Leader of the "AuktYon" group Leonid Fedorov: "Grebenshchikov did not understand the essence of "Paradise"

Leonid Fedorov and the group "AuktYon"

Leonid created his group “Auction” in 1983. After some time, the name underwent a slight adjustment. The group became known as "AuktYon". It was Fedorov who became the musical director of this group. He was also a composer and vocalist, but this was never advertised as a musician.

In the mid-eighties, “AuktYon” was considered one of the most interesting rock bands in the USSR. The group had a recognizable stage image and a unique musical style. Success mainly depended on Leonid Fedorov, although one cannot ignore the work of all the other musicians.

The guys began touring, including abroad. They appeared on stage during the same period of time when “Sounds of Mu” and the legendary “Kino” with Viktor Tsoi performed successfully. The musicians performed abroad more than two hundred times. Tours in North America and France were especially successful.

Creative biography[ | ]

A native of Leningrad, Leonid Fedorov took his first steps as a musician in the 1970s as part of beginning amateur rock bands. Leonid Fedorov, according to him, made his first attempts to create a musical group at the age of fourteen. The ensemble consisted of his classmates who rehearsed in Leonid’s apartment. One of the first performances was at Fedorov’s school, where they played at one of the graduation balls; according to him, his voice died before the start of the second part of the program, and the graduates finished the program[1].

In the fall of 1978, he assembled a group: Leonid Fedorov (guitar), Dmitry Zaichenko (bass) and Alexey Vikhrev (drums). Two years later, their ranks were joined by two more school friends of Leonid: Mikhail Malov (guitar, vocals) and Viktor Bondarik (bass guitar), Zaichenko switched to organ. At the same time, Sergei “Squaw” Skvortsov joined them as a sound engineer and lighting designer. The group was called “Phaeton” and performed mainly at school parties[2].

Auction[ | ]

Main article: Auction

Leonid Fedorov as part of the AuktYon group at a concert in the St. Petersburg club “Waiting Room”, July 10, 2009

In May 1983, “Phaeton” was renamed “Auktsion”, later renamed “AuktYon”, where Leonid from the very beginning was assigned the role of musical director and main composer of the group, and later - the lead vocalist. Playing an important role in shaping the creative image of the group, Leonid invariably kept a low profile both on stage and off, avoiding excessive popularity and publicity.

The creative development of “AuktYon” took place in the mid-1980s: then Soviet rock came to the forefront of cultural life in the country and aroused interest in the world. In a short time, "AuktYon" gained fame as one of the most interesting domestic rock bands with an unmistakable stage image and a unique musical style. In 1989, "AuktYon", along with other leading Soviet rock groups "Kino" and "Zvuki Mu", was invited to give concerts in France, where the group was one of the first in the country to record a CD.

During the years of the economic crisis in Russia, “AuktYon”, which valued its creative independence, conducted active touring activities abroad. The group has over 200 performances in Europe and North America. In 1992, their long-term collaboration with the poet, performer and artist Alexei Khvostenko began. The fruit of this collaboration during Khvostenko's lifetime was four albums of studio and live recordings; Leonid turned to his legacy in the future.

In April 2007, AuktYon’s first studio album in 11 years, “Girls Sing,” was released. It was recorded in New York with the participation of Vladimir Volkov, as well as famous American musicians, stars of the New York underground: Marc Ribot, John Medeski, and Ned Rothenberg. In October 2011, another studio work of the group was presented - the album “Yula”.

The beginning of solo activity[ | ]

In the late 1990s, without stopping working and performing as part of AuktYon, Leonid Fedorov became known as a solo performer. His acoustic debut CD, Four and a Half Tonnes, was released in 1997. The subsequent active work together with the progressive ethno-jazz project “”[3] was reflected in the recordings published on the discs “There Will Be No Winter” (2000) and “Anabena” (2001). Constantly expanding the circle of creative like-minded people and musical movements that interested him, Leonid Fedorov actively experimented - collaborated with such diverse artists as Vladimir Volkov, Vladimir Martynov, Tatyana Grindenko and the early music ensemble [4], the choir of Russian sacred music ""[5], Leonid Soibelman and “We Didn’t Expect”, Alexey “Colonel” Khrynov, “Stolen Sun”, “Leningrad”; actively worked on music for films and television films; In his work he turned to Russian poetry of the twenties of the 20th century, folk, classical and sacred music, avant-garde jazz. In 2002, he began implementing another project, this time together with the famous Russian folk singer Sergei Starostin and the director of the Sirin choir Andrei Kotov (later implemented in the program of the album Soulful Songs for Every Day (2008)). More than once Leonid acted as a sound engineer and music producer of recordings by other artists.

