Growing up with PINK FLOYD in the Soviet Union

7/30/2019 Growing up with PINK FLOYD in the Soviet Union

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Growing up with Pink Floyd in the Soviet Union

Written by Lukas Devita

Monday, 01 January 2007

The start of a new year has one looking forward to what the next twelve months' promises,and also back to the past.

In a fascinating peek behind "the iron curtain" of yesteryear, Lukas Devita reveals what it waslike growing up in the USSR as a Pink Floyd fan - and how the band's music was distributedin a strictly underground manner...

TAPE TO TAPE: GROWING UP WITH PINK FLOYD IN SOVIET UNION

Living in the U.S.S.R. in the conditions that were famed by its negativity there weretwo things you could learn: to read between the lines and listen with the heart. And peoplewere eager to know, there was always the feeling of lacking something and longing for thenew.

So, growing uneasy, for us it was nothing to compare with the first knowledge about theWestern life. And since the mid seventies there was much more allowed to take a glimpseat. Everyone used to go to the foreign movies at the cinema and quite a lot of Italian orHollywood classics were screened in these years. Also a number of good booksrepresenting English and American literature were translated, but there were almost noWestern magazines available. So you couldnt get the feeling and real life breathing ofyounger generations abroad otherwise than through the magic of contemporary music.

It was the time of radio and imagination for a child in Soviet seventies. Listening to anygood song from other side, hearing the voice - it was close to live appearance, this musicspoke directly to your heart, vibrating some strange emotion of being together with thespirit of freedom. The sound was in your room and presence was so personal as somekind of communion.

And it seemed only rock music had this charisma, instantimpact and overwhelming influence. It was no matter lyricscould be very unclear due to the poor understanding oflanguage. The latter made the phenomenon called 'rock'

even more mysterious and attractive.

It seemed this kind of music had no restrictions inside andalso contained the unique voice and style of particular artistor band. But also all of them had the similar approach tosocial values tending to be free thinkers far away from anystandards.

And to most of us the music became so familiar as if youwere born with these sounds. Although from the perspective

of our everyday surroundings the artifacts of English or American rock music should looklike meteorites: totally out of context in Soviet culture and the frame of mind.


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Though radios were all around and some good foreign stations were more or lessaccessible you couldnt just sit without any effort and hear rock or soul music flowing. Itwas more like catching a tune, hunting for a song. The most important foreign radioprogram in Russian language introducing pop and rock music to the U.S.S.R. was Rockposevy (Rock Crops) with legendary Seva Novgorodsev, since 1977 presented by theBBC Russian Service from London on short wave (the first special show dedicated to Pink

Floyd went on air in July, 1979).

In such circumstances, more likely the first your real encounter with rock would be throughthe sharing of recordings. It was your friend, sister, cousin or in some rare occasion, yourparents who introduced you to their collected items. Except for classical music and somejazz virtually no Western vinyl records or cassettes were on sale and no rock music wasreleased locally at the time. In spite of that fact, lots of original LPs received or broughtfrom abroad were circulating, borrowed from friend to friend for recording, helping todevelop reel-to-reel collections. Since the late seventies when cassette tape recordersbecame more available, individually reproduced cassette albums were spreading evenwider. But none was made for sale, usually everyone was taping for personal use oradmiration. Items were sometimes exchanged for re-recording, second or third time in arow, so of course quality loss was a norm. Leasing recording for a fee was considered byany music fan as an unpleasant act.

If you were lucky enough you also listened to the original vinyl albums, lent by your friendor acquired at some wild price. The sum of money you would spend if buying a Westernrecord in many cases were no less that the average month salary of the employee withthe higher education. Or it took your entire piggybank from childhood to teenage years.And some of us spent it all.

But even before you would start recording, almost surely the first unforgettable thing youhear would be The Beatles. The group that was already considered a pop classic even bythe authorities. And then, if you follow your bliss in search of sound, if someone would talkyou in excitement about the cosmic rock, as well as deepest human music - it all of coursewould be about Pink Floyd.

Now you knew what to ask for the future birthday gift. And probably every teenager had adream and struggle for magnetofon as tape recorder was called in all wide SovietUnion. And then - your life changed forever.

And at last you can hear Pink Floyd cassette anytime you like. And it was something aboutthe recording idea itself because of sound effects they used. It was obvious that this groupwas always experimenting with recording process and also making use of concretesounds. At the same time the compositions were very acceptable and moving to tears. Itwas amazing and inspiring to any Soviet child with so limited possibilities of entertainment.For example, it happened for me to hear the train sound on Wish You Were Here albumbefore I heard the actual train on the first school class trip. And it was like oh my, thissounds similar to recording of Pink Floyd!

Hope one would excuse me for relying on personal experience and these reflections willhelp in any way to get the idea of atmosphere, common to many music fans or

melomans as they were called here.

In the seventies through all parts of Soviet Union this progressive group called Pink Floyd


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established itself, as the next most well know foreign band after the Beatles. For sometime Pink Floyd were practically an equivalent of inventive rock group, consisting of fourincredible individuals, well, almost five, because no one was forgotten.

