Egor Letov (real name: Igor Fedorovich Letov; September 10, 1964 in Omsk - February 19, 2008 in the same place) - Russian rock musician, poet, leader of the rock band " civil defense" The younger brother of the famous saxophonist Sergei Letov, with whom he also collaborated creatively.

He began his musical activity in the early 1980s in Omsk, forming together with like-minded people (the most famous of them, who is Letov’s constant associate, Konstantin Ryabinov (Kuzya Uo)) the rock group “Posev” (1982), and later the rock band group "Civil Defense" (1984). At the dawn of their activities, the musicians of Civil Defense, due to political persecution by the authorities, were forced to record their musical works in semi-underground apartment conditions.

After all, soldiers are not born, soldiers die.

Letov Egor

In 1987-1989, Letov and his associates recorded a number of Civil Defense albums: “Red Album”, “Good!!”, “Mousetrap”, “Totalitarianism”, “Necrophilia”, “So the Steel Was Tempered”, “Combat” Stimulus”, “Everything is going according to plan”, “Songs of joy and happiness”, “War”, “Armageddon Pops”, “Healthy and Forever”, “Russian Field of Experiments”. In those same years, albums of the “Communism” project (Egor Letov, Konstantin Ryabinov, Oleg Sudakov (Manager)) were recorded, and the collaboration between Letov and Yanka Diaghileva began.

Despite the semi-underground existence of musicians and their so-called. Grob studios, by the end of the 1980s and especially in the early 1990s, they became widely known in the USSR, mainly in youth circles. Letov's songs are distinguished by powerful energy, lively, simple, energetic rhythm, non-standard, sometimes shocking lyrics, and a kind of rough and, at the same time, refined poetry. The basis of Letov’s lyrics is the incorrectness of everything around him, and he expresses his position not directly, but through the depiction of this incorrectness.

In the early 1990s, Letov, who by that time had ceased the concert activities of Civil Defense, recorded the albums “Jump-Jump” (1990) and “One Hundred Years of Solitude” (1992) as part of the psychedelic project “Egor and the Opised” (1992), which are among one of his most popular and popular albums. In 1994, Letov became one of the leaders of the national communist rock movement “Russian Breakthrough” and was actively touring. In 1994-1998, Yegor Letov supported the National Bolshevik Party and had a party card with number 4.

In a meaningless kaleidoscope of days
My destiny is just an episode
After all, what is a person - a set of molecules
The code embedded in proteins by nature.

Letov Egor

In 1995-1996, Letov recorded two more albums, “Solstice” and “The Unbearable Lightness of Being.” His group is again called "Civil Defense". The music in these albums becomes more polished, “faceted”, the lyrics lose their excessive roughness, becoming more poetic, each song resembles a hymn, at the same time acquiring psychedelicity. Both albums were released in 1997.

In February 2004, Letov officially disowned any political forces, including nationalist ones. Before recent years interest in the work of Yegor Letov waned until in 2004-2005, 2 new albums of the group “Long Happy Life” and “Reanimation” were released, as well as re-releases of the albums “Solstice” and “Unbearable Lightness of Being”, which were remixed and released under new names “Moon revolution” and “The bearable weight of nothingness” respectively. In May 2007, the album “Why Do Dreams Dream” was released, later called by Egor the best and perhaps the last album of the group.

The last concert of “Civil Defense” took place on February 9, 2008 in Yekaterinburg. It is known that the concert was filmed by a local television company.

Everyone is some kind of species, or an individual, the main thing is to figure out in time and not be mistaken who you are. And live according to the laws of the type of beast that you are.

Letov Egor

Egor Letov's grave at the Staro-Vostochny cemetery in Omsk, July 2008. Egor Letov died at the age of 43, on February 19, 2008 at his home in Omsk, at about 16:00 local time. He was buried on February 21, 2008 at the Staro-Vostochny cemetery in Omsk, next to the graves of his mother and grandmother. Was installed on the grave wooden cross. Before the funeral, a farewell ceremony took place, which was attended by several thousand people, including those who came from Moscow, St. Petersburg and other cities of Russia.

