Uncensored?: Reinventing Humor and Satire in Post-Soviet Russia

Striking Crude Chords: Bawdy Humor in Post-Soviet Russian Rock

Striking Crude Chords: Bawdy Humor in Post-Soviet Russian Rock Anthony Qualin, Texas Tech University When the Soviet Union broke up, Russian rock underwent a crisis. No longer able to define themselves in relation to Soviet society young bands, such as Nol' (Zero) and Sektor Gaza (The Gas Strip), turned to bawdy humor as a way to rebel against cultural norms1 In the period immediately following the dissolution of the Soviet Union these groups played music of a carnival, festive nature, reveling in the expanded freedom of expression, while using laughter to defuse the anxiety and uncertainty of the times. Such raucous humor differed considerably from the esoteric, pointed, self-absorbed humor of eighties Russian rock. As the nineties came to a close, however, it appeared that post-Soviet pop music, estrada or popsa, had managed to squeeze rock into a marginal cultural space even narrower than that inhabited by Soviet rockers. The social and political changes tha t began with glasnost and perestroika forced rock to adjust to new economic and cultural realities. Whether one views Russian rock of the eighties as a counterculture opposed to the Soviet political and musical establishment or, as Alexei Yurchak prefers, a subculture within the dominant discourse, the dissolution of the Soviet Union changed the context in which the rock artist functioned2 The idealized concept of a rock community of genuine musicians and fans who were involved in the scene for its freedom, honesty, and nonconformity became increasingly difficult to maintain in post-Soviet Russia3 Rock's values were besieged from 1 Scktor Gaza generally means "Gaza Strip," though it can be translated as "sector of gas" as well. The band is named for an area in their home town of Voronezh where chemical plants emit foul smelling gas fumes. Asian Kurbanov, "Gruppa 'Sektor Gaza' kak fenomen otechestvennogo shou-biznesa," http://www.geocities.com/SunsetStrip/ Amphitheatre/400BlwUnf.htm (accessed 9 June 2005). The band does not seem overly interested in Middle East conflicts and there is no evidence that the name is anything more than a pun. The translations of all song titles and citations are my own. 2 Alexei Yurchak, "Gagarin and the Rave Kids: Transforming Power, Identity, and Aesthetics in the Post-Soviet Night Life," in Consuming Russia: Popular Cultllre, Sex, and Society since Gorbachev, ed. Adele Barker (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1999): 76-109, here 80. 3 Lawrence Grossberg discusses the importance of "authenticity" in the context of rock culture in the United States. Grossberg, We Gatta Get Ollt of this Place: Popular ConserUncensored ? Reinventing Humor and Satire in Post-Soviet Russia . O lga Mesropova and Seth Graham, eds. Bloomington, IN: Siavica Publishers, 2008,195-209. 196 ANTHONY QUALIN one side by economic factors and from the other by the cultural confusion that faced all of Russian art in the post-Soviet era.4 After all, it is impossible to maintain an identity as an outsider when the structure in which one refuses to abide appears to have crumbled. As rock is an art form that values rebellionwhether real and imagined - many Russian musicians of the early post-Soviet era turned to the violation of sexual and lexical taboos as a method of defying cultural norms. Though Yngvar Steinholt probably overstates his case, contending that "Sexual themes are surprisingly rare in Russian rock lyrics of the 1980s...,,,5 songs on sexual topics became far more common and more graphic in the post-glasnost era. This change in subject matter was accompanied by a change in the music as well, as bands incorporated an increasing number of folk elements into their works. Finally, the tone of the music became less serious and more playful as rock artists began to perform for a larger segment of the youth population rather than for a relatively small public of bohemian rock aficionados. Early Russian rock has a reputation for being virtually devoid of humor. As Sergei Guriev notes, "In the dawn of their era Russian rockers, with rare exceptions, did not like to joke on the stage.,,6 Guriev goes on to argue that eighties Russian rock humor tended to fall into one of two categories. Some performers, such as Avtomaticheskie Udovletvoriteli (Automatic Satisfiers) and DK, relied on the somewhat crude violation of lexical and sexual taboos. More commonly, however, Russian rock humor was built upon a technique known as steb? valism and Postmodern Cullure (New York: Routledge, 1992),201-09. Russian rock, it seems, is no less concerned with this concept than...