Excellent review from an Italian journalist in Italian.
Only one clarification: Volch’ya Yagoda (Wolf’s Berry) in Russian is the name of a poisonous and at the same time healing berry.
This folk name is difficult to translate into another language. This is certainly not Wolfberry (Goji Berry). But in general, the journalist has felt the spirit of the album and its roots. Respect!
For anyone who read in Italian:
http://rock-impressions.com/theodorbastard3.htm
There are not many interviews with Theodor Bastard in English and the more valuable they are.
Here is an outstanding Italian journalist Giancarlo Bolther (rock-impressions.com) talked to Fedor Svoloch, the founder of Theodor Bastard.
Fedor “In general, in the term World Music, in this concept itself there is something flawed. I began to understand this only recently. It’s like Thai beads that local residents sell to tourists in order to somehow survive, and the tourist brings them home and shows them as an exotic. That’s what the modern genre of World Music is. This is not so joyful. And at some point, we realized that with our Africa and other things, we are like these tourists with beads. But we were born in the north, all my and Yana’s childhood passed in the village on a farm. We are familiar with old folk songs, Slavic spells and lullabies. Since childhood, we heard the sound of a gusli, a harp, a beep. Why not record it, why not sing about what is closer to us?”
See more: bit.ly/3fPapuf
Dear friends, the Bandcamp action is happening today. You could greatly support us if you would buy our releases today. Because today all the money from sales is received by musicians without any fee.
Now, in addition to releases that were not in your collection yet, and to new album, you can purchase the collection of remixes – album Remixed – in maximum sound quality.
And one more good news: you can buy all our releases at once with a 15% discount here: https://theodorbastard.bandcamp.com
An amazing Finnish journalist Tuomas Harviainen has written a review about new album by Theodor Bastard for the magazine Kultturivihkot. It was released in the rubric «Top soundtracks for our quarantine times»:
«”The Russian-Karelian arts collective, Theodor Bastard, formed around Fedor Svolotch, in turn keeps changing its style from one disc to the next. They make game music as well as ethno, and one never knows what is coming next.
Their newest album, Volch’ya Yagoda (2020), is however quite traditional modern folk music, where one can hear both nyckelharpa and jouhikko. The band, as always, shows here its’ members’ undeniable mastery over what they decide to do.
Yana Veva’s is just as big a pleasure to hear as always, in any genre. And the material dances brilliantly between the clichés of Slavonic folk, Eurovision song contest mentality, and machine influences, but never ever crosses over to being corny in any way.
The single from the album, Les, is soft and beautiful. It does not really stand apart in style from the other pieces, but the lack of a clear “hit” often does good for albums in this genre. Due to that, on the other hand, for example Urzala shines out with its strength. The band’s instruments are clearly recognizable from each other and the album’s production quality is nothing short of perfect. So if you are like me and feel bad about missing the Kaustinen folk festival this year due to the circumstances, this album should work as an excellent substitute.»
Dear friends, according to many requests, we decided to upload the entire album Volch’ya Yagoda on our YouTube channel. Surprisingly, it was founded that listening to music in this format is convenient for many people. Denis Kniazev made interesting visualizations for each song, this adds more atmosphere to listening.
It’s not the first year when Yana and Fedor have been fascinated by studies of children’s folklore, where children act as an ethnic group, as a kind of small people. A people who are still closer to “there” than to “here.” A people that has its own special connection with the cosmos, with the world of the collective unconscious and with the whole mythological layer.
The song “Secrets” was written by Fedor under the impression of reading the impressive monograph by Sofya Mikhailovna Loyter “Russian children’s folklore and children’s mythology: Research and texts.” The textual material of which widely represents the children’s tradition of Karelia and of the region that especially famous in the world folklore – of Zaonezhie.
When creating the lyrics, Fedor relied on this monograph, and partly on other books about children’s folklore and on his childhood memories.
In the songs of Theodor Bastard, consciously or not, we quite often turn to the themes of childhood.
We use the symbols of childhood: game songs, teasers, countings, fables, as well as sayings and riddles.
Dear friends, today Bandcamp store performs an action to support musicians. Bandcamp is waiving its revenue share on sales today. They do not take away their fee! So we would be happy if you could support us exactly today and we decided to add our own action: we will send our yet unreleased song personally to anyone who will buy any our album today on Bandcamp.
The hope that concerts will be allowed this year is very little. A challenging time has come for all musicians, but we try to stay with you and keep releasing songs.
By the way, Bandcamp is an unique service where you can purchase music in lossless format!
Our page on Bandcamp: https://theodorbastard.bandcamp.com
Thank you very much and take care!
Urzala is a piece of our experience of solo travels to the most remote corners of the Karelian and Ural forests, as well as to the north of the Kola Peninsula.
We were especially impressed with the acoustics of the forest Ural caves.
For example, the Miracle Cave – the longest cave in the region of Chusovaya River and one of the most beautiful caves in the Ural.
This cave is located in a wild forest, on the slope of Mount Kladovaya, and its entrance is a narrow loophole, through which you need to crawl surrounded with cliffs by all sides.
Claustrophobic and scary experience.
Then the space expands and the grotto begins, which cavers call the Great.
There is absolutely unhuman acoustics here.
Urzala song is the quintessence of these travels, of observations the natural acoustics of forests and caves, and it is a certain sum of shamanistic experience and shamanistic practices available to us.
The entire Volchya Yagoda album is dedicated to the forest.
Of course, the first associations arise with the northern forest, which we know.
But the forest is where we all came from.
And even when we return to it for a short time from the city, we feel it.
