Russia Punk Fashion in the Cold War
A t home in California, Joanna Stingray is an estate agent with 2 additional jobs. Only in Russian federation, the 58-year-old American is a nigh-legend, feted by stone fans and musicians for her fearless championing of Soviet underground music during the cold state of war. "Yous are the mother of Russian rock!" a fan shouted equally Stingray promoted her new autobiography at a Moscow bookstore.
"I always loved that I was famous in Russia and and so I could get dwelling and no i would recognise me," Stingray says, when we meet about Carmine Square. (Stingray in Wonderland has, so far, been published only in Russian.) It'southward only her second visit to Russia since she left her adopted dwelling house to render to the US in 1996, but the years haven't dulled her enthusiasm for her time at the eye of the underground rock scene in Leningrad (now St Petersburg). "In America, we had the 1960s. In Russia, we had that fourth dimension in Leningrad."
Stingray'due south passion for Soviet rock – which led to her being questioned past the KGB and the FBI – inspired her to smuggle recordings out of the country for a landmark compilation album featuring four Russian groups. The Red Moving ridge LP, released in America in 1986, introduced western audiences to Russian rock and helped terminate the Kremlin's censorship of homegrown groups – Mikhail Gorbachev reportedly asked: "Why is it that such albums come up out in America, simply non here?"
Stingray'south first visit to the Soviet Matrimony, in March 1984, came after her nascent rock career striking a hitch. She had released a single, Beverly Hills Brat, and performed at Studio 54, before a dispute with her manager scuttled further plans. Heading to Russia was an act of youthful rebellion: in 1962 her father had produced an anti-Soviet documentary, narrated past Ronald Reagan, and he would oft warn her never to step foot in the communist country. "When your parents tell you lot non to do something, you want to do it even more," says Stingray.
On her inflow in St. petersburg, Stingray and her younger sister ditched their state-employed tour guides to meet a rock musician whose telephone number they got from a Russian émigré. Boris Grebenshchikov fronted Akvarium, regarded at the fourth dimension as the Soviet Union'south leading underground stone group. Like other bands that refused to submit their lyrics to government censors, Akvarium were barred from state-run studios and the stage, every bit well as from releasing music officially. Instead, they distributed their albums on illicit cassettes and played acoustic gigs in communal apartments. The exception was St. petersburg'due south Stone Club, where not-state-approved groups were permitted to perform, admitting under the watchful eye of surreptitious KGB agents. Foreigners were barred.
Back then, Stingray knew nothing of this. At Grebenshchikov's cramped flat, she says, "I pulled out my record covers and my promos and I thought, he must think I'm so cool, an American rocker." Then she got her commencement gustation of Akvarium's music, a blend of Russian and western influences with poetic lyrics that would later encounter Grebenshchikov dubbed "the Soviet Bob Dylan". "I realised I'm not an artist; I'm a airheaded American trying to exist a rocker," she says. "This guy is the artist, and he'south magic." The next night, Grebenshchikov took her to an illegal experimental gig. "It was one of the best nights of my life. It was the moment I realised I was witnessing something extremely special and surreal."
Inspired, Stingray vowed to return to St. petersburg equally soon equally possible. Before she left, Grebenshchikov gave her the number of an American banker with links to David Bowie'due south management. The broker had met Grebenshchikov during a trip to Leningrad and passed on recordings of Akvarium's music to Bowie, who promised to buy him some instruments. Grebenshchikov asked for a ruby-red Fender Stratocaster. Dorsum in the US, Stingray called the number, and Bowie, who had travelled to the Soviet Union in the 70s, duly kept his hope. Stingray delivered the guitar when she returned to Leningrad that year. There was one hitch: custom officials insisted that whatsoever musical equipment brought in had to be taken back out. And so Grebenshchikov's friends created a mock-up, right down to the serial number. It worked.
Stingray's second visit to the Soviet Union attracted the attention of the KGB. As she was leaving an Akvarium gig at the Rock Club, she was pulled aside and questioned by ii agents. "They dragged me downstairs," she recalls. "I was so agape. I knew if I gave them my proper noun, at that place was a good gamble I'd never exist immune back." She eventually admitted she was American. They let her go. She spent the next few hours wandering the streets to milk shake off a KGB tail. "Like a bad movie," she says.
During subsequent visits, Stingray minted potent friendships with members of Akvarium and Kino, another Leningrad-based group, whose guitarist, Yury Kasparyan, she later married. In 1986, Akvarium invited her to perform with them; the plan was thwarted when the KGB threatened to cancel the gig if she got on stage. A few months later, Stingray performed with Kino, a calendar week afterward Gorbachev and Reagan's failed peace meridian in Reykjavik. "We want to starting time the non-agreement that took identify in Reykjavik, Iceland, to demonstrate that we want peace and friendship with the United States," singer Viktor Tsoi said as he introduced Stingray on stage. The musicians wore T-shirts designed by Stingray that read "Salvage the world" in English and Russian.
Determined to get the music of Leningrad's underground rock scene to the west, Stingray enlisted the foreign diplomatic community. "The staff at the American, French and Swedish consulates loved these bands," she says. "Sometimes we managed to go things out through a diplomatic pouch." Stingray also smuggled reel-to-reel tapes and paraphernalia out. "I stuffed the lyrics into my big wintertime boots and I had a big leather jacket with zippers everywhere. If I'd been caught, I would have been screwed. But when yous are young and you lot are passionate, y'all are fearless."
The Scarlet Wave LP was released past US label Big Time to positive reviews and became an secret hitting dorsum home. More importantly, Gorbachev'southward insistence that Soviet music should be available in the Soviet Union led to the end of state censorship of rock: shortly subsequently Red Wave was released, Akvarium made their get-go record for Melodiya, the country-owned record label. "[Stingray'southward] advent in St Petersburg in the early on 1980s was an answer to our unconscious prayers," says Grebenshchikov.
At home, Stingray'due south frequent trips to the Soviet Matrimony attracted the attention of the FBI. "I got my common cold war-era file from the FBI three years ago," she says. "Information technology said that they suspected me of working for the KGB. That's absurd."
With the appearance of perestroika, Stingray moved to Leningrad. She released two albums on Soviet labels before leaving Russia in 1996. In 2014, a pro-Putin MP suggested that she had been part of a CIA plot to foment discontent among Soviet youth through the spread of Kino's music. "That's crazy," says Stingray. "CIA agents would never take been talented enough to write songs like those."
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