“This is not a “truth of life”, this is a sick psyche.” Zinaida Pronchenko* met with Boris Grebenshchikov*

In January 2026, Aquarium released a new album , “Strange News from a Distant Star,” and MOMA in New York hosted the world premiere of a restored version of the classic British documentary Michael Apted’s film “Long way home” (1989), dedicated to Grebenshchikov’s work on his first and only English-language album, “Radio Silence.” Inspired by both, Zinaida Pronchenko met with Boris Grebenshchikov to discuss Husky, Stoptime, Vladislav Surkov, the “collective West” and the “Russian sound”.

— The first song on your new album is called “Let's Talk About the Dead.” This is a rather ironic composition, since there is too much talk about the dead at the expense of the living on that “strange planet”, by which you mean our homeland. And yet, it is about the dead or very elderly that I would like to talk to you.

- Yes, for God's sake. True, the “strange star” from the song has nothing to do with Russia for me; but everyone has the right to their opinion; so let’s talk about the dead, or the very elderly.

— Michael Apted’s documentary “The Long Way Home” was set in 1987–1988. And this time is shown as a period of hope. The advertising slogan of the film could be the phrase: “Everything is just beginning!” But if we step back just three years, we find ourselves in 1984 - the time of the events of “Cargo 200” by Alexei Balabanov, where the USSR is shown as a living hell on earth. How did you really feel this era back then - with all its compromises and absurdity?

“The era felt like ordinary life with its joys and problems, because there was nothing to compare with. But there were and could not be any compromises. Trade-offs between what and what? If you mean the creative intelligentsia, then for them a compromise on the idea of ​​death is like death. As soon as the creative intelligentsia begins to compromise, humble itself and stand aside, it ceases to be both creative and the intelligentsia too. From my point of view, there is a general trend of human thought according to which people should deal with each other, so to speak, moderately justly. Any government has an absolutely clear goal of doing what it needs, but the word “justice” is not in the government’s vocabulary.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIMNbaiWEtA

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