THE ZVERSTVO

THE ZVERSTVO / THE BEASTLINESS [rus.]

"I love demented rock music and it doesn't get much more demented than The Zverstvo. Loud, abrasive and deliciously funny, the vocalist of this Russian avant-rock ensemble screams its lyrics over the top of pounding drums, guitar, and a saxophonist that I am sure is on the run from the jazz police. All that screaming doesn't disguise the fact that these brief songs are smartly arranged affairs equally borrowing from rock, jazz, and more than a little art theater. My guess is you will either run from the first track or listen to the whole crazy album several times in a row. I'm on the third listen."
(by Marvin)

 

Despite being known The Zverstvo guy practically don't communicate with the press. Probably such isolation is explained by the fact that journalists often simply don't not know what to ask. But may be it is the other way around: the musicians themselves are not mad about meeting the journalists and prefer traditional ways of talking to the audience – through their music. Yet, we fearlessly decided to risk and ask the members of the band about their opinion on Krasnodar underground, local audience and their own music. So, here they are – The Zverstvo: Petr Pavlovich – vocals, Alexander Ivanovich – double-bass, Ivan Valerievich – guitar. Questions - Roman Matytsin.

R.M..: In your opinion, to which style can you relate The Zverstvo?

A.I.: To label something is an unthankful business. I think that we have rather indirect relations to music generally. It is just according to the laws of pop-music as a genre we use music instruments.

R.M.: So you consider yourself as a pop-group?

A.I. The Zverstvo is a music for entertainment.

R.M.: Aren’t you a bit insincere calling yourself a pop-group?

P.P.: There are three categories of music: traditional, academic and pop-music. Any rock, or disco is pop. Including our music.

A.I.: All the experiments in any of the styles are just experiments. The substance remains the same.

R.M.: Are you considering yourself an experimental band?

P.P.: We are an untraditional pop-group. Some say that we are playing punk-jazz. But punk music implies certain political or social position. We don’t have it. Speaking about jazz, we do not master the level of playing enough to be called jazz musicians. Everything happens accidentally. There is a saxophone player – we play with saxophone. If something happens to him - there will be, let’s say, a piano player.

R.M.: What are your sources of inspiration?

A.I. We are inspired by everything happening around us. Ideas we use are lying under our soles. It is enough to pay a little attention to the nightmare around us.

R.M.: Nightmare, you mean, cultural one?

A.I. Nightmare in everything, starting from Kubanian architecture of residential cottages and finishing with everyday rudeness.

P.P. If there is no notion of ‘architectural ensemble’ in town, where should vocal and instrumental ensembles come from in Krasnodar? On the other hand, Krasnodar is a fertile soil for the growth of abstract arts. In the context of common psychodelia our town is a simply unique place.

R.M.: Simplistic figures you use in your music, minimalism – was it the original position of the band, or you came to it later?

A.I. It is like it is.

I.V. We always wanted to play minimally. But every time we come to record something – we get a Southern Russian carnival. What can we do about it?

A.I. It is all because of the Kubanian vitamins. Look at Akvarium – a typical Northern band, everyone is kind of frozen. And look at our music – twist-and-shout. We are truly Kubanian lads.

R.M.: You don’t really look like lads. Do you play folk?...

P.P. Folk implies traditionality. We are not dressed like Cossacks, while to some extent we, actually, are those. In my view, Krasnodar is a some kind of California. It is not felt yet, but we are trying to hint at it with our music.

R.M.: Who in your opinion is your audience?

P.P. People with not-standard way of thinking who can feel the humour of everything which is going on.

R.M.: Some say that only a prepared person with a certain level of culture and education can understand the music of The Zverstvo?

I.V. We are trying to go away from this. A.I. In any kind of arts emotions come first. The person has to connect, to live through, and only afterwards – to think whether he likes it or not.

R.M.: Why are you so rare performing live?

A.I. We don’t see the purpose of playing the same songs over and over again. It is always interesting to show something new. We have now a new instrument – marimba. When the new programme will be ready, sure we will present it.

R.M.: Are you often invited to play in other cities?

A.I. Yes, we receive such calls.

R.M.: Who is doing management of your band?

I.V. Management is done by everybody, which means by no one.

P.P. So that to send our album to Brian Ino – no, for sure, no one is doing things like that.

R.M.: Are you interested in cooperation with labels? Do you have at least one official release?

P.P. In a classic meaning of this word we don’t have a discography.

I.V. Everything we record we give to our friends or put in the net.

A.I. To move towards underground labels or to create one of our own – these things are of little interest to us.

R.M.: There are some rumours that soon there will be a tribute to The Zverstvo.

P.P. Tribute is no more than a joke. It seems to me that the idea of the tribute came from the simplicity of our songs. They are easy to play, not like some hard or heavy.

R.M.: Do you have any goals? Does your music have some ultimate aim?

P.P. There is an intention to create some kind of ideal music. Sure this will never happen. But our main message is to make the music we would want to listen. Indication of the success of the song for us is healthy laughter.

R.M.: Did you ever have an idea to earn enough money and to give yourself out to music completely?

I.V. You have to be a complete idiot to think that in our country you can earn for living by playing music. Unless you are Philip Kirkorov with everything which follows it.

P.P. Music is separate, money is separate – that is the guarantee of sincerity of music. And when money come, then the Russian rock starts. Although for me the notion of ‘Russian rock’ has no meaning, there is a Soviet rock. It disappeared after 1991. Its meaning disappeared, and the rock itself. Nowadays rock is a repetition of the street songs accompanied with a guitar. The problem is that in Krasnodar and in other towns musicians are not really musicians. Not because they play badly, but because they play musicians. They come on stage like on a spectacle, some kind of Micks Jaggers.

R.M.: What kind of music are you listening now?

P.P. There is Community of Avant-Garde Musicians. In my view this is a very serious thing with a prospect of becoming a some kind of cultural event. You can feel something real in it.

I.V. There are very few new things are coming out in Russian music. In general it is all a re-play of the Russian rock, or the Western one. But life goes on, and this music simply does not catch it.

P.P. Music is a result of cultural processes that happen in your country. The level of music is defined by many external factors – salaries, the style of the city etc. I believe that in seven years, with the development of nano-technologies there will be something interesting in our town.

I.V. Many musicians are trying to run away from their town and trying to play like in Moscow, Saint Petersburg or New York. I, for example, listen a lot of bands from Nizhniy Novgorod, but I don’t hear Nizhniy Novgorod there.

A.I. We are a provincial band but we want our provincialism to be our advantage.

Interview: Roman Matytsin.

Text: Konstantin Volkov

TV-project Sobytia Kul’tury (Cultural Events), ABC, Krasnodar 2009

Translated by RottenBeat, 2009