Grazhdanskaya Oborona - History

History

Grazhdanskaya Oborona was formed in the Omsk, Siberia, by bandleader Yegor Letov, who was the only one to remain a member throughout the life of the band. To distinguish his group from others of the period, which only slightly flouted the tenets of Communism, Letov branded the band with the slogan "I will always be against". Grazhdanskaya Oborona are synonymous in Russia with self-destructive punk energy in the name of social dissidence.

Grazhdanskaya Oborona started in 1982 as Posev ("Sowing"), in which founder Letov played drums and sang while Konstantin Ryabinov played bass. Because of the group's unapologetically defiant stance against the administration and its aggressive music that condemned militarism and totalitarianism (among its song titles were "I Hate the Color Red" and "Good Tsar, Familiar Stink"), it immediately became a target for the KGB. Letov was subsequently committed to a mental ward, and Ryabinov was drafted into the army.

Letov formed Grazhdanskaya Oborona in 1984 and immediately began to write and record albums. He often recorded on his own, though he credited other musicians, who were really just pseudonyms. His style leaned toward lo-fi, noisy punk rock, occasionally drawing inspiration from Russian folk tunes. His albums were recorded using minimal technology in Letov's apartment or the apartments of friends, with a changing cast of collaborators. He recorded other groups too, and was so prolific that his apartment came to be known as GrOb Studio, or GrOb Records. Albums recorded during this period were:

• Poganaya Molodezh ("Nasty Youth", Letov's first album) (1985);
• Optimism (1985);
• Necrophilia (1987);
• Krasny Al'bom ("Red Album") (1987);
• Totalitarianism (1987);
• Horosho ("It's Good") (1987);
• Tak Zakalyalaz' Stal' ("The Steel Was Tempered Thus") (1988), named after Nikolai Ostrovsky's book How the Steel Was Tempered;
• Boevoi Stimul ("Fighting Stimulus") (1988);
• Voina ("War") (1989);
• Zdorovo I Vechno ("Fine and Eternal") (1989);
• Armageddon-Pops (1989);
• Russkoe Pole Eksperimentov ("Russian Field of Experiments") (1989);
• Pesni Radosti I Schastya ("Songs of Joy and Happiness") (1989).

During this period of heavy censorship and monitoring by the Soviet administration, GrOb's albums were copied many times and passed from one friend to the next, a procedure known as magnitizdat. The group occasionally performed at small amateur venues and a few rock festivals, one of which ended with the electricity being cut off by KGB officials in the audience.

The album "Horosho" originally had an African woman's vagina on the cover, however when it was released by Moroz Records in the late 90's, it had a white box with the text "The original cover cannot be displayed for moral and legal reasons" in Russian on the front cover, but it still had explicit images in the inlay. When it was re-released by Misteria Zvuka in 2007, it had a completely different cover.

In 1987 Letov formed the band Velikiye Oktyabri ("Great Octobers") with Yanka Dyagileva, who would become his common-law wife. They traveled the country, playing songs and evading the KGB. They recorded three albums rooted in folk music: No Permission in 1987, and Go Home and Angedonia in 1989. He started working on the conceptual project Kommunizm ("Communism"), in which kitschy Soviet art and Stalinist poetry were accompanied by Letov's contrary compositions.

GrOb's sound consisted mainly of distorted electric or acoustic guitars, simple bass lines, rudimentary percussion and Letov's impassioned voice. Letov's music experimented with lo-fi and noise. During the late 1980s, GrOb began also to use harsh industrial sounds occasionally in the background of the music. Letov's lyrics became more irrational, and he began releasing recordings of his solo performances. He was extremely prolific, releasing more than 30 albums under the Grazhdanskaya Oborona name.

Contrary to the popular image of an anti-communist, Letov himself claimed to be a "true communist", a claim he did not abandon until the most recent change in his beliefs. Being the most prominent figure in Siberian rock, Letov was always a source of contradictions. At times he expressed opinions exactly opposite to his earlier sayings, making him seem aligned with the nationalistic, leftist National Bolshevik Party, despite his formerly strong opposition to despotism and nationalism. Most recently, he identified himself as a "World Christian".

In 2002 Letov produced Zvezdopad ("Starfall"), a nostalgic album that contains covers of Soviet-era songs. In the new millennium many Russian groups have recorded and performed tributes to GrOb, and in 2005 the group toured the United States. They also recorded the critically acclaimed 2005 album Reanimatziya (Reanimation). "We were a cult band before we released any albums ... If it turned out that I was popular among some bastards, I would feel sad", wrote Letov on his web site in response to a fan who complained that Grazhdanskaya Oborona was getting too popular. "We play for our people. Their number is growing and this is good."

But in playing games with the Soviet past and raging against consumerism, Letov was still seeing the world as he did in one of his old songs, "Zoo", where he criticized a life of "empty sounds and empty days" and sang, "I'm looking for people who are crazy and funny ... and when I find them, we'll get away from here, we'll go away into the night, we'll leave the zoo."

"If all the normal people would just leave the zoo-like world and start to live according to the principles of self-reliance or personal freedom ... all of that world would die", he wrote on his web site recently. "I see that many people in the West think the same. I consider myself a lucky man, because I am seeing evolution happening before my eyes."

Letov's last album, What Dreams Are Seen For (Russian: Зачем снятся сны) was released in 2007. In an interview in January 2008, Letov said that this album might be his last. This album was recorded as usual in the "GrOb studio", but is not at all typical of the band. It is much brighter – Letov prefers to describe it as "shining". There are far fewer songs of tragedy, rage and strain on this album than in previous ones; there are no coarse words in it, and Letov’s voice sounds natural and calm. The first track is the ode "Slava psyhonavtam" ("Glory to the psychonauts"). "Zachem snyatsya sny" ("What Dreams Are Seen For") is exceptionally polyphonic. "Siyanie" ("Shine") had frequently been played in concerts.

Letov died on 19 February 2008 in his sleep at his home in Omsk from heart and respiratory failure. He was 43 years old.