No home collection of recorded music was worthy without some albums by the Floyds.Having in mind how the number of original vinyl was relatively small, its almost anomaly

how tape recordings were spreading wide and fast among the various nations of Sovietrepublics. Especially in the capitals and big cities. This developed in to the form ofunderground culture, which today looks obviously different from music piracy of any kind.There was really no other way to hearthatmusic. And it went from people to people.

In the light of this its interesting to note that the information about the same rock musicand Pink Floyd in particular was not spreading well at all. Of course the media was run bystate and the official press was vague in presenting any valuable readings about suchadmirable and bit dangerous act. Anyway some brief publications appeared but writtenwith mistakes, such as Mother with atomic heart (for Atom Heart Mother of course) and

in many cases the very name Pink Floyd was translated as Pink Flamingo!

It was due to the enthusiasm of individual music critics the first serious articles saw thelight of day in the end of the seventies. Artiom Troitsky, now considered the best rockmusic analyst in the history of Soviet Union, wrote one of the breakthrough introductionsto Pink Floyd, the first titled Quadrophonic journey of Pink Floyd to the Dark Side Of TheMoon published in some the small magazine in 1977. Next important article was almostan epic featuring the detailed history of the band as well as reviews of every record, told inwitty style and deep understanding. The latter was published in the magazineMuzikalnaiya Zizn (Musical Life) in August 1980. And soon the same year the story wastranslated and published in main Lithuanian cultural weekly Literatura ir Menas

(Literature and Art) this becoming the first source of exciting knowledge to many youngmusic fans as well as mature intellectual readers. It also made Lithuanian youngsters lovethe literature newspaper because it was brave enough to publish cool texts about theirfavorite rock groups!

In case to get such material published the author had to present to a certain degree thePink Floyd as the artists criticizing the capitalistic society. Which wasnt itself incorrect butwas obviously stressed over the top.

For instance,Animals album was introduced by Artiom Troitsky as a social "Chinese

horoscope" combined with the moods of Animal Farm by George Orwell. It was supposedto picture typical bourgeois society out there, but the local readers, who were familiarwith the music and lyrics, saw inAnimals the representation of the Soviet classes. Pigsfitted well to party leaders and all kind of respected rulers of culture. Dogs clearly pointedto KGB agents and all sorts of careerists or guardians of the system. And of course,Sheep were all the rest - simple people like us.

Artiom Troitsky also later published separate in-depth review about then new album,called The Wall. Starting from that, various publications confirmed the album to be theprogressive work of art in Soviet meaning of the term. The Wallwas considered as thebold statement about the alienation and hopelessness of the little man in the

consumeristic world of stagnant beliefs, cold-blood comercialism and business machine.Ironically, most readers saw these points as pure Soviet propaganda because we werestunned to find out instantly that The Wall was in fact about our lives in totalitarian world!


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We felt so familiar with the oppression and cry of the little man which was heard allthrough the terrific songs of the record. I remember also finding this really small man,nearly lost in the painting of the inside sleeve, with the frightening lights on him

The influence and cult appreciation ofThe Wallon this side is simply immeasurable. Asserious rumor goes, the only Soviet music mega label Melodyia was tempted about

releasing the record in around year 1982. Some sources claim that the first copies werealready printed in the factory. And suddenly in the West the new album of the group wasout, The Final Cut. And it had the famous fatal line Breznev took Afghanistan... whichprobably challenged the urgent meeting of party leaders in Ministry Of Culture in Moscow.And all the printed issues were quickly destroyed under the factory press machine. Still,Melodyia does not confirm this story officially so it stays as one of the urban legendscirculating to this day. But that is for sure, since 1983 Pink Floyd suddenly entered thehigh position in secret black list compiled by some party and komsomol headquarters.The list consisted of rock groups not to be played anywhere in open places and it wassent to schools and other educational institutions. It also meant no radio broadcasts, andtelevision was of course out of the question.

At the time, probably few ordinary people and only those who travelled abroad could claimin seeing the Pink Floyd on TV screen. No experience in seeing face to face obviouslyincreased the attention to the photos of the band, images and sleeve art available to thefans. And there was always something visual about the music of Pink Floyd. This wellknown quality of their sound had the special turn to the listener in Soviet Union. Many ofthe music fans were lucky to see the cover of the vinyl album, while taping it, and somehavent seen it at all. But if you once did, it will stay in the back of your mind. All the PinkFloyd album sleeves, especially done by Hipgnosis were taken as integral part of therecord itself. It made an influence to local photographers, artists and was a theme for long

exciting conversations. It became the style of seeing things, as look, this could fit thecover for the next Pink Floyd album!. The inspiration was huge and many of us startedalso to make 'replica' design for the cassettes we recorded. Those more skilled in art wererecreating the cover sleeve to their notebooks or tape boxes and some works wereexcellent. Others were making photographs of the original cover, usually in black andwhite (most accessible at the time). Amateur posters and paintings started to appear.Needless to say, how much creativity was uncovered and elevated thanks to the amazingalbums! It became almost a must to save the lyrics if we got such luck to find it all printedon the sleeve or inside envelope. There were no copy machines then (the first low qualityones became publicly available only in the end of the eighties). So all the song lyrics werere-written by hand to the notebook. And it was extremely important to have the lyrics of

Pink Floyd because its not Abba which singing phrases one can instantly catch withouteffort. On the other hand, some of the memorable lyrics as from The Dark Side Of TheMoon were quite simple and it brought a joy of understanding to the Soviet listener asprobably to any non-native English guy.

