Russian rock music originated in the Soviet Union in the 1960s based on the influence of Western rock music and bard songs, and was developed by both amateur bands and official VIA.
Boris Borisovich Grebenshchikov is a prominent member of the generation which is widely considered to be the "founding fathers" of Russian rock music. He is the founder and lead singer of the band Aquarium which has been active since 1972. Grebenshchikov is frequently referred to as BG, after his initials.
Aquarium or Akvarium is a Russian rock group formed in Leningrad in 1972. The band is considered one of the founders of Russian rock. Aquarium has had many line-up changes over its history, and lead singer and founder Boris Grebenshchikov is the only remaining original member. Former band members include Anatoly Gunitsky, Mikhail Feinstein, Andrei "Dyusha" Romanov, Vsevolod Gakkel, and Sergey Kuryokhin.
Viktor Robertovich Tsoi was a Soviet singer-songwriter and actor who co-founded Kino, one of the most popular and musically influential bands in the history of Russian music.
Kino is a Russian rock band formed in Leningrad in 1981. The band was co-founded and headed by Viktor Tsoi, who wrote the music and lyrics for almost all of the band's songs, until his death in 1990. Over the course of eight years, Kino released over 90 songs spanning over seven studio albums, as well as releasing a few compilations and live albums. The band's music was also widely circulated in the form of bootleg recordings through the underground magnitizdat distribution scene. Viktor Tsoi died in a car accident in 1990. Shortly after his death, the band broke up after releasing their final album, consisting of songs that Tsoi and the group were working on in the months before his death.
Sergey Anatolyevich Kuryokhin was a Russian composer, pianist, music director, experimental artist, film actor and writer, based in St. Petersburg, Russia. He was an influential figure in the Saint Petersburg music scene of the 1980s and early 1990s. He was the former keyboardist for the rock band Aquarium.
Khleb is an album released by the Russian band Leningrad. This album was later re-released in Germany, where it gained some popularity.
Gruppa krovi is the sixth studio album by Soviet post-punk band Kino, first released in 1988. Released at the height of Perestroika and Glasnost, together with a crime thriller titled The Needle released in the same year starring lead vocalist Viktor Tsoi, it would go on to be the band's most popular album both inside and eventually outside the Soviet Union, with songs from the album, including the title track, commonly being listed among top 100 lists of Russian music.
Radio Africa is an album by the Russian rock band Aquarium.
Yuri Dmitriyevich Kasparyan is a Russian musician best known for his time as the guitarist of the Soviet rock band Kino and as a member of Vyacheslav Butusov's group U-Piter.
The Leningrad Rock Club was a historic music venue of the 1980s in Leningrad, situated on Rubinstein Street in the city centre. Opened in 1981 and overseen by Komsomol and KGB, it became the first legal rock music venue in Leningrad. Overall, it was the largest rock scene in the Soviet Union and influenced the development of Russian rock.
Mister Twister is a Russian rockabilly band. The band was formed in 1985 when rock’n’roll music was allowed in the Soviet Union.
Joanna Stingray is an American singer, actress, music producer and socialite. She was a key figure in popularizing Soviet and Russian rock music and culture in the West in the 1980s.
DK was a cult Soviet underground rock band founded in Moscow in 1980 by its drummer and leader Sergey Zharikov. It was one of the first Soviet and Russian experimental rock bands. DK was known for the dirty art punk style, sound that combined blues rock, free jazz and RIO, and their scandalous satirical anti-Soviet creativity. The band released about 40 albums from 1980 to 1990. DK was one of the most influential bands in USSR, influencing Soviet and Russian bands such as Grazhdanskaya Oborona, Sektor Gaza, Mongol Shuudan, and Dna Error.
Strannye Igry was a Soviet Leningrad-based new wave band, noted for using the ska influences, writing lyrics based on the translations of the early 20th century French poetry and indulging themselves in all sorts of buffoonery on stage. The Leningrad avant-pop experimenter Sergey Kuryokhin was their regular collaborator. Six of Strannye Igry's songs featured in a 1986 split double album Red Wave which also featured Aquarium, Kino and Alisa.
Andrei Vladimirovich Tropillo was a Soviet and Russian record producer, music publisher, sound engineer, founder of the label AnTrop ("АнТроп"), and rock musician.
Alyans or Alliance is a Soviet and Russian rock band formed in 1981 by Igor Zhuravlev, Kostya Gavrilov, Oleg Parastayev and Andrey Tumanov. The band is best known for the 1987 single "Na zare".
Roksi was a Soviet rock samizdat journal founded in 1977. It published 15 issues between 1977 and 1990. Roksi is generally considered to be the first rock music periodical in the Soviet Union.[Note 1]
AnTrop is a Russian record label and production center founded by Andrei Tropillo. The name of the label is made up of the first letters of his first and last name.
Vsevolod (Seva) Yakovlevich Gakkel' is a Russian rock musician, who played cello in the band Aquarium. Gakkel founded the club TaMtAm and was the art director of the club Chinese Pilot Jao Da in Saint Petersburg.
