Soviet Style
A number of anniversaries of Soviet-era events are coming up in Russia (as discussed in the first paragraph of this article in the Moscow Times, and then less apologetically here). With the recent spectre of a return to more authoritarian rule emerging at the Kremlin (well elaborated on here), remembering the bleak times of the Soviet Union’s political and human disasters tends to be a sombre topic.
Luckily, one of the more clever scenes from the animated series The Simpsons provides a humorous take on the possible re-emergence of the dreaded Soviet Empire. See the 41-second YouTube clip by clicking here.
The foreboding music which accompanies this clip is akin to the style produced by the country’s famous Red Army Choir. Additional examples of note of this type of music include the cheerless (though triumphant) Warsovienne [3:23] and March of the Decembrists [3:05], as well as the haunting Katusha [2:29]. The tunes are beautiful in their own eerie way.
My friend Adam recalls seeing an ominious red t-shirt which featured a bright yellow hammer and sickle beneath which was written the caption ‘Come Visit Us Before We Visit You!’. Clearly, unless the use of irony was officially prohibited there, Russia is quite far from truly returning to their former Cold War culture.
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November 14th, 2007 at 5:33 pm
I would not be surprised, if they reprised some kind of totalitarian rule in Russia. They feel their loss of empire and prestige very keenly. However, I do not hink that the new form would be a proletarian state, since the Communist party bosses stole too much money, and would like to keep them. Some kind of kleptocracy will emerge, but things will get really tough when oil prices will go down. Because that is how Putin finances his popularity – Russia does not have any substance, any product which anyone could possibly want, only oil and gas.
November 14th, 2007 at 5:34 pm
Where is the T-shirt with the hammer and sickle from Rome?
April 12th, 2008 at 4:12 pm
[...] Red Army Choir voicing a patriotic hymn of the past (something I’ve discussed previously here, with [...]
September 1st, 2009 at 5:14 pm
[...] music (past articles here indicate how I tend to have steeped myself in Schubert, hymns, and the Red Army Choir, with occasional forays into Johnny Cash and other classic bands), I would not have expected that a [...]