Crossing

One example is the group Crossing, based in Berlin. Founded in 2004 the group consists of ethnic Germans from Russia and Kazakhstan who at the time of the interview were between 25 and 40 years old. The name is an allusion to them being at the crossing of two cultures – that of their origin and Germany. When I interviewed them in 2009 they rehearsed in a youth/girl’s club – located in a residential area in Marzahn – a borough in the eastern part of Berlin where a lot of ethnic Germans were settled.

Their 2007 album Chast’ Zhizni (Part of Life) and 2009 album Ia ne Gagarin (I’m not Gagarin – both Crossing n.d.) consists of guitar driven songs within a rock idiom and with Russian lyrics. When I played the album to some musicians in St. Petersburg after the fieldwork the first response was «This sounds like Makarevich, that sounds like Chaif, Splin, Chizh etc.» In other words, Crossing’s music was compared with singers and groups from the 1980s and 1990s. This is both based on the language, vocal timbre, harmonization and intonation as well as the guitar riffs, groove and the overall sound.

I made similar observations with the other bands I talked to during that fieldwork stint: the music played by the bands often sounded like well known Soviet and Post-Soviet bands – clearly presenting a musical link between Berlin and the musicians’ country of origin. In Crossing’s case this link is reinforced by including covers by bands like Kino and Chaif in their repertoire (Baburin et al. 2009).

This was also acknowledged in the interviews – the musicians were very upfront with pointing out what music they listened to and what musical influences were important. Here Soviet and Post-Soviet music was part of their listening biography. This is not that surprising considering that the musicians were born in the former Soviet Union before emigrating, spoke Russian and some still had family in their country of origin. Furthermore, the bands they mentioned were active while they lived in the Soviet Union, Russia respectively Kazakhstan. At the same time this music does not reflect the local popular music from e.g. Kazakhstan but a regional Soviet / Post-Soviet popular music from the centers St. Petersburg and Moscow.