ID Late '80s Russian Rock Band?

[interbellum]

You sure it is not Gorky Park?

Gorky Park (international title) or Парк Горького (Russian title) is a Russian hard rock band, that gained mainstream popularity in the United States during Perestroika. Gorky Park is famous for its kitsch use of western stereotypes of Russians, such as pseudo-traditional clothing, balalaika-like guitar design and the hammer and sickle as their logo. It was the first Russian band to be aired on MTV.

In 1987 guitarist Alexey Belov, vocalist Nikolay Noskov, bassist Alexander "Big Sasha" Minkov, guitarist Yan Yanenkov, and drummer Alexander Lvov (formerly from Aria) came together to form Gorky Park. Stas Namin, a famous 70's soviet musician, became the band's manager. Because Gorbachev lifted the censorship, many underground rock bands, including Gorky Park, became able to receive more widespread popularity. Later that year the band left Russia for the United States in search of a record deal.

In the U.S. the band soon made some connections in the record business. One of the first people to take notice was famous guitarist Frank Zappa. Jon Bon Jovi and Richie Sambora also helped them to secure a deal with Mercury Records.

The band released a self-titled debut album in 1989, featuring initials 'GP' stylized as a Hammer & Sickle on the cover. With the fall of the Iron Curtain and a growing interest in Soviets to western countries, Gorky Park soon became widely known. The band seemed to be a kind of symbol of American-Russian friendship. The band's first video, "Bang", received MTV rotation. Their next two singles, "Try to Find Me" and a collaboration with Bon Jovi, "Peace in Our Time", received rotation on mainstream radio stations.

Funny sidenote about Gorky Park: To complete my Allan Holdsworth-collection I wanted to have the CD "Stare" from them on which Holdsworth is playing two tracks.
After a long search I finally found it sealed in a German internet-shop. After I ordered it (it was quite cheap) I noticed I had to order for at least € 50, which meant I had to order 10 of these discs. And they only accepted a bank-change, so no credit-card. Well, I got the box with the CD's and sold them all except one.

[progholio]

Can anyone ID this Russian rock band from the late '80s (I didn't have much luck with Google Translate)? Any of their stuff make it to CD?

Interesting, sounds like they're covering Van Halen's I'll Wait with Scorpians style vocals. I imagine that was hot as hell in 1980's Russia.

[spacefreak]

There was an excellent PhD dissertation on Russian 80s rock music produced here in Norway about a decade back, and I still keep the pdf. somewhere. I'll try to find it for you.

Would like to see that paper, if you got any pdf, link or something similar. There's also an interesting read on the subject, that you might know: Timothy Ryback's book "Rock Around the Block". A History of Rock Music in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union (Oxford University Press, 1990).

[Levgan]

Why don't you PM Levgan and see if he can help?

Just found this thread, but unfortunately the description is too vague to identify the band in question. There were dozens of bands playing arena rock in the Perestroika years. Gorky Park is the most famous of the bunch, but I agree it might not have been them, because they mostly sang in English.

As for the band in the original post, everyone in this thread is right. They were called SIR (Сэр) at the start and then renamed themselves SSSR (СССР, which means USSR).

Also, Rostov on Don is in Russia, not in the Ukraine, although it is relatively close to the Ukrainian border.

Alisa
Agata Kristi
Autograph
Aquarium
Auktyon
Aria
DDT
Kino
Mashina Vremeni
Nautilus Pompilius
Krematorij
Grazhdanskaya Oborona
Voskreseniye
Secret
Piknik
Zoopark
Zvuki Mu

This list is like a who's who of Russian rock underground. All of these bands were big (some still are), and a few were really HUGE. However, I would not really classify most of them as arena rock. Alisa were hard rock, Agata Kristi were post punk, Autograph were prog, Aquarium are one of the longest-standing Russian bands with several distinct periods, covering folk rock, art rock and many other genres, Auktyon are experimental post punk, Aria were heavy metal, Kino were post punk a-la The Cure, Mashina Vremeni are melodic 1960s-influenced rock and so were Sekret, Grazhdanskaya Oborona were Russia's premiere punk band, Zoopark were acoustic blues rock, Zvuki Mu were unclassifiable experimental rock etc. I'd say DDT could be called arena rock, although they really turned into a stadium-filling band well after late 1980s.

I wish you had more recollections about the band in question - maybe an album sleeve (did you hear it on LP at all, or on tape or on CD?), maybe instrumentation, were they popular or more like a cult band with a few devoted fans? Also, was their album about teenage love or did that bit refer to your relationship with the girl?

[Proglodite]

It was a cassette copy (not original, so no visual clues); I sort of remember the first song seemed sort of slow with keyboards (maybe a ballad), then up-tempo, catchy rock. I'm not sure if the entire album was a loose concept about teenage love, or just the first two or three songs were sort of linked together (the way Boston put a couple of tracks together, but not become a concept album). That clip I posted originally is the closest I've heard to what I remember.

You're right - she was Russian; I knew someone else back then and he was from the Ukraine.

Peter

[Tepu]

Not sure if anyone is still interested in this information, but I can confirm that the name of the band was indeed CCCP (in Russian), which translates to USSR in English and is pronounced "es-es-es-er." You can hear it called out at the beginning of the video. The band members correct as listed in a previous post. I was in Moscow the summer of 1989 and dated the lead singer Aleksandr (Sasha). The band rehearsed and played frequently at Gorky Park (the actual park) that year, and their manager/producer was Stas Namin. Through him, they were also associated with the band Gorky Park and friends/touring partners with others listed in the above posts. The song in the video is жизни не без тебя (There's No Life Without You). It was one of their most popular, along with каждый выбирает для себя (Each Chooses for Himself). I don't think they ever made a CD--I have a cassette somewhere of their music from that year, but by 1991 when I went back and saw Sasha again, the band wasn't really playing together anymore. I think Vitaly (keyboards) left to go to school and eventually moved to Poland and the rest of the guys just went their separate ways. I think Sasha even left Moscow to return to his hometown of Cherepovets.

*UPDATE* I found their 1989 album online. You can hear the whole thing at http://metalrus.ru/groups/1631 . If you don't read Russian, just scroll down until you see a list of numbered tracks, then click on the link off to the far right. There is a second numbered list further down on the page, but that is an album by Rostislav (Slava) Grivoryev, who was the guitarist. He actually wrote many--if not most--of the songs CCCP performed, but his recordings don't have the same energy.

[Chain]

Logo.jpg

[Proglodite]

*UPDATE* I found their 1989 album online. You can hear the whole thing at http://metalrus.ru/groups/1631 . If you don't read Russian, just scroll down until you see a list of numbered tracks, then click on the link off to the far right. There is a second numbered list further down on the page, but that is an album by Rostislav (Slava) Grivoryev, who was the guitarist. He actually wrote many--if not most--of the songs CCCP performed, but his recordings don't have the same energy.

Thanks - I'll try to check this out tomorrow when I have access to broadband! --peter