Egor Letov - photo

Egor Letov - quotes

To become a good poet, you don't need to study poetry. The education system is needed for those who specifically intend to work, for example, as a doctor. I studied normally at school, and if I had had to, I would have gone anywhere. At least to Oxford. I achieve what I want, and there are no such obstacles to achieving any goal at all, and this applies to everyone. And therefore everyone gets exactly what they need. What is called, “serves him right.”

Egor Letov (Igor Fedorovich Letov) is a Soviet and Russian rock musician, founder of the Civil Defense group. He remained the leader of this team until his death.

Biography

Igor Fedorovich Letov was born on September 10, 1964 in Omsk, in the family of a military man and a nurse. He received his secondary education in Omsk secondary school No. 45. In 1980, he graduated from ten classes. Soon after this, it began musical activity Letova. His first team was \"Posev\", created with like-minded friends. And in 1984, “Civil Defense” appeared, as part of which Egor Letov later became famous.

Naturally, at that time the authorities were not very fond of rocker musicians, so Letov’s group recorded material in apartment studios. At first there were simply no other possibilities. And later, when they appeared, the group decided to continue recording in such simple and familiar home studios. At the dawn of its activity, “GO” was famous in Omsk, then in Siberia, and later throughout the country. In parallel with the growth of popularity, confrontation with the authorities is also intensifying. The most serious problems occurred in 1985, when Letov became a victim of punitive psychiatry. He was in the hospital from December 8, 1985 to March 7, 1986. As Letov later recalled, he almost went crazy because of the powerful drugs that doctors intensively fed him with.

In 1987, Letov, together with friends from Civil Defense, recorded the albums “Good!!”, “Red Album”, “Totalitarianism”, “Necrophilia”, “Mousetrap”. By the end of the 1980s, a number of more albums were released. By this time, literally, “Civil Defense” was known throughout the entire Soviet Union.

In 1990, Egor suspended performances as part of “GO” and created new project"Egor and the Opizdenevshie." In 1993, Letov returned to Civil Defense and continued studio and concert activities. Active touring continued until the end of the 1990s. In 1994, Letov entered into a civil marriage with Anna Volkova, with whom he lived until 1997. In the same 1997, Letov became the husband of Natalya Chumakova (bassist of Civil Defense).

In the early 2000s, interest in Letov’s work decreased somewhat, but grew again in 2004, after the release of the album “Long happy life" Then several other albums are released, reissues of old records. In 2007, the album “Why Do I Dream?” was released. This was the last album of Civil Defense, and Letov called it the best of his entire creative career.

On February 19, 2008, at the age of 43, Egor Letov died suddenly at home in Omsk. Initially, the cause of death was stated to be cardiac arrest, which was confirmed by Letov’s relatives.

Letov's main achievements

In total, Letov recorded more than a thousand compositions as part of various groups and independently. The texts of most of them were also created by him. In particular, eight studio albums were recorded.

It is generally accepted that Yegor Letov and his group “Civil Defense” became the people who laid the foundations for the formation of the punk movement “Siberian Underground”. In addition, Letov's lyrics had big influence for the development of a number of groups outside of Siberia. In particular, these are the groups “Teplya Trassa”, “Gang of Four”, “Snowdrifts” and a number of others.

Important dates in Letov’s biography

• September 10, 1964 – birth in Omsk.
• 1977 – experienced clinical death.
• 1980 – graduation from 10th grade school.
• 1982 - formation of the Posev group.
• 1984 - creation of the Civil Defense team.
• 1985-1986 – compulsory treatment in psychiatric hospital due to persecution by the authorities.
• 1987 - meeting Yanka Diaghileva.
• 1990-1993 – work as part of the project “Egor and the Opizdenevshie”.
• 1994 – joining the National Bolshevik Party.
• 1994-1997 - civil marriage with Anna Volkova, friend of Yanka Diaghileva.
• 1997 - official marriage with Natalya Chumakova.
• 2007 - the album “Why Do I Dream?” is released, later called by Letov the best of his life.
• February 9, 2008 - the last concert of “Civil Defense”.
• February 19, 2008 - Egor Letov died suddenly in Omsk.

