Cancellation of mercy – Culture – Kommersant

The performance of the St. Petersburg group “Splin” as part of the festival “Music with a strong character”, which is scheduled for August 26 and will be held at the capital’s “VEB-Arena”, most likely will not take place. Correspondent “Kommersant” Boris Barabanov this was confirmed by the leader of the group Alexander Vasiliev.

When asked for comment, Mr. Vasiliev replied: “And so everything is clear”, thereby actually confirming the most obvious version: the cancellation of the group’s performance in Moscow tied with her recent performance in Voronezh at the Chernozem festival.

There, going on stage, the musician said: “It is nice to see so many people who have preserved mercy, compassion, philanthropy, who do not accept cruelty, violence and murder. In these black nights, even major songs sound sad.” Before performing the hit “No Exit”, he expressed the hope that the groups “Time Machine”, “Aquarium” and Tequilajazzz, who were forced to leave the country, would return and “we will play for you here in Voronezh, because we have no other choice.”

For the performance, Alexander Vasilyev selected the sharpest songs from the group’s repertoire, lines from the texts of which unambiguously hinted at his current civic position.

Subsequently, the performance of the group was removed from a recording of an online broadcast posted on the Internet.

When asked if he thought about the possible cancellation of the long-awaited performance in Moscow when he sang and played in Voronezh, Alexander Vasilyev answered evasively: “It would be nice to foresee the future.” According to Kommersant, the Spleen group is currently recording a new album, but its release date has not been announced.

“Splin” is not the first group that was deleted from the list of participants in the Moscow festival. Initially, the advertisement also announced the performance of Mumiy Troll, the group remained on the posters even after Ilya Lagutenko announced the stop of its activities. But then the team disappeared from the announcements.

Officially, the performance of “Spleen” has not been canceled.

As in all similar cases of recent times, no one has published any documents in which the reason for the cancellation would be formulated.

On the rock and roll sidelines, the usual “they called the organizers and said to take it off” is voiced. The Kommersant correspondent turned to the organizer of Music with a Strong Character, Pavel Obluchkov from the Moscow Show company, for comments. He did not answer the call, he read the message in the messenger, but also left without response.

The campaign against rock musicians with a pronounced protest position has moved to a new level. In his remarks in Voronezh, Alexander Vasiliev did not say anything about the events in Ukraine and did not mention anything, in contrast to, say, Yuri Shevchuk, head of state. There are no sharp posts in the social networks of the group, except for the black square. That is, the group is “canceled”, in fact, for words about mood and emotions, and not about what causes them. And also for the respect for their colleagues.

Rock concerts in Russia are held every day. Artists who are patriotic, trustworthy or simply neutral do not lack work. But none of them, with the exception of Alexander Vasiliev, did not say a word from the stage in support of their colleagues, friends and teachers, from whom the audience was taken away. Among the participants of the festival “Music with a strong character” are “Moral Code”, “Chayf” and Vyacheslav Butusov. Now a word to them.