"Snail Records"[ | ]

At the end of 2000, Leonid Fedorov founded his own record label “Ulitka Records”, on which he published both his solo works and the recordings that were closest to him and most interesting. The effect of the independence gained in this way was the increased productivity of Leonid’s solo work in recent years. In the fall of 2003, his next solo album, “Purple Day,” was released, which attracted extensive press and aroused a lot of positive reviews as one of the most original and interesting new works on the domestic music scene. In the spring of 2004, two new discs in the genre of musical audiobooks were released, prepared together with one of the brightest representatives of the Russian cultural diaspora, Henri Volokhonsky - “Mountains and Rivers” and “Joyce”. In 2005-2006, three more records by Leonid Fedorov together with Vladimir Volkov were released: “Metal” (2005), called by many[ who?

] the best domestic record of the year, then “” (2005) with lyrics by “oberiut” Alexander Vvedensky, and “Beauty” (2006) with lyrics by Arthur Molev and Andrei Smurov.

On December 29, 2007, at the Moscow Central House of Artists, a presentation of Fedorov and Volkov’s new disc, “” based on poems by Vvedensky and Khvostenko, took place, and in mid-November 2008, work was completed on the duet’s next album, “”, which was presented to the public on December 26, 2008 .

On May 22, 2009, sales of the album “Waves”, created together with Vladimir Volkov, began. In 2010, two albums were released at once: in March - “Razinrimilev”, recorded in collaboration with Vladimir Volkov, Marc Ribot and John Medeski based on a poem by Velimir Khlebnikov, in September - “Wolfgang”, recorded with Vladimir Volkov.

The beginning of Leonid Fedorov's musical career

When recording their first albums, the musicians could not be sure that they would one day be released on media, or that the group members would be able to receive money for this.

At the very beginning of the journey, it seemed that the music of “AuktYon” should appeal to everyone, that they would definitely listen to it. But in reality, everything turned out to be not entirely true.

Fedorov remembers that a month after the appearance of the Kino group’s program, which was called “Blood Type,” songs were heard from all sides, they were already sung by heart. This has never happened with Auction. Not everyone was interested in their music. A sensation could only be made in those places where a prepared public gathered. If the performance took place at any factory, it was clear that people were not interested in their work. Some even asked after the concert what they were singing?

Album “Bird” by Leonid Fedorov

In 1992, the album “Bird” was released. It consisted of hits that can still be heard on the radio. Fedorov believes that this album turned out to be accessible, but this is not enough for popular love. He could write “more fun” songs that more people would enjoy listening to. Such music and songs are written without difficulty. But he is interested in doing exactly his music, exactly what he wrote and is writing.

Leonid Fedorov's songs have been popular for several decades

Fedorov says that their group received a lucrative offer. They were promised frequent concerts, including at the Olimpiyskiy, but they had to sing only what they were told. The musician was never interested in such offers. Leonid has no ambition to prove something to someone, to please someone. He is interested in the creative process itself and likes to push the boundaries of what is possible. According to him, he doesn’t even need an audience. But if someone is impressed by his music and someone praises it, that’s certainly nice.

There is a lot of dissonance in Fedorov's music. One gets the impression that dissonance was deliberately placed on top of the beautiful melody. The musician believes that only such music is real. When he hears the completed form, he gets the impression of something unctuous, as if he were listening to a parody. And there is no truth in such music.

Leader of the “AuktYon” group Leonid Fedorov: “Grebenshchikov did not understand the essence of “Paradise”

The helmsman of the Auction, adored by the free part of our society, Leonid Fedorov and avant-garde multi-instrumentalist Vladimir Volkov presented their new album in the capital's Central House of Artists. Before this event, an Izvestia columnist spoke with Leonid.

