Posted by I’m not one to write ticket stories about every time I go to a bar to see some random band; to do so would prove endless. In fact, I would spend so much time writing that I wouldn’t have any time left to go out to bars to see random bands.
However I will make an exception for this one as it was exceptional circumstances. To wit:
On August 31st, 2006 I was in St. Petersburg, Russia of all places. I had arrived by train from Helsinki having completed my solo bicycle trek through Scandinavia and was in the middle of a three-night stay in the city. Throughout my extensive tromping through the city taking in the truly astounding sights one thing had become blatantly clear: Russians like to drink. It didn’t matter where you went or when you got there, there would be liquor for sale and people buying it. Every shop had a table offering bottles of vodka and whiskey, and as far as I could tell the bars never closed. All of this was super-fine with me, as I like to drink as well.
As darkness fell on this night I found myself with a pair of recently-acquired drinking buddies in a bar seeing live music, something I had yet to stumble upon in Russia, literally or figuratively. Though drinking establishments were extremely common (as were regular shopping stores that amazingly sold and/or served alcohol) live music venues seemed to be a rare thing indeed.
And so after a jaw-on-the-marble-floor afternoon spent at the Winter Palace taking in arguably the greatest collection of art in the world followed by a very worthy splurge on a dinner of beef stroganoff at the actual Stroganoff Castle I forewent a much-needed night of rest when a fellow hostelite told me he was going to a bar to see a band. Three of us set off to find a bar called Fish Fabrique.
It was down a small alley and in a basement. I paid a hundred rubles cover and walked in. The small, square room was decorated with nifty wrought-iron fixtures throughout and the space was filled with heavy wooden tables and chairs. There was a small stage by the door and when I walked in there was a band crowded on it rocking out to a thirty-strong crowd. Dressed straight out of early-eighties New Wave with hair coiffed à la Duran Duran, the four guys with the great name of Stanislovsky tore through a forty-minute set of original music that was reminiscent of U2, The Clash, and The Police. I spoke to them afterwards and asked about playing music in Russia. They told me that they kept fairly busy playing two or three times a month, further insisting insisting that Fish Fabrique – with it’s dusty, outdated speakers running from a very small and questionable soundboard – had the best sound in all of St. Petersburg.
They would occasionally tour around and had played as far away as Moscow though they found it impossible to make any actual money. As we were chatting the doorman came by and paid them for the night, handing the band a thousand rubles (about $40, which was about a third of what came in at the door by my count). They gave my a copy of their cd single, a home-made affair that was recorded and duplicated on someone’s computer. I asked if they were doing another set or if there was another act. They said no to both questions, adding that the standard night of music was just one band playing less than an hour. I told them about the Canadian norm of multiple sets and maybe two or three hours of music and their eyebrows lifted off their heads.
The band started packing up so I let them be and turned back to the room of drinkers. By this time an entirely different crowd had drifted in and I quickly found a group to hang out with, a convergence that lasted until well past 2am. The guys I sat with were all in agreement that given the chance they would all move away from Russia – with Australia as the most desired location – though they also agreed that it was unlikely to happen to any of them. One of them worked six months on/six months off in the Antarctic while another had just that very day returned from his one month on/one month off gig working in Siberia. Solid, strong stock, these Russians.
Some cultural tidbits I learned over the course of the evening:
When the Russians cheer’sed they really cheer’sed. Whenever someone raised a glass it was absolutely required that every glass clang hard against every other glass with no exceptions. At one point a cheer’s came around and my mug was empty so one of the guys poured some of his beer into it and I almost choked on the stuff. It was traditional honey-beer and it was strong. I mean, it tasted like three or four heaping tablespoons of honey had been stirred into his ale.
It’s popular for everyone at a table to share a bottle of wine (which was also very sweet) alongside their own drink and whenever a bottle is finished tradition holds that the empty vessel be placed under the table. There was soon little room for our feet as the space beneath our table became positively littered with empty wine bottles.
At some point I made one of my stupid drunky-jokes – the type where I say the exact opposite of something I would generally say; something generally mock-aggressive – and I was immediately reprimanded, and not lightly. It was explained that while we westerners mean about 60% of what we say and do and leave the truth to come through facial expressions and tone of voice, in Russia they mean 100% of what comes out of their mouths. There is no sarcasm in Russia, they told me, and no matter how lightly I might intend a sarcastic joke it would never, ever be taken as such. Don’t get me wrong, it didn’t get ugly, but the message was clear: don’t do it again.
The guys were all big music fans and one mentioned that his three lifelong dreams were to see Pink Floyd live, to see Jethro Tull live, and to swim in the ocean. I didn’t have the heart to tell him how easy his dreams were for us in the west to achieve.
All in all it was an amazing and very unique night and I really could have stayed there drinking until sunrise (I’m sure the rest of the table did). But somehow I managed to lift myself up and find my way back to the hostel by 3am. Despite turning in so early, when it comes down to it this was of the more interesting days of my life.
I will close by explaining why I thought the band had picked for themselves a rather clever name. Stanislovsky was a Russian actor who developed an acting method that bears his name to this day, a method whereby the actor delves so deeply into his character that he can walk, talk, speak, and think as if he was that character. You know those actors who are known to stay in character and insist on being called by their character’s name even when off-set? They are following the Stanislovsky System of acting. So yeah, good name for a band.
Todd Man Out 