Lets make a Russian music chart, the one that already exists is gay and outdated. To do this, post five Russian albums you think the deserve to be on the chart, other anons responds with +, if you get five or more pluses for one of the albums, it goes into the nomination category, we'll see how it goes from there. It would be best to have the chart divided into genres (Classical, Folk, Post-Punk, Metal and so on). Please also provide links for other anons to check out the music (if available)
Classical isn't a genre and Russians have no pre-romantic era music. You would have to split it into romanticism (Glinka, Tchaikovsky, Rimsky-Korsakov, Rachmaninoff, Medtner), modernism (Scriabin, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Shostakovich), avant-garde (Lourié, Mosolov), neoclassical (Stravinsky, Prokofiev), post-WW2/contemporary (Gubaidulina) etc. There we go, that's a start.
Gavin Morris
Come on man, stop busting muh balls, you can just call it "Academic music" to simplify things. We can do sub-genre charts later, this one is just to make an overall guide for people getting into Russian music.
Anyway from that list
+Scriabin (nomination would probably be Scriabin 24 Preludes) +Mosolov +Stravinsky (Rite Of Spring) +Medtner +Shostakovich (Seventh Symphony) +Rachmaninoff (Second Piano Concerto)
Gabriel Kelly
My nominations Grazhdanskaya Oborona - Russkoe pole eksperimentov (for punk) youtu.be/VY8Xdtu_8go 4 pozicii bruno - зacтoльный-юбилeйный (for electonic, not sure about the exact genre) youtu.be/HC6NfWmigro Starukha Mha - Fires (for drone\ambient) youtu.be/Xww-bX461eM Alfred Schnittke - Requiem (for modern classical\neoclassical) youtu.be/icNHpzt2JzA Aquarium - Triangle (for folk\psychedelic folk) youtu.be/mdTajEHcods
>Гpaждaнcкaя oбopoнa - Apмaгeддoн-пoпc >Кoммyнизм - Caтaнизм these need to be on there somewhere
Jordan Jones
Baмп
Sebastian Gutierrez
>the one that already exists is gay and outdated Which one?
Joshua Torres
>Academic music That's even dumber, a lot of this stuff was against academic trends of the time lol, but seriously I wasn't trying to fuck with you, it was a post in good faith.
Jaxson Bell
+ for Schnittke (one of my favorite pieces of all time) + for Oborona (any of the 1989 albums would fit) + for Staruha Mha
I will withdraw from voting Aquarium cause I think Radio Africa is probably a better introduction album (however Triangle is amazing) and not sure if that is the best Bruno album .
+Yanka needs to be there for historical reasons definitely I love Kommunizm but I think Oborona is enough Letov for one chart.
Гpaждaнcкaя Oбopoнa (go through it all once and never listen again)
AyкцЫoн 'Devushki Poyut" album from 2007 (contains Marc Ribot) + Eugene Feodorov projects, like with guys from Medeski Martin & Wood.
Inna_Zhelannaya with her band - they play folk songs in like non-heavy industrial arrangements, 6string fretless base, sax or horn going through FX boxes, lots of stuff. youtube.com/c/InnaZhelannaya
Tequilajazzz - alt-rock, post-punk kinda band, still active, but boring now. Best albums are Virus (1996), Tselluloid (1998), 150 Milliardov Shagov (1999). Opened up for Faith no More a couple of times over the years.
apart from this there are less known worthwile black, death and punk stuff, like Komatozz, but you got to dig specially for diy bedroom-prod gems in that departments.
all in all, russia is very low on ok music, very very low, always has been, and never will anything change much.
>from the weed city on the north side of. Petersburg?
>all in all, russia is very low on ok music, very very low, always has been, and never will anything change much. I have seen many people outside of Russia are very fixated on Russian music yet most Russians I have seen on music related spaces were dismissive of their music. Some even going as far as calling Kino a bad The Smiths clone. Why is that?
