10/11/2001
Have you ever try to sing in English?
Rada - I don't know English very well, and my texts are rather dense, with complicated alliteration, metaphorics and elements of traditioalist imagery. It's quite difficult to translate these lyrics well. On our web-site we have a free translation by Yulya Fridman, which gives some impression of my poetry.
Since you have a lot of albums you must be well known in Russia?
I am very well known within some special circles of audience. Our music has no radioplay, because the radio format is very restrictive in Russia; we don't have videoclips. Our mainstream promotion is nil; we are completely independent from te music industry. It has many godd sides, as well as some bad sides - there are no investitions in our group's promotion for instance.
How it was to release a albums on french Prikosnovenie?
Prikosnovenie was contacted by Misha Verbitsky, the proprietor of the independent label Ur-Realist (http://imperium.lenin.ru/UR-REALIST) who releases most of our albums. Prikosnovenie liked it and they released their disk. Everything is quite simple.
What do you think about their press info that they said that you are “russian trip hop in the vein of Portishead”???At last kniga o jestokosti.... has nothing to do with Portishead?
It was said of our disk "My love, my sorrow", which is based on some trip-hop techniques - scratches, electronic effects. It is somewhat similar to Portishead and other early trip-hop albums.
You are compared to Nina Hagen,Patti Smith,Diamanda Galas,Cocteau Twins..etc.as it because we (music journalists) don`t know where to put an original band like your band and always try to compared with someone?
Exactly. It's very difficult to invent the new terms and definitions, to invent a whole new language. Ideally, this is what one is supposed to do - to invent a new language for a new kind of world, of music. But it's quite hard. I am compared with Diamanda Galas because I sometimes use similar vocal techniques (vocalization) and because of my vocal range.
What is concept about kniga o jestokosti....?Some thing about woman and love and their nature I suppose???Are they taken from old Russian and Asian pagan legends?
The name is connected with the Eastern image of a cruel beauty. In the Eastern legends the female protagonist is beautiful and perfect, and it brings pain simply by being perfect. It is so beautiful that it blinds; its poetry is so perfect that her lover weeps at her letters. One is reminded of the images of sirens and rusalkas - their voice is so perfect, their singing is so beautiful that those captured by their sounds are lost forever. The true beauty (in singing, too) is unbearable for human understanding and human eyes; the beauty blinds one's vision and stops one's heartbeat. The woman's cruelty is born when she is born and dies only when she dies. The legends are based on this observation. The legends' protagonist is cruel.
Here in Turkey we always have a veiw about Moscow that you are poor and post communist and mafiose and etc...But can you tell me the reality,how is life in Moscow?
The life in Moscow is bearable. The poverty of the rest of Russia is impossible to imagine. In Russian towns they live differently, not like in Moscow. People are poor, there is no jobs and no means of existence. Some factories are returning to life now, but still it's very hard for mos people. On the other hand, Moscow is vibrant, extremely expensive city with a lot of visitors and lots of stuff happening at all times. The mafia is everywhere where the money is; and most of Russia's money are situated in Moscow.
Did you play outside Russia?
Only in the post-Soviet countries - Moldova, for instance.
How is scene there?Can you recommend me some names?
Nothing interesting happens. The musicians play in pubs for a quick buck. In a pub, you have to play classical rock-n-roll, or jazz standards, usually in English. The new bands prefer to play the music which is suitable for eating and drinking. There are also some romantics, but they are usually text-oriented, and there is not much music there.
Well it seems that you are old enough to compare life back in USSR and now??? (I don`t mean that you are old or something like that,don`t understand me wrong!!!But you can do it healthly compared with any teenager...)
I rememer the Gorbachev's time very well. Unlike earlier, you could read any books you like, listen any music, but the people were still rich and people were much less influenced by the American mass-culture and American values. In the Soviet times, anybody could afford to visit a summer resort on a Black Sea, with kids and family. Anybody could afford to teach his kids arts or musicianship, or to send them to the colledge. Or to visit a theatre. Now it is prohibitely expensive. You have a total americanisation of all ways of life, American standards in everything, these horrid pop ditties. We used to have a very nice king of pop in Soviet Russia, with classically-trained divas, lyrics written by in a literary Russian instead of stupid imitations of teenagers' slang. There is a colossal number of glossy magazines writing about nothing, of fashions, pop-psychology and various useless culinary recipes. The people are becoming stupid, they are putting all their efforts to satisfy the standards borrowed from this kind of literature, to think about nothing and all the time smile, stupidly.
What kind of audience you have on gigs?
Intelligent. Those who don't expect entertainment, but come to understand something in themselves, in the world. Those who want to receive something, to think.
Was this gig on 1 november 2001 special about your 10th year???
Yes; especially for this concert we re-learned some of our eldest songs and released a "best of" compilation. A CD with a song from each of our albums (which are rather diverse, by the way) and also several unusual concert versions of our songs. In this concert, our group was augmented by Sergej Aleksandrov on sitar (we played with him in 1997) and renowned Russian avangarde jazzist Sergej Letov on sax, clarinet and flute. I jammed with him in 1989, in a big avangarde festival; this was my first public performance.
Have you ever think that you can do with band for 10 years?What was the hardest moment in history of Rada And Ternovnik?
I knew that I must work in music, because if I was given a talent to sig and to write lyrics - this is an obligation which I have to repay constantly. Hence, the show must go on. But the group wasn't always the same. From the original band, only the guitarist Vladimir Anchevsky remains. Throughout the history, there were almost 40 people playing with our project. They came, they relearned something, we created the new worlds. They received something. Then the time passed, the people went on. This is normal. This is life. The most difficult things happened when a musician who played with us came to the crossroads - have he got everything from us? Can he go or he should remain? We never dropped anybody, people should take their own decisions. It's very painful to see how they fret when they cannot decide. That's all.
Best Rada.