This is not the first time on New Year's Eve that St. Petersburg rocker Lenya Fedorov, in collaboration with Vladimir Volkov, designs and records intricate albums in his Moscow apartment based on poems by poets who are captivated by the play of sounds. Three years ago, Fedorov, bypassing the “AuktYon”, put together a record “Bezonders” based on the poems of the repressed Oberiut Alexander Vvedensky. Then “Beauty” appeared, based on texts by Andrei Smurov and Arthur Molev. And now here is “Sheaf of Dreams”, connected from the little-known works of the recently departed hippie emigrant Alexey “Tail” Khvostenko and his friend Anri Volokhonsky.

However, one must be more careful with the definition of “little known” in relation to “Sheaf”. Among the dozen international tracks of the album, called “Pagan Song”, “Portuguese”, “English”, “African American”, “Russian”, etc., there is the hyper-famous “Paradise” among the people. They just got used to calling it “Golden City”, or even “Under the Blue Sky”, and listening to it performed by Boris Grebenshchikov. In “The Sheaf of Dreams,” Volokhonsky’s famous verse is sung by the Tail and seems to do it with the meaning and intonation that the author of the work himself intended.

question: You and Volkov have addressed the work of Khvostenko and Volokhonsky more than once. After “The Sheaf,” you get the feeling that you have found a poetic deposit that suits you and decided to scoop it up entirely. Do you strive to ensure that nothing written by Khvost and Anri remains unsung?

answer: I'm just interested. I'm trying to find music that doesn't exist, and I think these writers are some of the best at achieving that goal. Their poems are much more interesting than all other modern material that I know.

Q: Did you dig deep?

A: Well, I hear what is played on the radio, on the Internet, I read something, and so far I have not come across anything that surpasses the works of Khvostenko and Volokhonsky. “Paradise,” for example, as one of my friends said, is actually our anthem like “Victory Day.” This is about us. I had a couple of tracks with Khvost’s voice, which he recorded shortly before his death at Anri’s home in Germany. Volokhonsky sent them to me. I wanted to work with this material, then the idea arose to record an album.

Q: The fact that at one time you began to move somewhat away from “AuktYon” is not difficult to explain. You wanted a different self-expression, some creative twists. But now it turns out that you are again stuck in one form of, let’s say, avant-garde chamber projects in tandem with Volkov. Your joint discography will soon be equal in volume to that of “Auktsyon”...

o: Yes, it will be equal, but I don’t yet feel the limit in our union. By the way, Volkov is now playing with “AuktYon” - himself, of his own free will. I didn't force him to do this. I don't question why he and I continue to work together. In my opinion, it’s great that every year we manage to record an album, or even two. We found an original, not boring form.

Q: Apparently, you need to look through more collections of Kruchenykh and Kharms...

A: Kharms, in my opinion, is generally impossible to sing. The same as Zabolotsky. I don't hear music in their poems. Those whom I have listed have such a gift in their texts.

Q: Is Mandelstam musical?

Oh no. He has passion in every poem. And we need people who are as cold as ice. Kharms has a lot of passion, but Vvedensky has none at all.

Q: So you are looking for an absolute pole of cold in poetry and music?

A: Because this is freedom. You can give any mood to such texts. In general, I have a reserved attitude towards passionate poetry. My friend, composer Vladimir Ivanovich Martynov, for example, believes that such poetry ended a long time ago.

Q: What do we have left? Rock and roll is dead, poetry is over...

about: The end of culture. It's actually not as funny as it seems. Martynov’s statement looks like offensive absurdity, but I see much more truth in it than in waving his arms and shouting about the originality and greatness of our culture.

Q: And “AuktYon” is not poetic?

A: Naturally. We calmly figured out poetry in songs. She simply isn't there.

Q: So you are crossing out the work of Dmitry Ozersky (the main author of the “Auktsyon” texts. - Izvestia)?

o: Why? He is not a poet in its purest form. Although now he is just working on his poetry collection. Good. But in “AuktYon” Dima deals with the lyrics of songs - he said this himself - and not with poetry. Moreover, he would have rewritten half of the texts of “AuktYon” if they had decided to publish them as a separate book. There are a lot of incorrect phrases there. We sometimes deliberately inserted some discordant words and made songs that had their own harmony. At the same time, I note with regret that our songs with Ozersky are not dispassionate.

Passion, it is always for some reason, and the reason is momentary. The occasion goes away, and passion becomes stupid. Any passion, in my opinion, initially contains human stupidity. But I want detachment, coldness, like Tsoi, Laurie Anderson, Vvedensky... This shows some kind of powerful peace.

