korea starring movie actress Jun Ji-Hyun. According to all of her biographic accounts, the commercial turned her into a “popular sensation”. The dancing around to “Get Up! Go Insane!” and the attitude expressed in the commercial’s footage made her into an icon for Koreans in their late teens and early twenties.
In 2013, German trance super stars Cosmic Gate, licensed Ithaka’s entire So Get Up vocal for their track coincidentally entitled “So Get Up” (again without a featured lyric/vocal credit to Ithaka). So Get Up became known as one of their best tracks, a ‘stadium banger’ as it was called by DJ MAG. They even manufactured a line of shirts with Ithaka’s lyrics printed on them, with no mention of the author.
By 2020, there have possibly been more than one-thousand remixes of Ithaka’s 1993 vocal acapella recording of So Get Up, becoming one of the most remixed acapellas in musical history. It appears under many alternative titles such as “Get Up”, “Insane”, “Get Up, Go Insane!”, “Next Life”, “See You In The Next Life” “The End Of The Earth”, “Hardventure”, “Headcharge”, “Belther”, “Last Resurrection”, “PPF (Past Present Future)”, “Intensity”, “Forget The Past”, “Trance Line”, “Viginti Etduo”, “Have A Blast”, “Turn To Dust”, “Alien Life Forms, Goodbye My Friends”, “Jet Airplane”, “Speed O.J.”, “Zombie”, etc..
“So Get Up” remix artists include: Armin Van Buuren, Fatboy Slim, Danny Tenaglia, Junior Vasquez, Dj Vibe, Oxia, Peter Bailey, Orion’s Voice, JJ Mullor, Dani Sbert, Lexington Avenue, Dylan, Derek Marin, Public Domain, K-Traxx, Technoboy, Bob Ray & Van Dyuk, Ben Gold, Pelari, Miss Kittin, Dave Seaman, Dade (ITA), Carlos Walker, Alien Project, Second Nature, Pomella, John Neiland, Br1an, DJ Healer, Traumprinz, Joseph LP, Rab-Beat , Pirro, Matheu, Neanderthal Phonogram, Omar Lopez, Liquid Viking, MotivBreaks, Chaka & Marty, Jay Dahbi, Hu Bee, Frankyeffe, Township Rebellion, Rui Flip, Dani Villa, Rodri Vegas, Dr. Funk, ZRG, Swing Kings, Acti, Antolini, DANTEE, Alternative Journey, Nell Silva, Geometric Dark, Pepo, Pacho, Club Atlas, Branko, Buraka Som Sistema, Alex Di Stefano, TNT, Zatox, Marc Hartman, Meat Katie, DJ Dũng Tí , Future Plays, Manu Kenton, Dejay D, Ozy & Ash, Derk Marin, Marcel, Doppeldosen, Maik Ibane, Cubik, Checo Zak, Fuelo Ruedo, Paradigm X, Samir Kuliev, Lee Burridge, Razat, Alex Page, DJ Kryst-Off, Breaker, Micromakine, Gu’Brian, Trolley Snatcha, Mr. Argenis, Let’s Try, Audio Noir, Peace Maker, Ninja, Cab Thomas, Loose Effects, JJ Mullor, Dani Sbert, Atmozfears, Igor Carmo, Pelari, Ben Gold, Koozah, Slow Panpot, Furio Levant, Bob Ray, Van Dyuk, Morgana DJ, Damien Blaze, Audio Noir, Hardwell, Agustin Servente, Matias Chavez, HeatBeat, Danny Garlick, Hakan Sarugil, Cassien Jean, Marco Calanni, Bageera, Black Force, Horizon, DJ Pibert, Outworld, Plusculaar, Mike Steventon & Tone, Bart Skils, Peace Maker, Philippe Rochard, Andrea Doria & Dino Lenny, 2 DJs In A Room, Steve Hill & Technikal, Seikos, Dantime, Maziano, Lochness DJ Team, DJ Zorneus, Phunk Investigation, Sharp & Smooth, Mowree, Lexicon Avenue, Architect, Committee, Low End Specialists, Dan Robbins, King-Size, Eric Kupper, Mert Yucel, Dylan, K-Traxx, High Voltage, K-Traxx, PCP, Ce Ce Lee, Atlantis ITA, Pathfinder, Jason “Jinx” Zambito, Tecmania Rebel, Patrick van der Hart, Public Domain, Sarasite, etc.
