'Ia Ostaius’ Chtoby Zhit': The Pro-Putin Turn in Russian Rock Music

• In Event: Resistance and Conformity: Rock, Shanson, and the Russian Invasion of Ukraine

Abstract

Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine has polarized virtually every faction of Russian cultural life, with one unexpected byproduct being the ideological division within the popular music and entertainment industries, which, for the most part, remained largely apolitical until February 2022. Russian popular music split into two distinct camps: those who support, and those who oppose the war and Putin’s regime, disrupting the implicit political spectrum of post-Soviet popular culture, in which more mainstream genres tended to toe the Kremlin line, while the more transgressive ones embraced political opposition. This paper will turn its attention to the ideological divisions that the war in Ukraine revealed in Russophone rock music – rupturing existing alliances and disappointing scores of devoted fans. Safariants will argue that the blueprint for this political discord has been in place since the perestroika period, when rock bands acquiesced to a symbiotic cooperation with Soviet authorities, tempering their anti-establishment messages to serve the interests of the regime.

Author

• Rita Safariants, U of Rochester