Q: “Sheaf of Dreams” includes a rare performance of “Paradise” by Tail. Or is this a later version of it, after BG’s “City of Gold”?

A: Tail recorded it literally a year before he left. And we talked about how “Paradise” should sound for a long time.

Q: Don’t you like Grebenshchikov’s version?

o: Not really... It’s just that when I read the text, heard Khvost sing this song, talked directly with the author of the poem, Anri Volokhonsky, I understood a lot. Volokhonsky, unlike Khvostenko, had a very negative attitude towards the Aquarium version. He did not like the romance of “The City of Gold.” And Khvost’s wife Rimma didn’t like the fact that Grebenshchikov distorted the text. But most importantly, he thus admitted to a complete misunderstanding of the essence of the song. It is called “Paradise” and begins with the line “Above the blue sky...”, and not “Under the sky...”. Do you notice the difference? These are different images. But the man, obviously, did not understand what this text was about, and made an urban romance out of it. And this is not a romance, this is an anthem! And that’s how Volokhonsky and Khvostenko presented him.

Q: As I understand it, you are not very inspired by Boris Borisovich right now. But he remains one of the few in our rock music who differs from the performers from the “Our Radio” clip.

A: Perhaps “Aquarium” is really the most interesting thing we have right now. I don't want to criticize him in any way. But in general I don’t like what’s happening in this country. Because nothing happens. The fact that young people are playing and listening to us now is ridiculous. No matter what group or performer you take, everything is at the level of the Leningrad rock club of the early 80s. I'm not interested in this at all. I listen to other music, mostly Western. Once upon a time, I remember, I first heard “Strange Games” and was stunned. They played and thought then at the level of the leading underground groups in New York and London. But, sorry, that was in 1982.

And now someone is probably doing something of high quality here, but I don’t see it. And what is heard on the radio, especially on Nashe Radio, is 99 percent nonsense. The best thing I hear there is Tsoi. The rest is the same Soviet radio “Mayak”, “at the request of dear radio listeners.” For those who listen to, say, Alena Apina, there are no problems. For the rest, we have no sources of information other than the Internet.

One of the best singers in the history of world rock, Laurie Anderson, came to Moscow, and only a few hundred connoisseurs sat in the hall. Although, it seems to me, all of our singers today should have run there and listened with their mouths open to this 60-year-old aunt, who is still doing everything. I have never heard a better concert in Moscow. No one here even comes close to her.

Q: The Russians have a singer Zemfira...

o: And God be with her! I understand that this is very fashionable, but I am not interested. In my opinion, this is the music of the last century. We used to do similar music-making at dances. Several musicians got together and distributed: you play bass parts, you play solos, and I sing songs... But the days of the Beatles are gone. A lot has changed since then. There was already great art rock, and punk, and grunge... Probably, someone still needs something like “the faces are erased, the colors are dull...”, but I find it boring.

Q: Do you agree with the assumption that Fedorov makes money with “AuktYon” in order to later be able to engage in underground solo work?

o: Nothing like that. Vice versa. I now earn much more solo and with Vova. And “AuktYon” is my tribute to friendship and the pleasure of performing together with its participants.

Q: Are you ready for “Sheaf of Dreams” to turn out to be one of your most difficult albums for the public to perceive?

o: This one?! I don’t know... Everything about it is simple for me.

Solo activity of Leonid Fedorov

Fedorov began performing solo at the very end of the nineties, but he remained in “AuktYon”, continuing to perform.

Leonid’s first solo album was called “Four and a half tons.” This was in 1997. In 2000, the disc “There Will Be No Winter” appeared, and a year later another one – “Anabena”.

The musician collaborates with ensembles, projects, artists, choirs, thus expanding the circle of like-minded people.

Together with Vladimir Volkov, the album “Waves” was created, which was released in 2009. A year later, two more of their joint albums were released. In 2013, listeners were able to evaluate another result of the joint work of Volkov and Fedorov - the album “If He Is Not There.”