• The lyrics of the song “Overdose” from the album “One Hundred Years of Solitude” were written by Yegor Letov after his cat, who had lived for 11 years, died.
• Several times Letov was banned from entering Estonia and Latvia.
• Yegor himself said that he wrote almost all the songs from the albums “Reanimation” and “Long, Happy Life” while under the influence of drugs.
• At the first major concert of Civil Defense, held in 1988, Letov appeared on stage in bell-bottoms and a pea coat, and sang not very respectful songs about Lenin.
• When the KGB began to take a serious interest in Letov in 1985, he was even accused of planning an explosion at an oil refinery.
• From the moment he left the psychiatric hospital until 1988, Yegor was forced to wander throughout the Soviet Union. At that time, he was even forced to steal food from time to time.
• Egor's brother, Sergei Letov, is a famous jazz saxophonist.

The future “patriarch of Siberian rock” Igor Letov (Egor is a pseudonym) was born on September 10, 1964 in Omsk, in an ordinary Soviet family. Yegor's father was a military man, then acted as secretary of the city district committee of the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, his mother worked as a doctor. According to rumors, Letov suffered clinical death 14 times as a child.

Since childhood, the boy had before his eyes a living example of an inexhaustible love for music: Yegor’s older brother Sergei is a famous saxophonist, musician, working in different styles. Egor studied at high school No. 45 of the city of Omsk, from which he successfully graduated in 1982. After graduating from school, Letov went to his brother in the Moscow region. There, Egor entered a construction vocational school, but a year later he was expelled for poor academic performance.

Returning to Omsk, Letov continued to work on a project called Sowing, which he founded in 1982. From that time on, the biography and life of the pioneer of “Russian punk rock” was inextricably linked with music and creativity.

In those years, Yegor Letov worked at tire and motor factories in Omsk. As an artist, the musician painted portraits of Ilyich and propaganda posters for communist rallies and meetings, and later worked as a janitor and plasterer.

Music

The Posev group recorded their songs on magnetic albums. This process took place in ordinary apartments using primitive equipment, due to which the sound was dull, rattling and unclear. Subsequently, even having gained access to normal recording equipment, Letov did not abandon the “apartment” method, making “garage sound” his signature style.

The uniqueness of the artisanal sound, characteristic of the later Civil Defense, was largely due to the musical preferences of the leader of both groups. In interviews, Letov has repeatedly mentioned that his songs were influenced by American garage rock of the 1960s and the work of performers working in the spirit of experimental, punk, and psychedelic rock.

The Posev group ended its existence in 1984. Around the same time, the legendary “Civil Defense”, also known as “G.O.”, was formed. or "Grob". Letov continued to work in his favorite “garage” style, while simultaneously opening an independent recording studio, GroB-Records.

The studio was located in an ordinary Omsk Khrushchev apartment. With the money raised from the concerts, Yegor published the albums “G.O.” and other groups related to Siberian punk rock.

Released albums, underground concerts, hand-distributed recordings and a completely unique performance style along with obscene lyrics performed by deep meaning, brought “Civil Defense” deafening popularity among Soviet youth. Letov's songs are distinguished by unprecedented energy, recognizable rhythm and original sound.

According to his colleagues in the workshop, Yegor was able to prove that you can play rock even without knowing how to masterly play complex chords or brilliantly use a drum kit. Surprisingly, Letov himself never considered himself a member of the punk movement, he was simply always “against”. Against the system, the system, established stereotypes, against oneself. And this nihilism, along with the criticality of the lyrics, was taken as a model by subsequent Soviet and Russian punk bands.

