(We present Comrade Aleks‘ interview of Vadim Baev, guitarist from the Russian doom/death metal band Yakor (Яkорь).)
Onega is a town in the northwest of Russia, situated not far away from the White Sea. And Yakor / Якорь (translated as “the anchor”) is probably the only doom metal band in this entire region. The band was formed in 2016 with the following lineup: Vadim Baev (guitar), Vitaly Rudy (guitar), Sergei Belov (vocals, bass), Sergei Kostin (drums). Evgeniy Zhuravsky from the Trawler band took the second guitarist’s position when Vitaly left, but that’s not the point of this interview. It’s just that from the very beginning, Yakor was strongly inspired by the melodic doom influenced KYPCK, and these men didn’t hide this influence.
However, with the release of the third album under the ambiguous name Russkaya gotika / Russian Gothic (and that’s not about gothic metal or whatever) through Soundage Productions, the rules of the game seriously changed, and the band’s individuality looks clearer and sharper.
This short interview with Vadim Baev will answer some questions that arose while listening to the new songs.
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Vadim, hello! How is the situation? What’s new in the world of Yakor?
Alexey, hello, the situation is calm. After the release of the album Russian Gothic we went to Moscow and St. Petersburg, and now there is a creative break, except for preparations for the summer festivals in Arkhangelsk. Speaking for myself, I collect thoughts and ideas in a heap; after the album’s release I want to exhale, it took a lot of effort.
Vadim, after the release of the first album Ya ne vernus’ / I Won’t Return you went the same route and slowly released single after single. How justified was this approach? And why in the end did you decide to record part of the material in the unusual format as the EP Nad velikoy stranoy / Over the Mighty Country?
Yes, initially we released singles, it’s just that it’s easier, for one single demands less effort and attention; there are much more all sorts of issues with the album. On February 22nd, 2022, the song “Smert’ v Vorkute” / “Death in Vorkuta” was released, and at that time, we finally licensed music on various services. We planned release dates for other singles, but after the start of all that mess on February 22, difficulties arose with the main aggregator and the release dates got lost, and the new songs “Nad Velikoy Stranoy” (“Over the Mighty Country”), “26.04.1986”, “Gorkaya” (“The Bitter One”) merged into one release.
How did you select songs for this release? Why did you decide to base the lyrics of the title song on the story of Stalin’s son, Yakov Dzhugashvili, who was a lieutenant and died at the fascists’ Sachsenhausen concentration camp in 1943?
As I said above, this is a coincidence. Although the EP songs are close in spirit. I remember our vocalist-bassist Sergei sent a sketch of the text about Stalin’s son Yakov. Honestly, at first, I did not really understand its idea, so to speak, and the rest of the guys reacted positively, and later I realized that it suits us. After that, probably about two years passed, music was invented, assembled into an arrangement, and in my opinion this track turned out as a very serious and powerful song. After the release, the reaction of the listeners was not unambiguous; everyone can see the meaning of this song, if this topic somehow touches him.
The album Doroga k schastju / The Road to Happiness was released in September 2023, many of the songs of which you posted online as singles. Why did you decide to gather all these tracks in the full-length album? Was this material re-recorded?
Yes, everything is true. To be precise, all the songs came out in the format of singles before the album. This proposal came more from me; I did not like that each song had a different sound, and the quality of the recording wasn’t ok. The guys supported this idea, and in the end we got a solid album. The material was re-recorded completely, for a single sound, maybe with the exception of some keyboard pads.
In February 2024 you published the digital version of your third full-length album Russkaya gothika / Russian Gothic, which caused sheer delight for Yakor’s fans. Why did you decide to release new material with minimal pause after the release of Doroga k schastju?
Since the album Doroga k schastju was already familiar to many listeners, there were previously unreleased songs in our arsenal; if I’m not mistaken, we had about four songs. And we thought that we should also write and make an album totally completed with new material.
Although one of the new songs “Skorbnyi list” / “Mournful Leaf” resembles KYPCK’s stuff strongly, one can feel Russkaya gothika as the departure from that band’s influences. So how consciously did these changes happen?
We agree about the similarity with KYPCK, and more than once we said that their songs essentially inspired us in 2015, and pulled out of us various experienced events, somewhere difficult and unpleasant. But the most important thing is that our songs are written by us, and do not depend on KYPCK’s legacy.
By the way, how do you see the latest (already last year) news from KYPCK’s camp?
It’s sad that in our time politics and propaganda have spread their influences so much into all spheres of life including art, and artists are forced to make unpleasant decisions. I have no right to condemn or encourage. Let’s hope that KYPCK will still delight us with their songs.
How was the name Russkaya gothika born? The first thing that came to my mind when I saw it was Grant Wood’s painting American Gothic; conceived as a collective image of Americans, many took this portrait as a caricature. What do you think?
Initially, there was an option with a different album name, but the song was already there, and through discussion we decided that Russkaya gothika would be a fitting title for the album. It attracts attention and sounds interesting. If we take a song with its semantic load, then here, of course, there is a certain collective image of a Russian person and, not without exaggeration, some aspects of our cultural code.
The vodka theme is undoubtedly an important cultural reference, without which, objectively, Russian doom metal is unimaginable. But don’t you think that there is too much vodka in Russkaya gothika?
Hah… Yes, we have the song there “100 Vagnov s Vodkoy” / “100 Train Carriages with Vodka”! In general, this is probably the most fun song we have, and not very typical for doom metal, although it is close in spirit to us. At concerts, it went well, judging by the reaction of the audience.
In general, the topic of alcoholism in Russia is quite acute, and we partly tested it on ourselves… At least, in our gray reality, sometimes it is simply unrealistic not to drink something stronger; of course we are not promoting the use of alcohol, better to keep living without it, but sometimes it’s impossible…
Vadim, thanks for the interview. Let’s sum it up: what are your plans for 2024?
There are more plans to play gigs, we’ll take part in several festivals which are planned in the summer and autumn. And I hope it will turn out to pay more attention to video content – I want to shoot another video. And save ideas for new songs…
https://gateofthesilverkey.bandcamp.com/album/-