The Bodhisattvas of Babylon

Mitki Songs (Митьковские песни)

This is the second album of Mit'ki songs. A great collection. Everyone sounds great, not just Boris. The four biggest-of-wigs on this collection are BG, V. Butusov (Nautilus Pompilius), Y. Shevchuk (DDT), and Chizh (Chizh & Co.) There are others, but we don't know who they are. Except for one, Aleksei Khvostenko (Khvost), who wrote that song "The City" that Boris sings from time to time. Guess what, Khvost sings it on this collection, and he stinks.

First released in 1996.

Review by Dzhrew

The setlist below does not reflect the songs that Boris doesn't sing. Sorry. We have to draw the line somewhere. Trust us, though, the other ones are really good. Even Khvost's version of "Gorod" (which he calls "Paradise" on this) is at least interesting.

Dzhrew dons his reservoir tipped thinking cap to lecture: The "Mit'ki" are members of an artistic movement centered around Dmitri Shagin, the painter who did the cover art, the art currently hanging in the window at Saigon, and so on. dMITri, that's where the term comes from. Mit'ki are a wily bunch. Musicians, painters. I have books with their logo inside the cover, so I think there are also mitki-writers.

Bonus: Here's all you ever wanted to know about the Mit'ki (thanks to Vakulik, who wrote what Dzhrew presents here): They appeared at the beginning of the 80s, achieving fame in the mid-80s. Dima (Mit'ya, whence the name of the whole movement, "Mit'ki") Shagin is their leader, but there were enough other well-known personalities: Florenskii, Sinkarev, Filippov. The closest analogy to them in the West is the hippies.

Their songs are old, from Tsarist times. The Mit'ki think that they are reviving the soul of Imperial Russia, patriarchiness [patriarkhal'nost' -Dzhrew], and nostalgia for Russia's "golden century." All these thoughts weigh heavily in their philosophy. That's sorta why their songs and art tend to have naval themes. ["There goes the hippy parallel." -Dzhrew]

The Mit'ki are writers, artists, and musicians. They have their own creative union, and have shown their art at exhibitions in Europe and Ameirca. All their art was strongly connected with alcohol, so now—as all the movement's leaders have quit drinking (Shagin hasn't drunk for over 5 years)—the Mit'ki movement is slowly dying. Maybe that's for the better, for the Mit'ki personally.