Intelligence services and psychiatric hospital

At its dawn musical career leader of "G.O." was a staunch opponent of communism and the established system, although he never spoke out against the Soviet government itself. However, the political and philosophical context of his songs was so clearly visible through the feigned punk indifference that the relevant authorities could not help but become interested in the group and its creator.

Egor was repeatedly made suggestions by KGB officers. They demanded that the group's activities be stopped. Since Letov refused, in 1985 he was placed in a psychiatric hospital. The musician was subjected to violent treatment methods, pumped full of powerful antipsychotics. These drugs were used for complete change the psyche of the “patient”, and Letov himself compared their effect to a lobotomy.

Fortunately, the imprisonment lasted only 4 months. Egor was helped out of the mental hospital by his brother Sergei, who threatened to publish in Western media a story about how the USSR was fighting unwanted musicians.

Creation

In the period from 1987 to 1988, Egor returned to the “Civil Defense” project and recorded several albums, including “Mousetrap”, “Everything is going according to plan” and others. He performs songs himself, plays instruments, acts as a sound engineer and sound producer. In 1988, a bootleg “Russian Field of Experiment” was recorded at Firsov’s studio.

In 1989, albums for Yegor’s new project “Communism” were recorded, a little earlier he met and began working with, an outstanding rock singer and songwriter, whose life was tragically cut short in 1991. After Yanka’s death, Yegor completed and released her last album, “Shame and Disgrace.”

In 1990, Letov disbanded Civil Defense after playing a concert in Tallinn. Deciding that his project was turning into pop, the musician became interested in psychedelic rock. The result of this hobby was the next project “Egor and O...zdenevshie”, within which two albums were released. In 1993, Letov revived Civil Defense, continuing to work as part of both musical groups.

In subsequent years, the musician released several albums, some of which were composed of newly recorded old songs. The last concert of “GO” took place in Yekaterinburg on February 9, 2008.

At the turn of the century, Letov became interested in politics, was a member of the NBP, and was friends with Limonov, Anpilov, and Dugin. In 2004, Yegor Letov officially renounced politics.

Personal life

Personal life is so extraordinary person, like Letov, was quite stormy. Friends described him as a very versatile personality. Yegor was capable of repeatedly changing his views. His opinion could easily be influenced by a film or a book, while he was a born leader, next to whom everyone else faded.

On rare photos the musician is depicted during concerts, with friends or with fellow rock bands, and at home - exclusively with cats, but this does not mean that there were no women in his life. Letov was officially married once, unofficially twice, the musician had no children.

In the late 80s, the common-law wife of the leader of Civil Defense was Yanka Diaghileva, Letov’s lover, muse and colleague. Together they recorded several albums and played many apartment concerts.

After the tragic and mysterious death Yankee wife of the musician was Diaghileva’s friend Anna Volkova, who also took part in the recording of some albums of “G.O.” In 1997, Letov married Natalya Chumakova, part-time bass guitarist of the group.

Death

Yegor had many creative ideas, including a film project based on Cortazar’s novel “The Hopscotch Game” and alternative musical projects. However, these plans were not destined to come true.

On February 19, 2008, the musician and singer died. The cause of Letov’s death was officially named cardiac arrest, but an alternative version was subsequently made public: acute respiratory failure as a consequence of ethanol poisoning.

The funeral, which was attended by many people, including from both capitals, was accompanied by a civil memorial service. Yegor Letov was buried in Omsk next to his mother’s grave.

Discography

Solo albums:

• "Russian Field of Experiment", 1988;
• “Concert in the hero city of Leningrad”, 1994;
• “Egor Letov, concert at the rock club “Polygon””, 1997;
• “The Letov Brothers” (with Sergei Letov), ​​2002;
• “Egor Letov, GO, The Best” (collection of St. Petersburg concerts), 2003;
• “Tops and Roots”, 2005;
• “Everything is like people”, 2005;
• "Orange. Acoustics", 2011.

