Nikolas ‘Sprits’ Moutafis Guitarist/Metalhead/ Organizer/Producer
Nikolas ‘Sprits’ Moutafis is a Greek-Cypriot guitar player born in Nicosia Cyprus, a place where he currently lives. Since a very early stage he started playing classical guitar when he was 6 years old and at the age of 10 he started playing trumpet for the ‘Philarmoniki of Lakatamia’. Nikolas discovered his passion for Metal music at the age of 14. By the age of 15 he formed his first band called ‘Ablaze’ which later changed their name to ‘Hardraw’. The same year he auditioned and joined the ‘National Youth Orchestra’ as a trumpet player and 2 years later the ‘Intercollege Symphonic Orchestra’. In 2006 he applied for the Ionian University of Music and he concluded successfully his studies – 5 years in music composition-. From 2011 until today Nikolas returned to Cyprus and he has been teaching electric, classical, bass guitar, theory of music, music production and prepared students for university studies.
In 2006, he along with a group of musicians and metalheads, decided to create a Metal festival in the Island to give opportunity to new talents to show their potential, the festival was called ‘Power of the Night’. This festival has been consolidating its reputation as the best yearly festival in the Island combining local talent along with international metal bands. After many yearly editions, local press has recognized the event as the biggest Heavy Metal festival in Cyprus and it’s still present until today.
In early 2012 he opened a rehearsal studio (Steel Fortress), where many local bands practice. In this facilities, he later begun recording singles and demos at the beginning and then full album productions. In 2019 the studio was sold and continued his productions at his home studio where he recorded the 2020 release of his band Solitary Sabred and currently is responsible for the full production of Dragonbreath’s and Hardraw’s upcoming albums and the recordings and pre-production of his band’s Mirror upcoming album.
In 2014 he joined Solitary Sabred, a Heavy Metal band from Cyprus. The same year Solitary Sabred released their 2nd album entitled ‘Redemption Through Force’ and Hardraw released their debut album ‘Night of the Wolf’. Solitary Sabred, sold out their self-financed version of ‘Redemption Through Force’, and signed with the Greek No Remorse Records for re-releasing the album, which had many great reviews and was Metal Hammer’s album of the month January in 2015, and for the release of the album ‘By Fire and Brimstone’ which was released on March 2020.
In late 2014 – early 2015 he recorded, with another project called KTH Music Band, live at his studio some covers among Wes Montgomery’s ‘Sundown’, B.B. King’s ‘Everyday I Have the Blues’, The Meters ‘Cissy Strut ‘ and Jim Kelly’s ‘Meterman’, Ray Charle’s ‘I Got a Woman’ playing bass, while responsible for the recording, mixing and production.
In 2016 a project was formed, by Nikolas, to pay tribute to the band Apollo Ra, named Ra Pariah. In this project, musicians from Cyprus and Greece took part for one show, but in 2020 a festival was interested in having them in Germany, so they reunited for that event which was cancelled due to Covid-19.
In late 2016 he joined another project named Orgasmatrons, which is a Tribute band to Motorhead. The band is performing rarely, 1-2 times every year since then in local festivals, venues and events.
In early 2017 he joined the band Neon Knights, which is a cover band covering bands from Rock to Metal such as ‘Gary Moore’, ‘Led Zeppelin’, ‘AC/DC’, ‘Judas Priest’, ‘Ozzy Osbourne’, ‘Dio’, ‘Black Sabbath’, ‘Queensryche’, ‘ Bad Company’, ‘Whitesnake’, ‘Kansas’, ‘Deep Purple’, ‘Uriah Heep’, ‘Metallica’ etc. They were appearing regularly once or twice every month in several venues and festivals until the pandemic striked.
In 2017 he joined forces with the band Mirror with which, in 2019, he released the band’s second album Pyramid of Terror, which was in many magazines, websites and fanzines in the top 10 Traditional Heavy Metal of the year 2019. With Mirror he appeared in many festivals in Cyprus, some festivals in Greece and was going to also appear in Muskelrock festival in May 2020 in Sweden – again Covid-19 said NO.
In late 2018 he started organizing events with bands from abroad. He had Omen (USA), Riot V (USA), Anorimoi (GR) and many more and now he is also working as a promoter for Cyprus Metal Events under the name NSM (Nikolas Sprits Moutafis). The same year Nikolas was a Sponsored Artist of Ortega Guitars and recorded some Trios along with Kyriacos Hadjittofis and Panayiotis Xanthou.
Nikolas with his bands, have shared stage with international names such as Ross the Boss (USA), Marauder (Gr), Tokyo Blade (UK), Reflection (Gr), Praying Mantis (UK), Dark Quarterer (IT), Emerald (Ned), Domine (It), Crystal Viper (Pol), Manilla Road (USA), Sortilege (France), Titan Force (USA), Heir Apparent (USA), Sacred Steel (Ger) Virgin Steele (USA), Bonfire (Ger) Slough Feg (USA), Scald (Rus),Riot V (USA), and the list goes on.
2020 would have been a great year if Covid-19 never happened. The quarantine time though was spent productively since new material for both Mirror and Solitary Sabred was composed, recordings of the first are almost done and preproduction for the second is going on. The recording of the new Hardraw album is almost finished and the mixing procedure is on the way, while Dragonbreath’s debut album of is already produced, mixed and mastered by him. At the quarantine time he also found some old Hardraw recordings of the debut album, which he mixed and mastered and are already digitally released through bandcamp.
In 2022 a new project and a new challenge emerged as a result of joining forces with Tas Danazoglou, Alex Danazoglou and Hugo Enrique Olivos. That project is another band ‘March to Die’ in the veins of Manowar and Bathory. The recordings took place from October through December, while Alex is living in Greece and had to travel for the vocals recordings. The full album was recorded mixed and mastered by Nikolas ‘Sprits’ Moutafis and will be released soon… Just after that, the recordings for the upcoming Solitary Sabred album and yet another journey has begun.
His work as a guitar teacher and his live performances with Hardraw, Solitary Sabred, Mirror, Ra Pariah, Orgasmatrons, Neon Knights and KTH Music Band in Cyprus and Europe, made him a very active guitarist. His character and skills have helped him to earn his own place in the music community of Cypriot Metal Scene being recognized as one of the most talented and versatile guitar players on the island of Cyprus.