Ithaka Darin Pappas - vocalist/lyricist of all versions of the song, "So Get Up"
ithaka: SO GET UP, ESCAPE FROM THE CITY OF ANGELS (featuring Marta Dias)
https://www.facebook.com/SoGetUp// "SO GET UP, ESCAPE FROM THE CITY OF THE ANGELS" (lyrics/vocals by: Ithaka)
THE END OF THE EARTH IS UPON US
PRETTY SOON ITLL ALL TURN TO DUST
SO GET UP FORGET THE PAST
GO OUTSIDE HAVE A BLAST
GO A THOUSAND MILES IN A JET AIRPLANE
GO OUT OF YOUR MIND GO INSANE
TO A PLACE YOU NEVER BEEN BEFORE
EAT ICE CREAM OUR YOULL LICK THE FLOOR
CUZ, THE END OF THE EARTH IS UPON US
PRETTY SOON IT'LL ALL TURN TO DUST
GOODBYE MY FRIENDS, GOODBYE WORLD
I'LL SEE YOU IN THE NEXT LIFE
For more Ithaka lyrics see: http://ithakalyrics.blogspot.com
ithaka "ESCAPE FROM THE CITY OF ANGELS" (featuring Marta Dias) from The Replacement Killers soundtrack - wth lyrics.
lyrics / voice: ithaka
chorus voices: marta dias
bass: francisco rebelo
trumpet: nuno reis
produced by: pedro passos & joe fossard
Escape From The City Of Angels
was recorded at Namouche Studios
located in Lisbon, Portugal in 1995
and originally appeared on
Ithaka's debut album
Flowers And The Color Of Paint.
The album was nominated for
three Blitz Awards (the Portuguese
equivalent of the Grammy) in the
categories of: Best Album,
Best New Project and Best Male Vocalist.
And in an end-of-decade retrospective
of national music, the prestigious
newspaper Publico considered
Flowers And The Color Of Paint
to be one of the ten most influential
'Portuguese' albums of the 1990's.
In 1997,
acclaimed Hollywood director
Antoine Fuqua
used the song in the soundtrack
for his feature film
The Replacment Killers
[released by Columbia Pictures]
starring;
Mira Sorvino (academy award winner)
Chow Yun-fat (academy award nominee)
and several other known actors such as
Clifton Collins Jr. and Michael Rooker.
Because of difficulties in obtaining rights to
some of the other songs appearing in The
Replacement Killers, there was not an official
soundtrack release for the film.
The original pressing of
Flowers And The Color Of Paint
by Movieplay Records was only 1500 copies.
Ironically, despite the song's obvious cult
status with literally millions of illegal
downloads around the globe, the label
has never made a second issue of the album.
All licensing inquiries for
"Escape From The City Of Angels" by Ithaka
should be directed to Scion Four Music (NYC).
SO GET UP - lyrics and vocals by Ithaka.
