Word: sukachev
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...past, Soviet bands often shamelessly copied popular Western styles, but Sukachev set out to create a uniquely Soviet sound, something kids could dance to. Although a punk rocker at heart, Sukachev added a four-piece horn section to the driving rhythm-and-blues backup of lead guitarist Kirill Trusov and bass player Sergei Galanin. The result is a slick multi-generational hybrid, the Talking Heads meet Count Basie, the Andrews Sisters on acid...
...punk is in the presentation, which can shock Soviet conformists. Once, Sukachev demolished an enormous poster of Brezhnev onstage, then threw the pieces into the audience. During a number about drug addiction, he often pantomimes a heroine injection. His shaved-sided flop-mop elicits frequent comment on Moscow's streets. "People think I'm a fascist," he says. "I can't think how many times I've been called that...
...lyrics also speak of a scorching resentment of the older generation. In Don't Follow Us, Sukachev warns his elders that his generation will be different from theirs: "Hey, indulgence sellers . . . We're not the same as you./ We're not the heroes of big polemical battles/ So don't follow us." Another number, the feisty Reptiles, all but declares open rebellion: "We'd be glad, glad, glad/ If some time, any time/ All these reptiles . . . Would disappear forever." Sukachev dislikes assigning meaning to his songs. "I like to stick images together," he explains. "Other people can tell you what...
...Sukachev, who remembers having to beg for money to ride the subway, makes more than 3,000 rubles ($4,800) a month from concerts, nearly 15 times the Soviet average wage and more than twice the take-home pay of Mikhail Gorbachev. (Says Sukachev: "If I had his house and his car, he could have my 3,000.") Still, success has its problems. "It's really dangerous when people start to praise you for doing the things they used to slam you for," he notes. The band now risks losing the special edge to its sound that developed from...
...summer the group will release its first two albums, following the top-selling unauthorized concert disk put out last year by Melodiya, the country's sole record label. There is talk of a U.S. tour as well, possibly in June. "We're hoping to sign a few small contracts," Sukachev admits. Still, he says he wouldn't give up the band's underground years for anything. "Those years are our strength," he says. "We'd be nothing without them...