| A video clip of "Nikita of Ryazan" (Никита Рязанский) from "The Russian Album" (Русский альбом), released in 1992. From an English-language review: The Russian Album: Beautiful. Fundamental. It is arguably the single greatest Akvarium album and it is definitely among the greatest rock albums. After his one and a half foreign solo albums, Boris Grebenshikoiv toured with "The BG Band," recording two albums under that name before renaming the band Akvarium. This piece of genius is the first of those recordings. My theory is that it marks Boris' recovery from a bad spate of bewilderment and disillusionment after he got out of the crumbling USSR into the wasteland of late '80s England/America under the influence of record company folks and his own longstanding ideas of what it means to be a rock star in the West. With Russian Album he takes his own advice (circa Acoustics) and grabs hold of his roots. [...] [The chorus of the opening song,] "Nikita Ryazanski," [goes:] Look, Lord: A fortress, and the fortress breeds fear, And we are children in your hands. Teach us to see you In every misfortune. Take, Lord, this bread and wine. Watch, Lord, as we dive to the bottom. Teach us to breathe underwater. This album emerges from the heart of the heart of darkness, the early years of the 90's. Perestroika and the fall are history, while the present and the foreseeable future belong to the new robber barons and the pseudo-culture of the buzzcut thug. "Nikita Ryazanski" references the ... |
