About author
1997 2007 2018
I was born on 16th of December 1979 in Leningrad, now Saint-Petersburg. My first encounter with "electronic" music was at the age of five or six. It was an LP by a Latvian group called "Zodiac", and the albums' title was "Disco Alliance". It was basically a Soviet copy of the French group "Space". In other words, not the kind of stuff I would listen to, now. However, back then it was kind of miracle to hear all those far-out sounds and rather cute melodies. I think that was when I really fell in love with synthetic sounds. I literally wore off this LP. Around the same time during our stay in the southern region of Russia (it was the coast of the Black Sea, in Caucasus) I saw a real synthesizer for the first time.
Our family had regular trips to the seaside during summertime in those years and once in a while there was a rock-group called "Reklama" ("Advertisement") playing evening shows in the small town of Divnomorskoye. I remember the following just as if it was just yesterday: a man from the crowd was allowed to play some kind of Armenian folk melody (I can't say what it was exactly) on the synthesizer. So he played and played and then he pushed something on the synth (a button maybe) and the sound changed completely. I don't know why this fact impressed me that much, but it certainly had some impact on my vision of music. Of course, I didn't know anything about synthesizers and electronic instruments back then, but it seemed so fascinating and at the same time natural... This is something I couldn't explain back then and actually cannot explain even now. I just felt it HAD to be like this, I knew subconsciously, that synthesizer was capable of producing lots of different sounds, I mean, I knew it wasn't piano or something. I don't know which type of synth it was but I do remember the "Casio" logo on it. (I think it could be something from the CZ series) In any case, that's completely another story. Maybe someday I'll do another site about electronic instruments, as I have a wealth of material, and I'm a real gearhead.
In 1990, when I was ten years old, upon retruning from France, my father brought me an MC of Jean-Michel Jarre. It was "The Essential" collection. After Iistening to his music I knew already where my musical interests would lie. It was like a miracle, a dream come true. And it IS miracle, indeed, when I think for a while about it, even now. Or maybe now even more than ever?
Since then I was searching continuously for new Electronic Music to feed my desire for unusual "synthetic" sounds. That doesn't mean, of course, that I don't like other types of music. During all these years I listened to as many different musics as possible. Disco, pop, rock, techno etc. But my greatest passion in music was already defined (or maybe predefined?). I'm happy there are still people who support this kind of music, compose it, write about it and promote it. Without these people this project wouldn't have been possible. And this is the right place to say a big THANK YOU to all the people who are involved in the production and distribution of this music, a very special music for all of us, which is timeless like any REAL art is.
Artemi Pugachov