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Leonid Fedorov

Leonid Fedorov Leonid Fedorov Career: Musician

Birth:
Russia, January 8,
1963 Leonid FEDOROV was born in Leningrad on January 8, 1963. Phaeton assembled his first rock band from his classmates in 1978. By mid-1981, when he was already a student at the Polytechnic Institute, the group acquired its first stable lineup, debuted on June 18, 1982, performing energetic post-punk numbers by Fedorov and Dmitry Ozersky, his constant collaborator. At the same time, Oleg Garkusha appeared in the group, and thanks to his eccentric dances, he became the headliner of the Auction. The first performance of the group under this name took place on November 18, 1983. For the next two years, AuktsYon worked on a new repertoire, and only in May 1986 he presented the program Return to Sorrento to the public. The pinnacle of the new stage was the album Bird (1994). In 1997, Fedorov recorded his first solo album, Four and a Half Ton. In 1999, he found new like-minded people in the musicians of the jazz group Volkovtrio. In subsequent years, he continued to perform both as part of Auction and with other musicians. In total, Leonid Fedorov has 16 albums recorded with Auction and 8 original records.

add photos add biography

The most living and constantly developing fairy tale of the St. Petersburg rock club, Leonid FEDOROV annually produces a fresh plan, releases a new disc, amazing his fans. Concerts at different venues and with a variety of lineups. Having caught him between performances at the festival of the classical minimalist Vladimir Martynov, tours in Ukraine and work on a new record, his correspondent tried to find out how Leonid manages everything and what he wants to catch up with soon.

I saw you for the first time in the film Rock in 1987, and I still can’t forget the atmosphere of scandal at the AuktYon concerts of that time, where there was swearing and either Garkusha or Veselkin bared his ass... You then, as they say now, lit up. And now you play in clubs, experiment for a narrow circle of your own...

As for swearing, it’s not difficult for us even now... The question is not what, but how and why... I didn’t like the stadium under any circumstances. For me, this is an overly simple problem of forming a stadium and setting it on fire. Then, in the 80s, it seemed interesting: after all, we can breathe freely. There were such feelings, but now they are not there.

In the legendary Leningrad rock club, which of the guys did you have good relationships with and with whom do you still have good relationships? Or was everyone hopelessly screwed up?

There was a legend. And the point of it is that we were supposedly all together then. In fact, relationships with some are closer and with others further away. And as for the fact that now people, then close ones, are hopelessly divorced... No, I wouldn’t say that. We met with Grebenshchikov the other day in Moscow, on TV.

How many years have you not seen each other?

About seven years.

And what? Hello, hello?

No, we chatted a bit...

Lenya, who or what do you miss from that time in the mid-80s?

Of course, Seryozha Kuryokhin... Now everyone who is not too lazy is feeding on his ideas, right up to the patriotic show on Red Square, which was staged by Konchalovsky. The influence is so powerful that it affects all major projects in both theater and cinema. Just don’t talk about the impact. And about the fact that the gentleman was excellent. After his death, the same thing happened to him as to many people in the counterculture: they began to use it shamelessly.

You had only one other close uncle, who had such an impact on many that we only now understand what happened to him. Tail. Alexey Lvovich Khvostenko, the final hero of the Parisian-Russian bohemia. Tell us how you met him and how you sang together.

I learned about Khvost, by the way, from Kuryokhin, who said that Under the Blue Sky is his song, that Khvost lives in Paris, and later there were people who invited Auction there. We were taken straight from the airport to a tavern for dinner. Then Mamleev lived there, from the magazine Continent People, in general, the whole flower of the Russian emigration gathered in that tavern. Tail and I were next to each other, and in five minutes there was a complete spiritual merger, just like that of a father and son.

The tail on the record says that you were rocking for a long time about the Teapot of Wine, but recorded it soon...

I didn’t hesitate, from the third meeting I said: Come to St. Petersburg, we’ll record it. To which there was a sharp answer: They kicked us out, and we will not return to this country. And then, in one of the meetings, Tail says: Well, let’s try it anyway, I have an idea. He organized something like a dinner party, I arrived about two hours before, and he recorded 25 verses of songs for me on a cassette player. Along the way, we drank a barrel of wine, about seven liters, and when everyone arrived, Tail and I were already in the sausage, but happy... And a month later Tail calls me: I am flying to you with some kind of humanitarian aid, get ready to write. And we recorded Teapot. Very agile.

