"I see your weird atonal yipping and raise you a strange piercing drone"

by Suw on February 19, 2004

I've just been introduced to the joys of Russian folk music by Maciej over at Idle* Words. No cute boys with guitars. No amps. In fact, no instruments at all, just a bunch of Russian speakers with lungs like bellows and a preternatural ability to yip.

Yet, despite years of blinkered obsession with indie rock, I find myself inexplicably loving this stuff.

One of my exes was really into British folk music. And I mean, really. In a big way. He'd often drag me along to gigs or attempt to 'educate' me about the wonders of folk. I never succumbed. Whilst I could intellectually see the attraction of playing folk, I just didn't get off on listening to it at all.

Thus I'm all the more surprised to discover that I actually really rather like this Russian stuff. Although I suspect the overall experience is enhanced by not understanding a word they're going on about.

Anyway, there's one particular track that's just really cool – it's got this kinda strange wailiness thing going on which is peculiarly attractive. Plus some of the tracks sound like fun to sing. I don't know if Maciej's links are permanent or not, but if I can I'll post one.

UPDATE: Maciej's files are here! It's hard to pick a favourite, but I think for sheer rollockingness, Pcholechka, which provokes in me the almost irresistable urge to sing along; for strange and repeated yipping, Porushka; and for just general weirdness Kogo Nyetu.

*Very bloody idle. Hasn't updated in yonks, for shame.

A visitor February 20, 2004 at 1:25 am

I've put everything under http://www.idlewords.com/audio/, that will be the permanent home.

Yip, yip, yip.

NB – those aren't Russian speakers for the most part, just Americans faking it.

Maciej Ceglowski

A visitor February 20, 2004 at 3:09 am

Suw! Next you'll tell me you like alt-country! 😉

Was thinking of e-mailing but thought this would be a better way of reaching you. I met a long-lost relative of yours! Plus, I have a cell phone with free long-distance now so I can, like, talk to you and shit! If you want.

Drop me a line and we can discuss this further…. 😀

lurv

n.

Natalie [emma_blowgun@hotmail.com]

A visitor February 20, 2004 at 5:44 am

Soviet Blues (Arc Of A Life)
D. Dobrynin
2003, Archipelago Records SSR1079

This fascinating CD is a look inside Stalinist Russia. Recorded on primitive equipment in two sessions, one in 1938 and the last in 1947, the acetates and wire spool masters lay forgotten in the basement of a former Melodiya warehouse in St. Petersburg for over half a century.

The artist is one D. Dobrynin, born in 1913 or 1915 on a large estate near St. Petersburg.
Very little documentary evidence exists about his life, other than army records, one lone newspaper clipping surviving in the Melodiya archives, and the labelled recording masters themselves. The clipping briefly mentions the young man's concerts in the St. Petersburg area as a balalaika virtuoso. Possibly as a result of this article, P. Tatenko, recording manager for Melodiya, the single State-owned record label inside the Soviet Union, made a visit to Dobrynin's collective in 1938 in order to record him. However, rather than a balalaika solo pieces, Dobrynin evidently convinced Tatenko to allow him to record a series of songs, an odd mixture of adolescent love mixed with revolutionary fervor.

If this were America of the same period, this music would be considered the Blues. Dobrynin was indeed a virtuoso on the balalaika, a wedge-shaped guitar-like instrument with only three strings. Most of the songs are in a slow waltz tempo, and his voice is a resonant baritone.

The first set of material was recorded to 78 RPM acetates in pre-war 1938. The young man's sincere revolutionary fervor shows in the lugubrious “I Am Distressed At Being The Tool Of The Capitalist Oppressors”. Young love first appears in “Comrade Miss, Let Us Maximize Our Industrial Output For The State”. His sincerity being challenged, he avows “I Would Never Exploit You For Personal Gain”. Loss follows love, in the poignant “Will I See You Again Following The Forced Collectivization Of This Region?”. Temporarily off women, he asserts, “Mother, I Am Going Up To The Mountains To Harden My Body With Physical Labor”. Evidently back down the mountain, young love reasserts itself in “I Cannot Forget When Our Eyes First Met At The Hanging Of Kubayachev The Landlord” and “A Brisk Walk Near The Solovyev Slaughterhouse #8 With You”, with its repeated refrain, 'so glad to be upwind'.

The CD's subtitle, 'Arc of a Life', illustrates Dobrynin's progression from naïve young collective member to soldier to Gulag prisoner. Member of a Soviet Army battalion that surrendered to the Germans outside Stalingrad, he disappeared. After the war, Mr Tatenko, now become general manager of Melodiya, remembered the young man and must have moved heaven and earth to locate Dobrynin, who was in the infamous Gulag camp in Perm, Russia. Surrendering to Germans was a crime in the Soviet Army. Amazingly, Dobrynin still had a balalaika and apparently earned extra rations by entertaining camp guards. This 1947 recording session was done in the Perm camp using a seized Grundig wire recorder.