Publishing: Ravenshark Music/Scion Four Music/ASCAP
See his new vocal-only album entitled
"So Get Up & The Lost Acapellas"
released by Sweatlodge Records. https://www.cdbaby.com/cd/ithaka2
___________________________________________
Also titled,
Ithaka's
"So Get Up" vocals and lyrics have been used on tracks mixed by:
Underground Sound Of Lisbon, Junior Vasquez, Danny Tenaglia, Orion's
Voice, Sarasite, Committee, Public Domain, Stretch & Verne,
Marcel, Fatboy Slim, Atlantis ITA, Ce Ce Lee, PC, Miss Kittin, K-Trax,
High Voltage, Dyla, Mert Yücel, Eric Kupper, King-Size, Dan Robbins, Low
End Specialists, Architect, Meat Katie, Phobia, Lexicon Avenue, Dave
Seaman, Mowree, Sharp & Smooth, Alex Bass, David Mimram, Phunk
Investigation, DJ Zorneus, Lochness DJ Team, Maziano, Dantim, Seikos,
Pathfinder, Andrea Doria & Dino Lenny, Philippe Rochard, Bart
Skils, Hakan Sarigul, Derek Mari, Danny Garlick, Black Force, Armin Van
Buuren, Hardwell, Cosmic Gate, Heartbeat, Bob Ray & Van Dyuk,
Furio Levant, Koozah, Ben Gold, Pelari, Igor Carmo, Swing Kings, JJ
Mullor, Dani Sbert, Micromakine, Atmozfears, Acti & Antolini,
TNT, Technoboy, Razat, Joseph LP, Alex Page, Feed, Lee Burridge,
FuturePlays, Samir Kuliev, Armin Van Buuren, Rui Flip, Geometric Dark,
Alex Di Stefano, Nell Silva, etc, etc, etc.
Thru
the years, So Get Up Has been released by the labels: Armada Music
[Netherlands], Wake Your Mind [Germany], Nervous Records [USA], Kaos
Records [Portugal], Tribal Records [USA], Tribal Records [UK}, Twisted Records (U.S.), Twisted Records (UK), Plastic City
[Germany], Sweatlodge Records [USA], Absolutely Records [Italy], Kontor
records, 24 Records [Italy], Skint, Bosphorus Underground Recordings
[Turkey], Chuvstvo Ritma Records [Russia], Black Hole Recordings
[Netherlands], Elektrobeats Records [Italy], Forensic Records [UK],
Mental Madness Records [Germany], Groove Records [Switzerland], Hymen
Records [Germany], Trance Corporation Recordings [Spain], Titanic
Records [Italy], Hardcore Maniacs [Spain], Party Label Unique Records
[Netherlands], Desire Records [Portugal], Black Habitat Records, People
Tech Records [Venzuela], HARDwithSTYLE Records [Netherlands], Subground
Records [Italy], Memory Stick Records [Netherlands], Union Recordings
[Poland], Supermarket Records, Orange Groove Recordings, Doctors Of
Chaos Records [Italy], Next Cyclone Records [Italy], Elektrobeats
Records [Italy], Digital+ Records [Spain], Bliss Point Records [Turkey],
Activa Records [Italy], Afterglow Records [Germany], Sector Beatz
[Switzerland], Re-Fuel Records [Netherlands], Fabric Records [UK],
Dogmain Records [Portugal], PTP Records [Germany], Bit Music [Spain],
Sys-X Records [Netherlands], Spot On Records [UK], Overodose Records
[Germany], Lost Paradise Records, BZRK Records [Netherlands], Kontor
Records, 24 Records [Italy], Skint, Renegade Hardware [UK], Melody Maker
Records [Italy], Tronic [Sweden], Mole Listening Pearls [Germany],
Refreshed [Germany], etc, etc, etc.
So Get Up and its
derivitives have been written about by: Ariya Beitollahi, Ryan Farber,
Steph Evans, Hugh Lurcott, Hannah DeuPree, etc.
For publications such as: Mix Max, Daily Beat, Insomniac, Earmilk, DJ Maj, Mix Mag, etc
In early, 2017, Los Angeles-based independent music label, Sweatlodge Records will release the seventh album by the Californian songwriter, Ithaka, entitled, So Get Up & The Lost Acapellas. The record will include thirteen of Ithaka's vocalized poems (without music), many of which were written during 1992 and 1993, two of the six years that the artist lived in Lisbon. Also, as a bonus track, the original 1993 demo-version of So Get Up will appear.
There in Portugal, Ithaka was regularly recited his texts and rhymes for the daily radio program, Quatro Bairro on the national station, Rádio Comerical. Ten of the poems offered on the Lost Acapellas release were written and recorded specifically for the radio program and later (in mid-1993) were rerecorded as voice-over and musical demos on a visit to England. These recordings, were missing for 23 years until recently being discovered in a Los Angeles storage unit on a antiquated cassette tape.