And the Dweller of the Peaks? Do you even understand what you did then? I won’t say that I was at all deaf to Khlebnikov’s poems, but you completely exposed these charades

Again, thanks to Khvost, due to the fact that when he first began to explain Khlebnikov’s text to me, everything became clear. He showed how it originally sounded... We sat in a friend’s apartment and puzzled over the record all January. Then I went to Moscow, made an agreement with the studio, they were distrustful at first, but I blurted out to them that this was Russian rap. The whole service took about six months, but I had a calendar where I put a cross when a studio was assigned, and I calculated: it took us two months smoothly...

Remembering Gogol's Inspector General, who was the first to say that in your project with Vladimir Martynov, Bin Laden and St. Francis?

Tanya Grindenko, great violinist, Volodya's hostess. We played her Opus posth program There will be no winter. You should have seen the Auction in silk camisoles... And, having met Martynov through Tanya, the three of them began to think about a continuation. Volodya remembered his rock opera Seraphic Visions of Francis of Assisi, composed in some shaggy year of seventy, but then he no longer wanted to remake the old thing, but the thought remained.

And Bin Laden appeared?

And Bin Laden appeared.

And from what hangover?

We had a press conference where we talked about this project, and Volodya gave an amazing phrase, as if he had read my thoughts. They say that both bin Laden and Francis, in their own way, destroyed the bourgeois way of life, and at the same time, the image of each was taken into service by the forces with which they fought and is actively used in the interests of this bourgeois world. Although they seem to have absolutely nothing in common.

Do you ever feel that the bourgeois world somehow wants to use you?

You know, it’s strange, but I still managed not to depend on anyone. Because I don't go to them.

And they don't call you?

No, it happens... We recently went to Davos. There was an economic forum there and a program dedicated to Russian culture. The company was funny: Igor Butman, Meladze, Chaif, the Veretentse ensemble, Nino Katamadze, a young lady from Tbilisi, with the Insight group, Volkov and Starostin and me. And that same one... kind of sweet-voiced, in sparkles...

Basque?

Yes, Blyostkov (laughs). And the only one who didn’t like it there was us. People just got up and left.

You, Leonid, do not fit into the format.

Don't want.

Martynov has the idea that the end of the time of composers has come. Have you ever had the feeling that the end of the time has come for Auction, which is still more than 20 years old? One after another, the anniversaries of our rock bands are celebrated, and everyone pretends that all these years have been a fresh turn.

Feeling the end? (Laughs.) Why not... Actually, I'm an optimist. We don't give concerts often. On average a couple per month. The composition of the group has not changed in practice since the beginning of the 90s, and, of course, for a long time now we have not had the same interest in joint creativity, as in things that we did not have to do together, but separately have to do. With Dimka Ozersky, the author of most of AuktsYon’s lyrics, we often perform in tandem, playing with double bassist Vovka Volkov. True, since his Volkov trio have become less common, but the Volkov Fedorov Starostin trio has emerged... Do you know Seryozha Starostin?

How about this: the number one issue of Russian world music... And all of the above and the unnamed, say, collaboration with Andrei Kotov, whose ensemble Sirin sings church music, are different things for you?

Why different? It's all music. Playing with Starostin and Kotov is not three tenors. Their musical culture is of a different quality than mine. That’s why I’m drawn to it: it’s exciting!.. A couple of years ago, Kotov proposed to perform a program of monastic and beggarly Russian songs that are five hundred years old, Starostin’s original works, mine, plus several classic folk songs. The result was a beautiful service of the Song of Death, where, apart from pure singing, there is truly nothing. See how everything works out. Like everything is constant in my life.

Sorry for the pun, but do you only succeed when personal sympathy arises? Or does it happen differently?

No. Can not be. Everything that comes, it comes by itself, without effort on my part. Just like he leaves. I studied piano at a music school and quit. I asked my dad to buy me a guitar. I worked at a research institute after that at the Polytechnic University, and suddenly, out of the blue, I upped and left. Likewise, the lineups I played with came together and disbanded. Everything happened and is happening on its own, contrary to logic...

This is already Taoism, Leonid.

Maybe.

In your, excuse me, religious beliefs, who are you closer to?

Yes, to the Orthodox, to whom else...

Because it’s dear, close?

Not even closer. But it seems to me that this is the only thing that can raise our country.

Don't you like her today?

No. What could she like?

Because there are people like you in the Russian country.