Other projects:

• “Songs into the Void” (acoustics with E. Filatov), ​​1986;
• “Music of Spring” (pirate collection), 1990-1993;
• "Border Civil Defense Detachment", 1988.

Best songs:

• "Russian field of experiments";
• "Eternal Spring";
• “About a fool”;
• "Everything goes according to plan";
• “I will always be against”;
• "Zoo";
• “My Defense” and others.

Everything that I managed to pass on by inheritance
That is not holiness, not bookishness,
That's healthy stupidity
Confidence
that it is easily possible
exhaust the oceans of powerlessness,
Not just with your palm,
And with my own.

(E. Letov, September 2007)

***
Egor Letov:

In general, by nature I am some kind of archivist; it has always hurt me when certain important, but not very obvious components of existence disappear or vegetate. Therefore, from the very early age, as far as possible, I tried in every possible way to record the disappearing existence through photography (which I have been doing since childhood), recording, etc. Thanks to this, it is possible that a fair amount of photographs have been preserved, as well as sound documents of the initial period of our creativity.

***
From an interview between N. Meinert and E. Letov, 1990:

Egor Letov: — Initially, everything that was written and done was done for myself, because I was one hundred percent sure that no one would like it at all. That’s why I didn’t give the first originals to anyone, because I was ashamed that I couldn’t play and... in fact, it’s not rock at all. I was pleased to hear this myself. I turned on and danced to what I made.

***
From Yegor Letov’s remarks at the concert in Kyiv “The holiday is over”, 1990:

Egor Letov: There is an opinion that what we have been doing for a long time - in 1986, in 1987 - is some kind of political action. Why Troitsky is still throwing mud at us there - it’s supposedly that we are involved in politics in pure form. I gave interviews several times and said that all these political symbols that we encountered were 70% not politics at all. Let's put it this way... These are certain images or symbols, as a relation to a certain world order or world order that has always existed and exists.
It’s just that at that time it was easier and more understandable for everyone - for us, for the masses - to somehow transform all this into political symbols. Those. This is not even a conversation about the fact that our songs there are anti-Soviet or not anti-Soviet - these are anti-social songs.

[….]

QUESTION: — Don’t you think that your songs are too opportunistic in nature?

Egor Letov: I can immediately say that I compose songs according to a certain principle. The song should, on the one hand, express this state, in this moment. Secondly, the song must work. For it to work, it needs to be sufficiently, let's say... not that bright... it should be, let's say... with a beautiful melody or something else... In general, that's my attitude.
As a result, a paradox arose, as it were, that, on the one hand, the songs are liked by those, say, for whom they are intended, and on the other hand, the gopniks like the songs. This is how the situation seemed to arise. Those. Our concerts are attended by those for whom they are, in general, sung, and half of the people are gopniks who punch people in the face. And a certain group of aesthetes, the one I hate the most, is also gathering under the leadership of all sorts of Trinity people, etc. They go to all the concerts and constantly listen to some kind of arpeggios there... (laughter in the audience) It turns out that our audience is constantly divided into three parts: their own, of which there are at least the smallest number in the hall, as usual (there are only a few of them); always gopniks and always aesthetes.

***
Interview with Egor Letov. Smolensk 2000:

I created the group because everything that was happening around me - in our, say, rock (and even in the world) - did not suit me.
Well, it was probably 86-87. In my opinion, it was necessary to break this one existing system aesthetic values ​​by any, in principle, method.
Three methods, I think, were the most important. The first is naked anti-Sovietism - i.e. do something that no one can afford. This is a monstrous violation of all laws and genres by swearing and the maximum violation of the canons of recording - i.e. this “dirt” with overload, that’s all...
Well, that's exactly what we did. It turned out to be a revolution...

***
From an interview with E. Letov:

— How do you usually work on song lyrics?

“It’s like hunting for an altered state of consciousness.” When the “hunt” is successful, you go into a trance and become something like a medium, and then a huge stream flows through you. You don't even have time to write it down. And after that, technical work with the text begins.