Since mid eighties suppression of rock music was heading to an end. Inside policy ofU.S.S.R. went through rapid changes, "black list" of rock artists lost its power. In fact fewimportant breakthroughs were already made since 1979, when Cliff Richard and EltonJohn played gigs at Moscow and Leningrad (now St.Petersburg). It was supposed to bethe "evidence of democracy" for upcoming Summer Olympic games of 1980 in Moscow,

but just few years afterwards rock phenomena made the serious shake of the cultural wallseparating the Western side.


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Pink Floyd appreciation was blossoming in the mid 80's (in spite the new wave influenceto music fashions). The knowledge about early history of the band became also morespread at that time, for instance in Ukraine there was an inoffensive gang who calledthemselves "Syd Boys" and greeted each other in the street like that - all because of theirrespect to the founder figure of the group. It could sound strange, but sixties Pink Floyd inmeans of information and recordings came to "this side" with much delay. All because the

most well-know Pink Floyd albums that turned out to be most successful in the West madetheir way to Soviet Union first. And early records obviously were big rarity and harder toget. But every old album had the eager listener or "student" and such worksas Ummagumma made a serious impact to the emerging Soviet experimental musicscene.

But the transformations of almost cosmic proportion were just round the corner. In winter1989, David Gilmour and Rick Wright were invited by "Glavkosmos SSSR" on the rocketlaunching site in Baikonur to witness Soviet-French rocket take-off in to space, with thePink Floyd cassette recording on board besides the crew. The famous two guests wereallowed to make the digital sound recording of the event, the unique rocket noise forpossible use in the future album! And since this unexpected appearance, dazzling rumorsbegan to turn about Pink Floyd wish to perform live in the Soviet Union. And even whenthe first messages about the tour appeared, many fans were still in disbelief. But like thedream come true, it happened, in June of the same year, as much publicized, five sell-outexciting shows were thundering in sport palace "Olympysky". And "Glavkosmos" - Sovietspace enterprise was also one of the main organizers of the tour!

Later that year, The Delicate Sound Of Thunder, double vinyl LP was released by"Melodyia" label, marking the first official recognition and was greeted by the queues atthe music shops, still common at that time. Afterwards, more titles of Pink Floyd catalogue

were issued on vinyl by semi legal label "Antrop" (offspring of "Melodyia") in early 90's. Asort of "Nice Pair" (with the cover of the Piper At The Gates Of Down) also was issued asvinyl double album by firm "Russian Disk" in 1992.

Walls fell down and independent republics reborn in the place of Soviet Union, known ofgrand cosmic plans. And the group what once made the idea of "space rock" widelyaccessible, was also an important part of the universal changes behind the iron curtain.Pink Floyd belongs to the tape-to-tape revolution with irresistible bright will and theysymbolically started live appearance in Soviet side at the Baikonur cosmodrome, headingus to the future with the better hopes.

by Lukas Devita

Additional discography

The first ever songs by Pink Floyd appeared in U.S.S.R. on flexi-disc as part of Sovietmusic magazine "Krugozor" (Outlook) in October 1980. Three tracks from The Dark SideOf The Moon were included together with the short introductory text. The sound quality ofthe flexi-discs were very low.

Below are listed the "full-fledged" issues (more or less up to the time of the dissolution ofSoviet Union)


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1.Delicate Sound of Thunder"Melodyia", 1989Cat. no: CTEPEO A60 00543 007 (2 LP)Issued under license from EMI records

2.Wish You Were Here"AnTrop", 1991Cat. no.: 91 00213/14 or 32395/96Semi-legal issue produced (as stated on the cover) by the "Center of rock'n'rollcongregations of united Evangelist-Lutheran churches of Russia"!

3.The Dark Side Of The Moon"AnTrop", 1992Cat. no: 91 00093/94 or C90 32309/10Same production as above

4.Pink Floyd 1967-68"Russian Disk Records", 1992Cat. no: R60 00511/12 and R60 00513/14Issued without licence. Double album concists of The Piper At The Gates of Dawn and ASaucerful of Secrets

5.Animals"AnTrop", 1993Cat. no: 9100213/4 or ATR 30057/58Semi-legal issue produced by the "Center of rock'n'roll congregations of united Evangelist-Lutheran churches of Russia" in St. Petersburg.

6.The Wall"AnTrop" and Santa Records, Ltd., 1993Cat. no: 93 00567/68/69/70 or ATR 30139/40/41/42

Note: To solve the legal problems, on all of the releases by "AnTrop" label the additionalremark "Recorded from radio broadcast" was used on the record logo. (At the time,somehow it was legal by Soviet law to reproduce the radio broadcast on the record ).

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Originally published in brain damage pink floyd news resourse

http://www.brain-damage.co.uk

Growing up with PINK FLOYD in the Soviet Union

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