There are a lot of people everywhere. But terrible for the children. You know, when all this perestroika began and the Auction began to travel, in Munich I met Henri Volokhonsky, a poet and philosopher, a friend of Khvost, with whom he jointly wrote Under the Blue Sky. He asked me: Well, Lenka, do you feel that a different existence has begun for you? And I answered him: Yes, it’s all the same to me, whether Gorbachev or Brezhnev. He says: Why don’t you understand, because the total distorted version of the facts that made everyone tremble with fear is gone. I didn't agree with him. And, in my opinion, he was right. And I remain right. My dad told me that he was in the Gulag three years before his death. In 1993, when everyone had already read Solzhenitsyn and forgotten. But my dad was still afraid. I was offended by him. After all, it would have been vile if he had not told me about this and that his father, my grandfather, the one who fought in Spain, was hanged by ours in 1942. And after this war, dad answered for his grandfather. He was afraid for me, dad. The most amazing thing is that dad, in principle, was not afraid of anything at all. But he was accustomed by life to the fact that, with the best intentions, one is allowed to lie, moreover, to one’s own children. And now I see that the total distorted version of the facts has not gone anywhere. It has acquired other forms, but tomorrow you only have to click your finger and everything will be the same. We remained a dinosaur: a huge body and such intelligence, as big as a child’s fist. Therefore, it is necessary not to be offended that we are not loved, but to stress what is allowed to be done so that we are allowed to be loved.

When did you think about it?

After one of the first visits to Germany. One day I returned from there and fell ill. And I couldn’t understand why. And then I realized that, unlike us, they are easily honest people. That is, they specifically have a complex about the fact that fascism existed. They said to themselves: fascism existed and it was us, not someone else. But we cannot easily say: we are goats, we were engaged in the murder of our own children, passing it off as some kind of victory, and today we continue to engage in this disgusting thing. We show our atrocities on television, instead of washing away our stinking Augean stables.

Do you like to work?

When it's exciting, yes, I love it.

But aren't you a workaholic?

From what. I can sit quietly for 12 hours. When it's fun. And at the moment I’ve been lying around for two days now, I’m tired for some reason. Happens. I'm lying down, watching TV. But I can’t do music programs.

Anything about animals?

Cinema, performances. Culture most often

What do you think of yourself as a St. Petersburg resident living in Moscow?

What do you mean I live in Moscow? We just move around a lot and rent an apartment with Lidka and my wife, sometimes in this place, sometimes in St. Petersburg. But we haven’t been to St. Petersburg very often in the last two years. Basically, everything is here, but in St. Petersburg... When it was the tricentenary, they updated everything there to the point of ridiculousness. Posts with chains on Nevsky Prospect were glued using Moment glue. There used to be a real existence, but today it’s kind of provincial. And in the early 90s, I didn’t feel any difference between St. Petersburg and Moscow. And nowadays Peter is open, but self-sufficient and quiet. Calm may not be bad, but it’s not fun. Everyone feels boredom these days, and everyone runs away from it. So Mamonov moved to the village and is happy that, as Pushkin said, there is serenity there. Instead of boredom. And I’m not Pushkin or Petya Mamonov, I like to make noise. Moscow is suitable for this.

They say Starostin is urging you to produce a record that will contain only the roar of the city?

Yes, there is such a thought. But frankly speaking, it's scary

We have said this word many times today.

In terms of?

Well, about fear.

Fear? It’s easy every time I don’t know how or what will happen. So far, apart from the idea, there is nothing. In the mid-90s, when the tail of the Resident of the Peaks and I were writing, I walked to the studio on foot through the courtyards, through the passages on Nevsky, and the characters there changed all the time: they booged, they fermented, they sang. And I kept thinking: I need to grab a tape recorder and record it all... It was a melodic flow: different things were mixed there and created music, funny, wild, touching. But such ideas, in my opinion, are easy to hang in the air. It can be done, but it is permissible not to build it. And existence, its hum, will not stop because of this, right, true?..

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Leonid Fedorov currently

In 2012, the album “Spring” appeared, which was recorded on the poems of Alexander Vvedensky without a group and without Volkov at Fedorov’s home studio. It can be described as something between “Waves” and “Four and a half tons”.

Leonid Fedorov continues to give concerts

The album contains alternative hip-hop, recitative, and prog rock. Some things are somewhat similar to the work of Boris Grebenshchikov and Marc Ribot. One of the songs was performed by Leonid and his wife. She sings along there in a child's voice.