***
E. Letov, 03/02/1990:

The song is a kind of flow. All my songs are born from a certain state; it’s like a funnel opens for me when I reach the limit. It’s as if it’s not me who writes the songs, it’s just in me... like an oracle I appear, you know? A certain system of images simply arises in me, which I completely, without inhibition, transfer... As a result, a song is born, but it does not lie on some edge of one meaning or another meaning. Otherwise, if I understand my song, or rather, it is subject to understanding by me personally, I don’t sing it.

***
E. Letov:

Everything done for the first time costs something. I wouldn’t play like Civil Defense now if I were young now. It just wouldn't have occurred to me. We then started playing like this because it was a violation of all the canons. If everyone played like that, I would never play like that. I would play something completely different. It could be jazz, anything.

***


When I write songs, I don’t throw out anything that has accumulated, but create something new, which I don’t understand and which doesn’t exist in me at all. I'm not interested in projecting myself anywhere. This is the wrong way. I realized this when I was 17. We need to create something new. To do this, you need to enter a completely unusual state of mind and being. It's entertaining and instructive.
.

***
From an interview with E. Letov:

— So all your radical changes are just a change of toys?

- In a sense, yes. But this sounds very cynical. I have never been cynical about toys.

***
From E. Letov’s answers to questions from visitors to the official website of the Civil Defense, 02/23/2006:

There is only one duty: creativity! And this is a terrible debt! Creativity is not even a duty; it is generally the only idea that is worthy of consideration and concentration. For all other manifestations of any ideology are manifestations of mediocrity and global futility.

***
E. Letov:

After all, by and large, I’m not really a musician, for me this is a forced creative form of contact with the masses, because poetry is not in honor among us. And I am primarily engaged in the development of words, experiments with words, psychology and philosophy embodied in words.

***
E. Letov, "URLIGHT", 02.12.1988:

Rock in essence is not music or art, but some kind of religious action - like shamanism - that exists in order to establish a certain attitude. A person who studies fate comprehends life, but not through affirmation, but through destruction, through death.
Shamanism is a rhythm on which improvisation is superimposed. And the more shamanism, the more rock. And, conversely, if art and music begin to prevail over shamanism, then rock dies.
...In my understanding, rock is an anti-human, anti-humanistic movement, a certain form of the elimination of man as a psychologically viable system. Man is a creature that is endowed with logical consciousness - and because of this, he cannot live HERE AND NOW. Therefore he is immersed in the past or in the future. HERE AND NOW only children live.

***
E. Letov:

Why did we even arise as “Civil Defense”? From the point of view of nature, I am not a natural creator or poet. I don't really like having to do this. I'm more of a consumer. I'm a lazy person. And I started doing this only because I didn’t hear anything among the Russian-speaking scene that would satisfy me, only this shit that sounded from everywhere. To such an extent I was, as they say, offended for the state.

***
From an interview with E. Letov:

— War is the main axis of this world, the main creative force. War is progress, overcoming rigidity and inertia. War is, first of all, a war with oneself in order to overcome some shortcoming or complex.

- Why do the winners feel so empty?

“Perhaps devastated is the wrong word.” Winners - wise people, and each of them has a state of accomplishment, and it is sad. a wise man- he pays with all of his own, with himself, so that others can feel good. This is a necessary sacrifice. There is a parable: while you are climbing a mountain, you think that this is the most important thing, but then you climb, and there is a descent, and another mountain, even higher and more terrible than the first, and further. I believe that the history of man and humanity is not a circle, but a spiral, striving higher and higher upward.

***
E. Letov:

I can’t explain my creativity. There is such a Japanese writer, Haruki Murakami. So on his website he explains all his works, what he put into them, how he composed “The Sheep Hunt,” for example. And when I read all this, to be honest, I was very disappointed. I had a big bummer, and I realized that I no longer wanted to reread Murakami. In any case, those books that he explained in his own way. That’s why I don’t explain my things either, because they often become clear to me after five to seven years. And of some of them it is still unclear what I actually created.