Joshua Powell
>Гpaждaнcкaя Oбopoнa (go through it all once and never listen again) Smartest comment ever made about this band
Jose Thomas
Self hate and propaganda. It is also visible in South America but not as much as Russians. I think it goes back to Moscow journalists in the 80s who would actively ignore all the underground music happening in the country in order to shill for their Moscow based bands (most of whom were way worse than Siberian, Izhevsk or even Leningrad bands). As a result all the cool underground musical happenings got shoved to the side and ignored until they all died out and mediocrity prevailed.
The Russian nationalists are too stupid to build their own culture and the Russian liberals, Western thinking people all ignore Russian art because they need Western validation (i.e. Zvuki Mu are "Ok" in the eyes of most Russ-Westerners because Brian Eno produced them or as guy said about Asian WOmen On The Telephone, Henry Rollins played them so its ok to like them).
They are the Eastern European equivalents of the White guilt American who dismisses all of the Rock music because "muh rip-off from black people". This is a phenomena only in countries with heavy political division and unstable political climates. Go ask most Eastern Europeans in other countries such as Belarus, Ukraine, Baltics, ex-Yugoslavia and they are proud of whatever they might have.
+ for Tequilajazzz, I would say Tselluloid is a good introduction album. + for Inna Zhelannaya but I would go with her stuf in Alyans on Sdelano V Belom
Russian music isalmost entierly a cringe due to decades-long lack of exposure to anything. Internet helped a little, in the areas of underground and extreme genres.
In 80s-90s russian music was like 4th tier looser copycat band full of people with no taste who hasndtheard much music anyhow.
Just think of that - zambian musicians in the 70s topped like crazy, like played proto-punk before the stooges, and they had mostly ak-47 and hendrix tapes. Russians had more prosperity, leasure time, x10 population and better gear than Zambia, but created a couple of hours of 5/10 semi-cringe tracks over the years, and Zamrock is like a couple of huge boxsets filled with absolute wins.
Later, in mid2010-s some russian producers figured a proper way to steal fresh and interesting production, like Ivan Dorn with his album that copied Disclosure like nothing doing. Some producer ripped off Robin Hannibal circa Rhye, and so on, but it was mostly used in making music for russian rappers, so all in vain and down the drain.
Today with all the how-to videos ofcourse it all sounds the same, be it polish trap-pop or russian trap-pop or romanian, wsystko jedno, kurwa.
Mason Myers
What about bands like Sonans, Trek, Nikolay Kopernik, Cholbon, Pekin Rou Rou, Yuri Morozov? Also you need to understand how fucked the situation was, members of Urfin Juice got beat up for simply recording an album at a Sverdlovsk movie studio, the special services would confiscate letters from Western companies who wanted to produce Soviet bands (Sonans or Mashina Vremeni). Despite all these problems Russians managed to churn out some real gems that are getting reevaluation in the West (which should probably mean something).
Also there is a difference in mentality and cultural roots. Russian music doesn't have the blues and African roots so their version of Rock gravitated more towards UK style stuff such as Prog, Post-Punk, Metal, Madchester rather than the groove based stuff. Even though those who attempted to do Black music actually managed to churn out some great jams, you seriously are going to tell me Komitet Ohrani Tepla isn't one of the best all-white Reggae bands of all time?
And your point about 90s Russian music is even weirder since Yeltsin provided the needed freedom to make whatever music you wanted. You are from Saint Petersburg so you should probably know Tam-Tam but there was also Izhevsk, the whole underground Anarcho-Punk/Nazbol community, Uchites Plavat Hardcore stuff. There was enough underwound music to go around and even the Pop music at the time was fairly good. Seriously, even though it's not wrapped in traditional Russian Folklore and kitsch Bear costumes, what American or European band sounds exactly like 90s Nogu Svelo or Kolibri?
What matters the most are the tunes. Aria (a band which I am not really fan of) is a total copy of Maiden but if you look online non-Russian Metalheads have no problem with them not being original because the music rips. Russian literature isn't anything innovate either but the stories and writing was so good that it managed to stand up to the French and German in the world, so does the music.