Among these early acapella poems is So Get Up, most recently re-popularized by Armin Van Buuren and Cosmic Gate, which today (twenty-four years and more than a thousand releases and adaptions later) is considered The Most Remixed Vocal Acapella In Musical History (by Guinness World Records - 2016, 2017).
Ithaka first wrote So Get Up in a small cafe in Amoeira near Rádio Comerical about an hour before going on air with it for his slot on Quatro Bairro, unfortunately this very first recording has never been recovered. He did however, as mentioned, record it a second time in the U.K - to present to radio producers and possibly record companies.
There working at Rádio Comerical, Ithaka met DJ Vibe (Portugal's most prominent DJ), who played an hour of progressive house music immediately following Ithaka's segments. There Vibe usually heard the end of Ithaka's vocal sequences and was intrigued by the poems. Some months later, he invited him to participate as a guest vocalist on the first release by Underground Sound Of Lisbon (a progressive house duo consisting of Vibe and Rui Da Silva) for Kaos Records.
They recorded Ithaka's vocal in the early hours of a rainy winter night at the garage studio, 1 Só Céu, owned by the Portuguese rock band called, Os Delfins.
Ithaka was told by Kaos (a micro label at the time) that they would make 200 white-labels vinyls for distribution within Portugal only. They paid him $70 dollars for his participation, with a verbal promise to discuss any future distributions and manufacturing that would possibly follow. And weeks later, from just that single white-label distribution, the song exploded into an almost instantaneous national dance floor classic.
Although open-minded musically, Ithaka was more associated with hip hop, surfing and contemporary art more than dance music and only infrequently appeared at the clubs his apocalyptic poem had literally become an anthem for an entire generation of club goers, inspiring even people who never liked dance music to get involved.
Ironically, Kaos Records and Underground Sound Of Lisbon themselves never made a point of explaining who the mystery prophet was and nobody seemed to ask, the press included - even though Ithaka was indeed the actual performer and owned 50% of the publishing.
"I remember specifically on a couple of occasions trying to get into Lisbon-area night clubs, which was always a chore because of the wait to get in, and there in line, two different times during height of the song's first wave of popularity, I could hear So Get Up playing on the dance floor...The first was at Frágil in Bairro Alto - and I said to the snob at the door, hey man, that's me, my voice...let me in. And the doorman said, if that was you...I would know who you are AND I DON'T! - And the other time, a few months later, was at ALCÂNTARA, when I again declared that that was my voice with hundreds of people shouting the lyrics on top of it muffled behind the thick curtains out the dance floor..and that doorman said, Yes, my friend, and Elvis is still alive too!
In late 1994, Ithaka left Portugal for four months back to Los Angeles for an art exhibit - and during that short amount of time, Kaos Records had licensed So Get Up, without consulting him, to several international parties most notably Tribal Records -USA, a sub-subsidiary of Miles Copeland's I.R.S. Records (EMI).
Although Rob Di Stefano, the managing director of Tribal Records had met Ithaka on a previous trip to Portugal, and obviously understood he was from California and only temporarily residing in Portugal, he realized the marketing potential of an exotic 100% Portuguese house music product arriving in the U.S. for the first time and made no attempt to publicize the vocalist's true origins. No featuring Ithaka credit was ever included on any of the releases, even though he is both the author and the vocalist. Yes, this is dance music, but no matter how good or bad the production is, no one can deny that the vocal-poem and adjoining hooks are the primal guts of the entire So Get Up experience. How else could it possibly appeal to such a large musical spectrum of DJs and producers?
