Russian rock star Boris Grebenshikov: 'Millions are afraid to think,
afraid to speak out'
One of the biggest names in Russian rock music -- perhaps the biggest
of all -- is now listed as a "foreign agent" in his homeland, a
designation that taints Boris Grebenshikov as an anti-patriot, even a
traitor. The charge meets with an amused shrug. "Ah, I'm always on a
list!" he says, laughing. "In the '70s I was on a list of forbidden
people. In the '80s I was there. It's all right."
Grebenshikov, 69, is famous throughout the Russian-speaking world as
the leader of the band Aquarium. They pioneered the rock scene that
emerged in the USSR in the 1970s. Initially a semi-clandestine version
of western hippy music, especially prog and folk-rock, acts such as
Aquarium captured popular imagination in the 1980s as harbingers of a
new Russia. They were like the pied pipers of perestroika. But
Grebenshikov has fallen foul of officialdom once again with the return
of authoritarianism.
https://www.ft.com/content/ef51acbd-cbbc-45eb-80b6-f5794d7486be
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