***
From an interview with E. Letov:

— You understand cinema, music, literature. Do you think that young people who have not read Kafka and Platonov or listened to Love and John Cage can fully understand your work?

- Certainly! I don't do things for intelligence at all. I create certain objects that should work in the cultural or non-cultural space of our country. Here main criterion. So far everything is working. I’m already over forty years old, and in principle I could already die. And I didn’t live my life in vain, but I did a lot of right things that blew someone’s mind, demolished something old, and erected something new. In this sense, I am a provocateur-builder.

***
From an interview with E. Letov, 1998:

EL: What we are doing now, in general everything we do in life, we do only “FOR”...

- For what?

EL: For what? For a life…

- How do you understand life?

EL: Life... Life is the only miracle that exists on Earth at all, completely inexplicable and incomprehensible, something that does not fit into any religions there - neither Buddhist, nor Jewish, nor Christian... If in Christian, then into the concepts of early Christians - apocryphal... Gnostics...

***
E. Letov’s answers to questions from visitors to the official website of the Civil Defense, 2005:

— Is it possible that Yegor Letov is wrong?

- It doesn’t matter to me whether I’m right or wrong. The main thing is that this is how it should be.

***
From an interview with N. Chumakova, E. Letov’s wife, “Seance” magazine, 09/10/2011:
http://seance.ru/blog/letov-chumakova-interview

Let me ask right away: did he consider himself a poet?

Moreover, it was precisely this, and not a musician, that he considered himself. I have his archives since 1982, where the poems are collected in notebooks with tables of contents, with numbered pages, with various kinds of “objects” pasted in: tickets, summons to the army, and so on. When he went to his brother in Moscow after school, he became friends with poets there, especially Leningrad ones, and learned a lot from conceptualists. I know that he listened to “Mukhomor” and had great respect for Monastyrsky.

... - No matter how much you say that you didn’t take drugs, people still don’t believe you.

The fact is that he was always in a hurry. I tried a lot of different methods - magical, non-magical, not sleeping, silence, holding my breath, all sorts of different practices, a million. Or, for example, this is his favorite thing - to do everything despite himself. That is, do exactly the opposite of what you want. What shocked me most when I met him was that all these fables about him turned out to be completely true - I thought they were exaggerating. He could do anything to himself for some purpose. And sometimes with others, if they had to do the same thing with him. When he said: “I don’t do art, I don’t even do creativity,” he meant the return of art precisely as a craft through which ... the main things are transmitted. Well, for the sake of life, so that the pendulum swings in right side. But at the same time, he was such a meticulous and hardworking person. He worked very hard to be a good poet, he really worked, worked, worked, he stalked the words like a hunter. He went to the forest constantly, he had a basic method - he went into the forest.
He really slept very little, about five hours. I hated wasting time. If I wasn’t composing or recording, I was reading, watching movies in huge quantities, listening to music, managing to give concerts and communicate with people.

Which poet did Yegor love?

For him, probably, the best poet was Vvedensky. Not Kharms, but Mayakovsky and Vvedensky. Of Western poetry, he appreciated Hughes and German expressionism. I treated traditional verse calmly, let’s say. He also threw Pushkin off the ship... It was funny with my dad - he’s a Pushkinist. Dad, by the way, values ​​him very much as a poet. But Yegor appreciated Tyutchev, and dad loves Tyutchev very much. On this they agreed. And I have a suspicion that he never read Pushkin, except in school. I can’t guarantee it, but it’s quite possible. As for poetry and music, he very quickly understood what he needed and what he didn’t. I didn’t read or listen to what I knew wouldn’t be needed. He used everything to find some of his own paths. He had both futuristic poems and concrete poetry, but these were one-time things.
There are several early poems in the book “Egor Letov. Poetry". Now we are re-issuing it, but we will still do it year by year, and not randomly, as then. Some of the early ones will be added, and all the later ones. We prepared this reissue during his lifetime, in 2007. This is the thing with these early poems: they are still quite studentish. It's like releasing his early audio recordings of him singing. in a high voice, squeaky, very funny. The voice that everyone knows came later, and he made it himself. He screamed into the pillow, tore it off on purpose, where did these hoarse notes come from... Why into the pillow - because, how about yelling at the whole house, or what? In general, he wasn’t going to sing at first, he was looking for vocalists.

