Vocal parallels

At first glance, the fresh albums of Zemfira (“Live in your head”) and Elena Vaengi (“ Lena ”) are too similar. Symmetric monochrome covers with a photo portrait of the singer. The names are scored by a simple font: in Vaengi - as if on a typewriter, at Zemfira - handed by hand. Vaenga seemed to make the cover herself in a graphic editor, behind the cover “Live in your head” still feels the work of the designer, but the message in them is the same: the author-performer gives fans his subtle handmade album, the main thing in which he himself.

The Tracking of “Live in your head” and “Lena” are also very similar: simple and short names of songs. It is easy to confuse the records or, for example, to make an imaginary dialogue of two singers from them. Vaenga: "Re-la." Zemfira: "River." Vaenga: "Princess." Zemfira: "Seagull." Vaenga: "Nomorok." Zemfira: "Smooth." Vaenga: "Vѝski." Zemfira: "Kofevino." Vaenga: "Where was." Zemfira: "Buried." And so on. This is a deceptive simplicity - the lyrics of songs claim poetic imagery and emotional complexity. The words in them are not just chosen, compiled in sentences and put into the title - they are generally the main ones, because these are the author, bard song.

Where Zemfira is catching the decadent atmosphere, Vaenga hit on the spot with simple truths.

Zemfira is considered to be a rock singer, because her first album was recorded by the musicians “Mumiy Troll” because she performed at rock festivals because she was crazy about Viktor Tsoi and almost achieved visual resemblance to him. In short, it happened. Although another tag has already been glued to the new plate on the Internet, a strange-Baroque Pop. Elena Vaengu is called the performer of the Russian chanson, although this is not a genre at all, but a marketing term, an umbrella brand, under which they sell completely different music. But, if you do not pay attention to the difference in arrangements, Zemfira and Vaenga are women bards, in the songs of which the music actually fades into the third plan. On the second there are words, and on the first - the figure of the author, manifested in his unique vocal feed, energy and personal charisma. Zemfira and Vaenga are closest colleagues or direct competitors. That is why they, the successors at the same time Vladimir Vysotsky and Elena Kamburova, are very popular in the country where "they still dance under words."

Their audiences, of course, are different. Zemfira sings for young people who are on the pathos of a single hero, drag away from their otherness and expect a sudden love, indistinguishable from random death. The audience of Elena Vaengi is more rooted in life - they, like the singer herself, gave birth, they know that “I don’t like it, but what difference does it make: I need to move more and speak less”, and they are most worried so that the man does not go to another. Well, for mom. Where Zemfira is catching the decadent atmosphere, Vaenga hit on the spot with simple truths. This can be seen from the same covers of new plates. Elena “Vaenga” Khruleva smiles, propping her head with a scratched hand, is a simple woman who found family happiness. The disheveled Zemfira is hidden in a stylish black sweater (or turtleneck) - a riveting nature, a bohemian character. There are no rings on the fingers-either free, or something hides. However, with all the difference in their worlds, they could easily change songs: Vaenga could sing “money” and “without chance”, Zemfira - “whiskey”, which is the same “Rumba” from her first album, only 10 years older. Both would have done it - they perform songs with the same anguish: the singers are ready to tear their hearts and declare this without habitats - they sing with direct text.

The sound of Zemfira and Khruleva, of course, is also different. Zemfira has noble noir minimalism: three Tsevsky chords, laconic synthesizers and dramas-machines, like Tom York on solo "Eraser" . Vaenga sings under the kichevo mixture of the Russian courtyard and Latin American rhythm, restaurant guitar salt and winds. However, there is a common thing-it’s funny that a similar Latin-Dish-Sound, only much more sophisticated, Zemfira made Dmitry Shurov on her previous album “Thank you”, considered unsuccessful. “Live in your head” is more successful than “thank you”. Because there is less music here, it does not come to the fore, does not come into conflict with the figure of the author, does not distract from the voice. Although in some songs (for example, already mentioned “money” and “without a chance”) it would be better to distract. A fragment of the Gregorian choral, glued to “buried”, also somehow out of place-he involuntarily overshadows all the great vocal work done by Zemfira Ramazanova. That is, Zemfira, like Vaenga, changes the taste. Just Vaenga, he changes all the time.

Div’s main one can not be taken away - Zemfira and Vaenga are able to write spectacular songs that will fall exactly into the ears and hearts of fans, they will tightly contact their heads with personal experiences, lead to concerts of new fans, strengthen the status of the “main singers of Russia” and make the author of this text anathere. There are such songs to “live ...” and “Lena” - so these are good records. There is only one question: if on an imaginary television “musical ring” Elena Vaenga and Zemfira Ramazanova came together for the title of “main singer of Russia” in a frontal attack, then who would gather anyone?

I would put on Khrilev.