Sekret

A journey beyond mainstream to rebel music
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Sekret

Post by admin »

I have been listening to Daj mne this morning and fun it quite interesting. I don't know what they are saying but the melody is a catchy one. What do you think?

Forgive me Sheena this is not exactly, Rebel Music.

Daj mne
Life, as with music, often requires one to let go of the melody and listen to the rhythm

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sowhat
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

Well, Peter, it's indeed quite far from rebel music. :wink: Actually, to some extent, they were rebels anyway — IIRC, they were on "black list" for playing "west-influenced" beat music during Soviet times.
They had some heavier type of stuff, btw, and if you or anybody else is interested, i'll try to post a couple of examples (but it'll take some time to make a translation).
Daj mne/Give me (a poor attempt at a translation)
Open your windows
To the wind of freedom.
We will be remembering this day
For many years.
Give your hands to each other,
The world shall be waken up by the sound of an orchestra.
Chorus: Give me the warmth of your palms,
Believe me — we'll kick away the pain and the death,
We'll stand up, back to back,
And it will be twice as easy for us.
***
And, despite snow and thunder,
Downpours and storms,
The sun of July
Will jingle above our home.
There's a place for everyone here,
And the sound of an orchestra will fly above the sleepy world.
Chorus.
And although the day of victory hasn't come yet —
The triumph of good over evil, —
I believe you and I will see in the end
A blue daybreak over every roof.
---
That's more or less what this song is about.
Nothing will get you dead quicker than being deadly serious about yourself.
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Re: Sekret

Post by admin »

Sheena: This group did seem to break the mould then in some respects. The lyrics fit the song's "feel" and I very much appreicate your translation, which I am sure is near flawless. Daj mne may have a western beat but it maintain some of their Russian roots, at least from my limited exposure to this music.

I look forward to some of their songs that may have a bit of a rough edge to them.
Life, as with music, often requires one to let go of the melody and listen to the rhythm

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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

With this song — and vid — the band got the closer to the rebellion/underground ever. The lyrics are pretty much "in your face" and the vid was a shock back in the day.

Here's an attempt at translation of the lyrics.
Ленинградское время/Leningrad time (M. Leonidov/N. Fomenko)
Right at midnight, or more precisely — at 0:00
All restaurants and coffee shops bar up their doors,
And only people in breeches stand at the entrance.
And they let in evil dogs in "Gostiny dvor" department store
So that every hooligan, every swindler and thief could see,
So that, even if he's crafty, he couldn't cop the nation's treasure/
Waiters from "Sadko" drive home slowly,
There are bagful of chow in their trunks
They don't smoke on an empty stomach,
And they've graduated from faculty of phylology or GITIS*
* State Institute of Theatrical Art (Moscow, Russia)
And heroes of barrel houses are discussing something near the subway,
It's a good time to separate them, but no fools [to do that]
Militia's soldiers remind silent, only the young girls scream, "Stop that!"
Chorus: Leningrad time — 0:00...
A very fashionable hotel's unearthly lights are shining.
It's inaccessible as a fortress, as a citadel
Cause the entrance is guarded like a secret factory and even more severely.
The retired colonels stand near glass doors.
Time to replace these people by photocells,
So that it would be like that: an enemy enters, and an electric fists slaps him in the face.
But Alisa and Larisa are in for some time,
And soon John or Chris (that doesn't really matter)
Will be trapped gently, put in a car and driven to Marina's flat.
They also want to have most fashionable silk rag,
And they have to hurry up while their brests are standing up,
And so these ladies' principle — "All flags are our guests" — is pretty innocent.
Chorus.
And so that the guest from afar smoking "Salem"
Could drink his beer as this parasite got used to,
We open bars at night and exchange goods for dollars*.
* At the times described in the song, buying/selling for dollars in USSR was illegal for "ordinary people" and buying/selling dollars was considered a crime (speculation).
Leningrad night is still in a moon phase,
And the pride of our country drives home from night shift
Subway runs them home shocking sidewalks' entrails.
Chorus.
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Re: Sekret

Post by admin »

Sheena: Thanks for this and again the translation. It certainly has the edge of which you speak. While we are on the subject, which rock group from Russia has had the greatest impact outside of the country?
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

admin wrote:While we are on the subject, which rock group from Russia has had the greatest impact outside of the country?
Well, really, i don't know. I mean, the problem is, it is probably better seen from "outside of here" than from the inside. Frankly, i do not think Russian rock was very influental in the world, language being only one of the factors. The first wave of Russian rock music (70s-80s) was usually more about words than music, good equipment being a bit of a problem. Aquarium worked in US and recorded an album in English but i do not think they were as influental "abroad" as here. Gorky Park? Well, they sang in English of sorts and recorded in US, but frankly, they were influenced rather than influental. Red Elvises, perhaps? But again, they didn't make it big by living and recording in motherland in their native tongue. I'm not talking modern/new bands cause to me, they — well, they don't have the same appeal and they try too hard to sound as if they were not bands from Russia.
Speaking of Sekret and "Daj mne" — yes, indeed, the roots are felt all the way through the song, not just because of language. To me it sounds like a funny mixture of Scott Joplin-influenced ragtime and a "traditional" Sovietic march. :wink:
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Re: Sekret

Post by admin »

Sheena: I especially like the part of the song that begins at 1:45 to 2:00 or so. What are they saying there?
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

I presume you mean the "rap" part in "Daj mne"? Here's this part, right before the last chorus repeated a few times:
And although the day that'll be the day of victory hasn't come yet —
Of the triumph of good over evil, —
I believe you and I will see in the end
A blue daybreak over every roof.
(i've edited it a bit so that it would be closer to the original Russian text, not sure it got better from the point of English grammar though :twisted: )
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

One more song. Nothing really rebellious about it, just a nice tune, and more typical for the band.
Не говори мне прощай (Секрет)
Don't say farewell (Leonidov/Fomenko)
Once more, the time sets foot in the stirrup,
That's time for us to tear away,
And the rain's pouring on the roofs —
It doesn't hear me
And disappears, turning into yesterday.
Here's the shore...
Don't care if nobody believes
That the trouble has left us forever.
But our sea
Is not all grief,
It's a pity that time runs away to nowhere.

