The Bodhisattvas of Babylon

10 Years (10 Лет)

An awesome acoustic concert (90 minutes) 10-yr anniversary show with a great playlist. The small audience doesn't seem to get it at first. Then Boris explains how the show starts with long ballad-type songs. Later it picks up, as do the audience. The recording isn't from a soundboard, a fact given away by someone bumping into the microphone, but the mix is great, and the recording quality is, all things considered, fine.

First released in 1982.

Review by Dji

Well, it was fine for a bootleg (long available on cheapo cassette from Zig-Zag in Moscow)...but is it really good enough to have been immortalized in the digitized concrete of a CD, as it has been this year (2002)? One comes into an umpteenth-generation bootleg with a different set of expectations than one has for $12 + disc, so caveat emptor: This is not a recording for the nit-picky, nor one for someone looking for high-quality stereophonic sound.

With this in mind, it's a fine addition to any Bodhisattva's collection. It sounds like the whole gang is there: acoustic guitars, flute, cello, congas (dude's banging on a lot of stuff besides drums, though), bass, Boris… They cover the whole gamut of the first 10 years pretty well, and even slip in a pre-release acoustic version of "Rock-and-Roll's Dead."

There's a dog barking in the background during the first few songs. It sounds like this show must have been performed in one of those awful DKs (with acoustics like a high school gym).

Some jackass irritatingly coughs through a solo version of "Contradance." He coughs throughout the whole show, actually. I prefer the dog barking.

The CD release also contains the following mp3 bonus tracks appended at the end of the concert: "Slice of Life," "The Game is Fixed," "People Arriving from Juniper Bushes," "Protect Your Prick," and "Simple Man's Blues."

Liner Notes from the CD issue:

Two concerts in two different formats are recorded on this disc. In the usual format is a concert recorded in a sculptor's studio on Tverskii boulevard in Moscow, September 17, 1982, known to the public as "10 years." However, this concert wasn't immediately connected with the 10th anniversary of the group Akvarium. The actual anniversary was observed in June 1982 in Leningrad, but the Leningrad concert was recorded very poorly and didn't last very long, since it was interrupted by the arrival of the police. Moreover, the capacity of a CD is limited, therefore it was necessary to include the songs saved from the Leningrad concert in mp3 format.

Gakkel plays only at the Moscow concert. Lyapin and Troschenkov play only at the Leningrad concert.