Dobrynin was certainly older and more jaded. His revolutionary fervor had turned wistful: “I Am Certain There Is A Place For Us In Comrade Stalin's Plan”. He enlists some fellow prisoners to recreate the rollicking Soviet Army singalong, “I Am Extremely Vexed With The German Invaders, Are You Not Also?”. “One Potato, Two Lives” shows the desperation and hard decisions of the terrible wartime Russian winters. The losses are personalized in the sad “Though Georgians Are Not Real Russians I Shall Miss Your Bright Eyes”. He brings the song cycle to an end with the heartbreaking “Moon Over The Gulag Latrine (Thinking Of You)”.

D. Dobrynin never emerged from the Soviet prison system.

Soviet Love Songs (Arc Of A Life)
D. Dobrynin
2003, Archipelago Records SSR1079
47 minutes. 12 Tracks:

1. “I Am Distressed At Being The Tool Of The Capitalist Oppressors”
2. “Comrade Miss, Let Us Maximize Our Industrial Output For The State”
3. “I Would Never Exploit You For Personal Gain”
4. “Will I See You Again Following The Forced Collectivization Of This Region?”
5. “Mother, I Am Going Up To The Mountains To Harden My Body With Physical Labor”
6. “I Cannot Forget When Our Eyes First Met At The Hanging Of Kubayachev The Landlord”
7. “A Brisk Walk Near The Solovyev Slaughterhouse #8 With You”
8. “I Am Certain There Is A Place For Us In Comrade Stalin's Plan”
9. “I Am Extremely Vexed With The German Invaders, Are You Not Also?”
10. “One Potato, Two Lives”
11. “Though Georgians Are Not Real Russians I Shall Miss Your Bright Eyes”
12. “Moon Over The Gulag Latrine (Thinking Of You)”

Reviewed by and copyright
Karl Moeller 2003

Karl Moeller

A visitor February 20, 2004 at 5:03 pm

Karl, those song titles are amazing. There's something about sucking up to totalitarian authority that brings out the best in certain songwriters. I'm reminded of those stirring North Korean anthems “I also raise chickens”, “The shoes of my brother fit me tight”, “We Are Marching For The Great Leader”, and my particular favorite, “Song of Bean Paste”. Still, I think that “Moon Over The Gulag Latrine (Thinking Of You)” beats them all.

Suw, there's a whole world of amazing music out there. I've been listening to Russian folk music on Radio Moscow for years and years, and I agree, it's incredible. Sounds very “off” to our western ears. Bulgarian music is similarly different.

ralph

A visitor February 20, 2004 at 8:07 pm

Oh, come on, surely you at least like fernhill?

Atlantic

Suw February 20, 2004 at 9:38 pm

Maciej: Ta for the link! Yip! Yip! Yip!

Natalie: Alt-country? Oh, I really doubt it! This Russian stuff is so not alt-country. 😉 Long lost relative? Intriguing! And yes, be nice to talk some time soon. Will email forthwith.

Karl: Fascinating, thanks for that. Although some of those titles would sound far better rendered in Russian, methinks.

Ralph: Music's a funny thing. I think I have to be in just the right frame of mind to appreciate certain new (to me) musics. I'd say that if you'd attempted to convince me of the greatness of Russian folk music a year ago, it would have been a losing battle. Right now, though, what with learning Polish 'nall, this somehow seems right.

Wonder if there's any decent Polish music to be had? After all, it was music that got me into Welsh, specifically Torra Fy Ngwallt Yn Hir, by the Super Furry Animals. It did a good job of keeping me learning too.

Atlantic: Fernhill? Hm, can't give you a definitive answer on that, as I am not sure I've ever heard of any, but probably not. 😉

A visitor February 21, 2004 at 12:07 am

OK, you have to listen to fernhill. Only Welsh folk/roots group I'd ever recommend to a non-Welsh-speaker or a non-folkie. Lead singer is a Welsh-speaking Englishwoman like yourself. Interview here:
http://www.rootsworld.com/interview/murphyj.html
Band site: http://www.fernhill.info/.
Sound samples at
http://www.bejo.co.uk/bejo/real/FNdole.ram
http://www.bejo.co.uk/bejo/real/FNllatai.ram
http://www.bejo.co.uk/bejo/real/wasod.ram

Atlantic

A visitor February 21, 2004 at 2:51 am

I wish I could point you toward some good Polish music, but to be honest, I haven't found a decent Polish band yet. The Czechs have some amazing bands; I'm quite fond of certain Ukrainian bands; and even Belarus has some excellent bands, but of the half-dozen Polish CDs I own, none of them have ever really grabbed me. Klinika's “Tourdion” is a moderately interesting fusion of violin and hardcore punk. Allians does ska, but not as well as their Czech neighbors Sto Zvirat.

The best source I know for indie rock from eastern Europe is Tamizdat at http://www.tamizdat.org/. They've got an office in New York that's being phased out, and their main office is in Prague. One of the nice things about their web site is that you can list all the releases they have from a given country. They also have links to the bands' sites (if they have them) so you might be able to hear samples.

ralph

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