Refrain:
Don't say farewell to me
Once again
Promise me you'll return
Give your word.
I'll scream: "Don't go!"
But, like a fallen star,
The night city
Is laughing at me again...

The race is over. Maybe tonight
Another star will burn away in the sky.
And we, as before, only believe in hope
And don't hear the years run away from us.
Round and round,
We may be in trouble:
It's easy to believe in lies of fairy tales.
But i know, we'll play again,
At random and once more all-or-nothing.
Refrain.
Nothing will get you dead quicker than being deadly serious about yourself.
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Re: Sekret

Post by jps »

Reminds me of Dire Soviet, the Russian counterpart to Dire Straits! :mrgreen:

Cool stuff, maybe good fodder for the Lemon Antennas!
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Re: Sekret

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Don't say farewell (Leonidov/Fomenko)

Wow. This is very nicely done and certainly Lights My Garage.

The jazz chords and arrangement is so typical of many Western compositions. There are moments that sound very much like Seals and Crofts on this track.

Pop, rock and jazz all rolled into one. It is so intriguing that I did not miss the lyrics. So much is learned from the tone alone.

It has been a while since I heard something for the first time that I enjoyed so thoroughly. Thanks for this love song Sheena. Their work is not a Sekret any more. :)
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

I didn't expect you to like it that much, Peter, that was a surprise, and a very pleasant one.
If you - or anybody else, for that matter - want more, here's a source, with quite a few songs. The site's in Russian (not a big surprise, i guess), you'll get to the album if you click on its title which is between the cover and the rating stars; to play a song from the album, click on the white arrow below the gramophone.
And here's one more video, since you like jazzy sound. That's from the times when the band worked as trio, without Maxim Leonidov.
"Ночь" - The Night
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Re: Sekret

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Sheena: The Night, is a great performance. Thanks for sharing it with us. Yes, Jazz would be the word. I love the tone of that Tenor Saxophone. The vocal is excellent and a captivating one. I have always been intrigued that music is such a universal language. The emotions expressed during this performance transcend the lyric and still sweeps the listener off his or her feet.
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

Here's the words (more or less). Wonder if that's what you've heard in the song or the feeling was different.

Night's the king of lanterns,
Steps off the roof, having whispered with the door locks.
Let everything turn to smoke again
And, covered with it, in emptiness,
And having given the way to Mistress Darkness,
Moon comes out alone, she's the hostess now.
Rain kissing the asphalt
Has opened his case, and his viol started hooting.
Where the neon trembles in the puddles
Prince of Shopwindows who'd lost his sleep
Fights the rain one to one,
The god of loneliness is here, and he's the host now.

The moon was telling me there'd be no trouble,
That everything passes by and time draws away the pain.
But still, the hand of the emptiness is on my shoulder,
And the rain's still talking.

A trace of somebody else's taxi.
As if somebody says "pardon" to me.
Here's rain, and it doesn't go
With a heap of papers
To nowhere.
Princess Water is in a hurry,
Sadness is the queen here, she's a hostess now.
---
Interesting you've mentioned excellent vocals, cause i always thought Fomenko couldn't really sing but his charisma and sense of humour compensated for that. Oh well. Tastes and opinions differ. :wink:
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Re: Sekret

Post by sowhat »

Okay, since it's a rebel music section anyway, let's try to get it back to rebellion. Here you go. This one's from the album released in 1991. Шаг за шагом (Секрет)
Step by step
Refrain: Step by step, march by march*,
Up the staircase leading down,
Time after time we were fallen aboard,
We'll never see the bench again.
* A play upon words. The word "марш" in Russian means both march and flight (pair of stairs)

The Chief who's grabbed the steering wheel,
Has sung us a sweet song about full plates.
But when the tired team has fallen asleep,
He's screwed our foots into moorage wall.
In the morning, he called, "Full forward!",
We grabbed the oars, and what's next?
It turned out the Chief simply lied to us,
But today, it costs more!

Refrain.

We've long forgotten how to scream,
Our throats are only capable of howling.
And if the Chief has achieved anything,
It'd be that we smell of war.
There, on the bridge, there'd been six Chiefs,
So what are we waiting for from the seventh?
We all know that all we think about
Is how to stay alive!

Refrain.

Having drowned us in sh@t,
They've thrown us a possibility to natter.
There, on the bridge, the Chief has forgotten about one thing -
About the oil's explode ability.
Here, in the enging compartment, there's almost wildfire,
We're shooting at each other.
But they won't blow steam off us this time,
Get ready, Captain, we're coming out of the circle!

Refrain.
Nothing will get you dead quicker than being deadly serious about yourself.
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