Eric Kraus once wrote that there is a certain type of expat that loves nothing more than to come to Russia, having failed to make it in the West, and get an easy ego boost by constantly harping on about how the West is superior to Russia. They walk around thinking ‘God these people are barbarians, I’m so much more advanced’, and feel pretty good about themselves.

I had a first hand experience of this last weekend. A Russian friend of mine, Sergei, a dentist and wannabe rock singer, told me there was a music exhibition at Sokolniki, and suggested we go. “There’s a guy from a British indie label speaking there”, Sergei said excitedly. “It should be really interesting”.

We met at 10.30, and I ran after Sergei as he bustled excitedly to see this doyen of British indie. “Come on”, he panted. “We can’t be late.” We wandered through the huge halls of Sokolniki until we found the press conference room. At the front of it, a tall podgy man with shaggy blond curls, wearing a shirt that was too small for him, was writing up statistics on a board. This was the guru, Steve Roper, of Roper Consultants. He was a genuine Londoner.

The room filled up behind us, with various wannabe producers, musicians and even an Orthodox monk, all of us yearning to hear the Word from the West, how those wonderful British make their ‘Brit-Pop’, and how us backward Muscovites could imitate them and learn from their success.

Steve began by telling us how rock music was really in right now, and electronic music was out. ‘Electronic music out’ scrawled the pale girl in front of me on her notepad. “That means”, he said, “that if you’re setting up an independent record label, you should probably be getting into electronic music, because in about five years, it will be in again.”‘Electronic music in’, wrote the girl faithfully.

Steve put down his marker and looked at his audience. “Now, if I was setting up a Russian indie label, there’d be some things I’d look at, and others I wouldn’t. A lot of Russian pop acts are still doing dance songs. That’s because they’re five years behind western acts. No one in western pop is making dance pop. They’re all making R&B pop. And in a short while, every Russian pop act will be making R&B pop too”. ‘R&B pop cool’ wrote the girl.

“Thing is”, said Steve, “Russians are never going to make good R&B. I’m sorry, but it’s true. You know why Americans make such good R&B? Because they have 40 years experience of soul music behind them. You don’t”.

“You know”, said Steve, warming to his theme, “I’ve been coming to Moscow for over a year now, lecturing at the college of music and business here. And I haven’t heard one Russian pop song I like. I mean, I’ve heard some that are OK, but none that I want to go out and buy”. You could feel the crowd sink back into themselves, like a dog about to be beaten. Their heads drooped. ‘Yes, it’s true’, they thought. ‘We are shit’.

“I think the problem is, they’re unfinished. They’re kind of quite good, but never totally finished. The production standards aren’t up to it. They’re just nowhere near western production standards. So I’m afraid you’re never going to sell Russian R&B to the West”. 

‘You cannot make Russian R&B’ the translator translated. A boy sitting behind me, dressed head-to-foot in outlandish hip-hop clothes, looked like he was about to start weeping.

“You can’t really do rock either, at least, not rock that will be popular in the West. You know what I suggest? Do traditional Russian folk music. There’s an audience for that in the West. Not a big audience, but an audience. The most interesting young Russians I meet are the ones into traditional Russian music”. The Orthodox monk to my left smiled and nodded.

The talk wrapped up, and Steve was mobbed by a crowd of wannabe stars. A young man handed him a CD of his music, his hands shaking with fear. This could be his shot at the big time! I looked at the cover. It was called Pere$troika, with a picture of a naked girl with a revolver. One of the songs was called Funky Funk.  “You think I should give him my CD?” asked Sergei. He offered it meekly to the Great Steve. “Cheers”, said Steve, barely looking at it.

“Man”, said Sergei, as we walked away from the hall. “Steve is so right. The music scene here is shit. There is nothing here at all”. He seemed really deflated. All those months experimenting with a synthesizer, and it turns out he should have stuck to playing Kalinka on the accordion.

An hour or so later, I was wandering around the halls on my own, when I came across the Great One himself. “Hey, Steve!” I said. “Oh hey, man. You were at the talk yeah? English, right? Cool. Want to go for a cigarette?” I didn’t smoke but I went along anyway. I thought maybe I could get him to come to one of my band’s concerts, maybe he would sign us up. This could be our shot at the big time!

We sat down on a bench outside the hall. “Getting quite cold, innit?” said Steve. ‘God that is so true’, I thought to myself. “So, you just flown over here for this exhibition?” I asked. “No, I live here.”“Really? But…but…why? I mean, like you said, the music scene is shit here. So…are you looking to sign up acts? Maybe traditional Russian music acts?”“Oh no”, he said. “I did a bit of that before, back in England, but I’m done with that now. I just fancied a change.”“So…you don’t work for a record label?”“Nah, I do a bit of lecturing at the institute. Basically, I make money DJing. I’m a progressive house DJ.”

I thought of all those wannabe musicians like Sergei, who’d sat through Steve’s talk and swallowed his every word of criticism because they thought he was some bigwig from a cool British record label. And he was just some…punter.

“Yeah, got myself a Ukrainian girlfriend, make a bit of money DJ-ing. Trying to learn the language, but it’s tough innit? You know any teachers, I mean, cheap ones, I’m quite strapped for cash”.

So Steve, it appeared, was basically a nobody who’d moved to Moscow because nothing was happening for him in London, and now he’d made a career, or at least a career of sorts, by standing up in front of Russians, claiming to be some representative of western culture, and telling them they were all rubbish and nowhere near as good as western musicians, and should just stick to playing Kalinka. And the Russians lapped it up and treated him like he was Phil Spector! It was like something from a Gogol play.

That being said, I sort of agree with Steve. I haven’t heard much Russian rock or pop that I like. But that doesn’t mean Russians shouldn’t carry on making it, and trying to improve. We Anglo-Saxons can’t just sit back on our laurels and think we have a monopoly on making good pop music. Where would techno be without the Germans? Where would house be without the Scandinavians? Where would jazz be without the French, or the Russians?

Last night I saw CSKA beat Arsenal 1-0, because Arsenal arrived in Moscow with the same condescending western attitude, and they were outplayed. And something similar might one day happen in pop music, when bands in Russia or Thailand or Senegal decide they don’t just have to ape western music styles, but can actually advance them, and invent whole new styles of music. Then maybe they will stop sitting around listening to the likes of Steve.

Julian Evans, a British freelance journalist based in Moscow.

October 19, 2006