The first 1994 release of So Get Up on Tribal was a double-vinyl set with ten-mixes, including several versions by New York superstars Junior Vasquez and Danny Tenaglia. The early international popularity of So Get Up was undoubtfully manifested by these interpretations by Vasquez and Tenaglia. Two New York all-stars creating music around the words of a California hip hop wordsmith. To call So Get Up, even at that point, a 100% Portuguese release, was inaccurate at best. The first release by Tribal, which sold upwards of 50,000 copies, also included an uncredited acapella of Ithaka's raw poem - which paved the way for a vast multitude of remixes and samplings over a huge cross-section of electronic musical genres.
With the exception of Stretch & Verne's legally licensed rerecord "Get Up, Go Insane!" in 1997 (and subsequently Fatboy Slim's remix of that), every other international release of So Get Up has essentially been unauthorized. It is fair to say that every (of the more than a thousand mixes released) house, trance, techno, electro, drum & bass, big beat, dub step, and art rock versions - under their varying titles of "So Get Up", "Get Up", "Forget The Past", "the End Of The Earth", "Have A Blast", "Headcharge", "Hardaventure", etc. have been issued illegally. No record royalties or performance royalties have ever been paid to the vocalist/lyricist although all have been made using Ithaka's 1994 recording - made that late night way back when in Cascais, Portugal. By the most recent estimates of Ithaka's publisher attempting to recoup his writing shares, So Get Up in it's many incarnations has been either sold or downloaded more than 30,000,000 times and approximately 250,000,000 have at least heard the poem. Whether payment ever falls into the right hands, time will only tell.
Ithaka himself has had an unusual career (and life) to say the least. He came to recording not thru music itself, but via music photography, visual arts....and reading books. For nearly three years, among his many other sporadic occupations, Ithaka was the principal photographer for Priority Records gangster rap icons, NWA and Eazy E , but that's a story for another day.
In 1992, attempting to expand his boundaries outside of the Southern California area, the half-Greek, Ithaka Darin Pappas, set off soul-searching. He first relocated to Athens for six months and then spent a year in Tokyo, finally landing in Lisbon where he spent more than six years.
During this six-year period in Portugal, Ithaka was hyper-productive. He recorded So Get Up (and many other poems), made two award-winning hip hop albums, published translated poems and short stories in Portuguese magazines - and had several large scale sculpture exhibits of his work. He also photographically documented much of the early and mid-nineties Portuguese music scene, shooting record covers for rock, hip hop and EDM projects.
another recording took place
in cascais, portugal in 1994
this version (in video) was recorded
at coffin alley studio, california
on july 8th 2014
for sweatlodge records (los angeles)
Notes:
I wrote this poem, SO GET UP
[aka: the end of the earth is upon us]
in 1993 in the amoreiras area of Lisbon for my daily segment of the program "Bairro Quatro" on Antena 1 - Radio Commercial Portugal. Later in 1994 I rerecorded it in participation with underground sound of lisbon (I was never a member of that project).
Of the 100+ mixes / usages of this poem (and my voice) on musical releases around the world, I have authorized only three.
ithaka 2014
Versions have appeared (both legally and illegally by: Underground Sound Of Lisbon, Danny Tenaglia, Junior Vasquez, Dubfire, Fat Bot Slim, Stretch & Verne, Cosmic Gate, Igor Carmo, Miguel Lemos, Ben Gold, Swing Kings, Wake Your Mind Records, Mowree, Igor Carmo, Rui Da Silva, Dani Sbert, Miss Kittin, JJ Mullor, Maik Ibane, Vendetta, Caos, Kaos, Supermarket, Nervous, Elektro Beats. Twisted Records, Tribal (UK), Tribal (USA)
Ithaka is the Alter-ego of American Photographer, Artist and Singer Darin Pappas, Conceived During the Period He Lived in Lisbon in the Early Nineties. 'stellafly', his Second Album, Released 1997, was Considered by Many One of the Finest Alternative/ Indie Albums Ever Recorded in Portugal, Revealing Pappas as an Extraordinary Talented Writer and Rapper with a Very Clear Vision of What his Urban, Rhythmic Music Should Present. http://www.tower.com/stellafly-ithaka-cd/wapi/110628487
Ithaka Darin Pappas - vocalist/lyricist of all versions of the song, "So Get Up"
