Conspiracy or Reality: Suppressing Punk Rock in Russia
“A Better America” – The boys of America Part Two are a homegrown band from Monmouth County’s Asbury Park, NJ. Their motto is “Perpetuate Love, Fight Hate.” In their latest song “Split,” they sing about fighting for the purpose of a better tomorrow, a better America.
As many of us know, Russia is home to some of the most secretive and crazy conspiracy theories. Now, what if what you believed was a conspiracy theory turned out to be true? We hear different stories daily, from the news, from our peers and sometimes it’s hard to decipher what is fiction and what is not.
Luckily for us, as Americans, we have freedom of speech. We are allowed to express ourselves. We are allowed to paint our feelings, we are allowed to write our feelings, we are allowed to even musically express our feelings.
When Russia was first introduced to the punk rock scene in the 1960s, blue jeans and platform shoes were sold on the black market. By the early 1970s, punk rock albums followed in the black market. Young Soviets felt as though they finally had their very own identity, different than the traditional styles of the older generations.
The government rejected this “punk movement,” stating that those who followed in this movement and expression were filled with nothing but hate and aggression. They even had journalists write articles that were against this movement.
Those who picked up a guitar and sung about how they wanted more out of life soon began to go missing. Everyone looked the other way, and nobody asked questions out of fear. The simple act of even making loud music that stimulates people’s minds was banned within the country, and they were declared to be enemies of the state.
One of Siberia’s most popular punk bands during this time was “Grazhdanskaya Oborona” or “Grob” for short. (Grob means coffin in Russian.) Grob began to gain popularity for singing about the government and was soon declared to be socially dangerous. Again, the government in Russia was using fear to keep people from thinking or feeling differently than the traditional route.
The government has not always listened but communicating in these ways has always made some sort of change within civilization in our country. In America, we are lucky enough to have that freedom of speech, to be able to pick up a guitar at the age of 11 and play and sing about how angry we are that our older sibling is picking on us. Our country has some ways to go still, but with freedom of speech and our very own voices, we can make a change greater than all of us.
