The wild femmes of rock

By Sergey Chernov

Russian mainstream pop abounds with female singers of all kinds but the rock scene here remains a male-dominated arena.

Unlike Western music, where bands led by women have become commonplace, there is no phenomenon like "female rock" in Russia. Women who have made any impact on the national music scene are few and far between and the exception to the rule.

The very first female rock singer who gained any fame and influence and later became quite a legend, was Moscow's Olesya Troyanskaya. she fronted the band Smeshcheniye (Shift) in the late 1970s. She sang throaty blues and was the closest Russia approached to anything like Janis Joplin. That era's rock bands normally had no access to any studio equipment and Smeshcheniye left no recordings.

Around that time, Olga Pershina started to perform in public, her repertoire consisting mostly of Beatles and Joan Baez cover versions. After spending several years in England, she is back on the scene using the name Olga Perry (after her British husband) and mostly plays her own Christian songs which are musically based on folk rock and blues.

In the mid-1980s, Zhanna Aguzarova of the revivalist Moscow band Bravo, became popular with her 1950s twist style rock and roll. A few years later she left the group, tried to become a pop singer in her own right and finally emigrated to the US.

Another creatively interesting Russian female singer of the 1980s emerged from the city of Yekaterinburg. Nastya Poleva, who performed with her band Nastya, played sophisticated art rock. She drew comparisons with Kate Bush, Laurie Anderson and Cocteau Twins. To date she has released a few CDs, among them "Nevesta" ("Bride"), "Tatsu" and "Noa Noa," which are still available in the city's music shops.

The decade also saw the appearance of Yanka (full name Yana Dyagileva), who came from Novosibirsk. She sported a somewhat hippie style, singing alongside certain Siberian punks, who added noisy guitars to her pessimistic ballads. She died in 1991, but is still remembered by her fans. Her recordings were released after her death on vinyl and CD.

Only one well-known female group existed in St Petersburg during the 1980s. It was called Situatsiya ("Situation") and played rather lame hard rock. If Situation should be remembered for anything, it's the fact that one of its original members was drummer Katya who now plays with the band Wineceaster.

Finally, the 1990s spawned Kolibri ("Hummingbird") -- an all-female vocal quartet. All of them live in St Petersburg, but they often travel to Moscow to play in some fashionable clubs there. And probably the members of Kolibri are the closest that Russian female singers ever got to the notion of feminism. "We are forced to be practical feminists, because of our artistic lifestyle. We have to be independent and make decisions," said the band's member Natasha Pivovarova.