Deep from the darkest heart of Russia comes this terrifying amalgam of B-culture detritus and mutant retro-futurism. As incongruous as they are sublime, these gems of post-Soviet exotica craft the shuddering twangs of surf rock to elastic electro rhythms, rockabilly chops and theremin wails. Imagine Bruce Haack detained at the border by KGB operatives and thrown into the Gulag with the tortured remains of Dick Dale and Les Baxter. 26 track remastered compilation with deluxe packaging, 20 page full color booklet with scholarly liner notes, rare photos, posters, original covers, memorabilia.
T**K
So-So Socialist Rock
I am all about the exotic sounds of rock from far away places. This compilation was just OK, IMHO. Reading the liner notes, the set was dominated by the same group of performers. I was hoping for more diversity to get a feel of underground Russian music scene. And the said group was heavily influenced by the underground German music scene. Oh well. But, neglecting to notice the sub-title (the electro-exotica part) of the album I was ready for some hard rockin' gritty growlin', but what i got was more the Devo or maybe like some early Nine Inch Nails stuff. The songs do span a wide range-- from of retro surf rock, to futuristic electronic / new-wave kinds of things, but to me, not enough straight up rock & roll. It all adds together to create this weird atmosphere, hard to explain but maybe like a fuzzy 80's TV show in Russian with robots and monsters and creepy clowns and violence and sex and other miscellaneous things happening randomly all around. That said, well i guess this album is kinda cool after all! But for me, I want scuzzy, skanky rock & roll and the greatest compilation available of the Eastern European underground rock thing is "Well Hung - 20 funk rock explosions from beneath Communist Hungary" THAT is unbelievably joyous dangerous gritty rock & roll.
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2 weeks ago
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