Didn't want to record alone?

Sometimes I wrote it down like that. At some point it turned out that he had neither a guitarist nor anything. And he invented comrades for himself: “on drums - such and such.” Because I believed that this should not be personal creativity, but group creativity. That is, I always really wanted comrades. Then somehow I stopped looking for them. And I found them more likely in Dostoevsky, Syd Barrett, or, say, Arthur Lee. It wasn’t so important for him that they were here, close by. The most important thing is that they actually existed somewhere at some point. Or they will.

... - Why do you think the “culture”, which recognizes itself not as an audience at a rock concert, but as a culture, did not realize and understand what Letov is?

- I think because it fits into the rock environment. Due to the fact that he went out to any people who came, he did not artificially filter out the public. He wanted everyone to hear it. And he used things that work for large quantity of people. If a person knows how to compose hits, do things that “catch”, then why should he deliberately not write them? This audience is supposedly “cultured”, but it is still often very closed-minded - if a lot of people wear these T-shirts, it means it’s some kind of rubbish, it means it’s not something you can join. These people are very afraid of what they will think of them: if some conventional gopnik sang “Everything is going according to plan” somewhere in the yard - that’s it, I can’t listen to it anymore, it’s a shame.
The advantage of being a rock idol is that you can speak and be heard. But in everything else he is a very loser. But if you are in demand, the recordings are played somewhere, and some completely random person in a moment of spiritual sorrow he heard them, and it helped him, this, of course, is great.

In addition to texts as such, there is also such a thing as the “figure of the poet,” which culture has been unsuccessfully searching for in the last twenty years. At the same time, in my opinion, if there was one whose texts the country spoke, it was Letov. If anyone expressed time, it was Letov.

- Yegor consciously left “just” poetry. He could, having arrived in Moscow, live in this circle of people, write poetry, he would have succeeded. He didn’t want to - I think he was bored, it was such a low-energy party. Once upon a time, Khlebnikov, Mayakovsky - they were then, like some rock performers we have now. They were simply placed in a cultural context, but rock musicians were not.
Yegor wanted to really influence the world and life, and this, of course, can only be done by public art. Since he understood it well, he took and combined poetry and this craft. He didn’t consider himself any special musician, although he good musician, what is there.

I wanted to change what reality, how?

The one around him, the one that did not suit him in any way. Change for the better. So that there is no dullness, melancholy, indifference in it. To be bright. It all fits in there, this so-called communism, and everything else. They say to him: “You are for the revolution, you are for communism, but do you understand that if this is really what you stand for, it starts to win, that you will be the first to be trampled on?” He says: “Yes, I know, so be it.” In principle, he did not really value his life; he was always ready to sacrifice it for this idea, if necessary.

For “this” - which one exactly?

Well, how to pronounce these words? The idea of ​​universal happiness. The idea of ​​the “brilliant present,” which is probably the Kingdom of God on earth. And he did what seemed right to him at the moment, that is, simply “this is how it should be now,” intuitively. When it seemed to him that now it was right to speak out against some “these” who were of no use at all, he joined.
It's 1993 and The White house. He didn’t think: “Yeah, I’ll support these guys.” He saw that this White House was being shot, everything in him turned upside down, and he ran like crazy.
You know, you can probably really say that “the kingdom of God on earth” is most accurate. Unlike those who believe that you just need to live quietly and not sin, and you will get yours someday - he did not understand this. He was a man of action, he could not sit and wait when he saw injustice and baseness.

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