The forest is our home, we feel it.
Such things, probably, may not be explain, the listener is unlikely guessing about them, but they pass through the entire album – slivers, whistles, similar sound little things.
Dear Friends, New album Theodor Bastard – now is available on all digital stores and streaming platforms.
New album Theodor Bastard is available on all digital stores and streaming platforms.
The long-awaited new Theodor Bastard album Volch’ya Yagoda is a major work the band has been working on for the past five years. Theodor Bastard albums aren’t released very often, but they invariably attract increased attention of audiophiles and music critics.
The multilayered and unpredictable album Volch’ya Yagoda inherits the band’s recognizable multigenre approach where psychedelic trip hop combines with cinematic instrumentals and archaic world music meets modern technological electronics. Theodor Bastard combine Russian texts with glossolalia and shamanic spells as easily as they change instruments on stage. Yana Veva and Fedor Svoloch compose music not only within the band, they regularly record soundtracks for popular computer games. Over many years they have sharpened the art of weaving complex sound canvases where the listener feels like in a labyrinth.
From album to album Theodor Bastard carefully and masterly combine many different exotic and traditional instruments. Volch’ya Yagoda is no exception. The special northern atmosphere of the album is created with Nordic nyckelharpa and jouhikko, primeval flutes created from tree roots and shamanic percussion. And as always, the leading role in the album belongs to the voice of Yana Veva, exciting and bewitching by its deepness.
Volch’ya Yagoda takes the listener to the cold and twilight realms of marshy swamps of taiga and mossy tundra, to unexplored places where the earthly plane and the spiritual world are separated only by a very thin ghostly veil. For over twenty years Theodor Bastard have been known for their amazingly serious attitude to the world beyond that very frontier.
All songs written by Yana Veva and Fedor Svolotch (except Volchok – folk lyrics)
Arranged by Fedor Svolotch and Yana Veva
Producer: Fedor Svolotch
The album was recorded at Theodor Bastard studio and Dobrolet studio.
Engineer (all drums): Alexander Dokshin
Mixed by Fedor Svolotch and Andrei Alyakrinskiy
Mastered by Boris Istomin
Artwork: Yana Veva, Fedor Svolotch, Stepan Samosevich
Booklet photos: Alexander Corvus, Maris Grunskis, Sebastian Jakob, Alexander Schitschka, Valerii M, Volodymyr Goinyk and Light-Studio
Dear friends, we are happy to present you a new track that will be included in our future album!
The base of this song was originally written by Yana alone for one of the soundtracks for computer games that we write as composers.
But when Fedor heard this, he immediately said to Yana: ‘We won’t give it to anyone, this song is created for the album!’
Then, when he added the drums, everything has become just fine.
Lyrics for Fjorn Gaden is based on the Younger Edda by the medieval Icelandic writer Snorri Sturluson. The Younger Edda consists of seven manuscripts, dating from 1300 to 1600.
Our song is not a meaningful Old Norse text, but rather, some selected quotes. We just really like the sound of some words and some images.
We did not have the goal to achieve some authenticity, so could you not look for it there. We are a quite modern band and we do not do reconstruction at all.
For Fjorn Gaden, we managed to gather an amazing cast. For example, Alexander Platonov, who has one of the lowest bass voice in St. Petersburg.
In the past he shone on opera and theater stages, but now he has gone into Russian folklore. Such an amazing metamorphosis!
In addition to the voice of Yana, the song also contains the vocals of Ekaterina Dolmatova, our regular back-vocalist and part-time vocalist of other Petersburg folk groups.
On the track, you can hear the very interesting instruments made by our friend, a wonderful master Ilya Dobrokhotov, who played them.
He played the nyckelharpa. This is a traditional Swedish musical instrument. Sometimes nyckelharpa is called the ‘Swedish keyboard violin’. Ilya also played the jouhikko there. This is a Finnish and Karelian traditional instrument also simply called ‘bowed kantele’.
This gave the song a special northern flavor.
T H E O D O R B A S T A R D «FJORN GADEN»:
Yana Veva – vocals, flute, keyboards, penny whistles
Fedor Svolotch – dulcimer, percussion, vocals, sound
Ilia Dobrokhotov – nyckelharpa, jouhikko
Ekaterina Dolmatova, Alexander Platonov – vocals
Vyacheslav Salikov – cello
All drums recorded at «Dobrolet studio», Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Soundengineer: Alexander Dokshin
Choir recorded at «Dobrolet studio», Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Soundengineer: Alexander Dokshin
Jouhikko and Nyckelharpa recorded at «Theo Records», Saint-Petersburg, Russia
Soundengineer: Fedor Svolotch
Mixed by Andrei Aliakrinskiy at «Dobrolet studio»
Mastered by Boris Istomin
Producer: Fedor Svolotch (Alexander Starostin)
T H E O D O R B A S T A R D:
Dear friends, we present our new music video for the song Les.
We left behind many expeditions into the wilderness, broken equipment, severe weather conditions, dozens of locations, wild animals and mystical insights.
We were covered with snow, shrouded in fog, the sky was whispering and the forests suggested.
So this beautiful fairy tale was realized on the Karelian Isthmus and became a reality or something between reality and dream.
The whole Theodor Bastard team took part in this video creation.
Surprisingly, in the light of current realities, the song Les itself and the video have some special and new reading for us.
You can characterize the video briefly with the words of one of the movie characters of the past: ‘We are all victims – that’s the essence.’
Happy viewing!
We are happy to present you a live version of our song Unhurei. This song was in the beginning of our concerts for a long time, but it was never ever released. Here is captured a very exciting moment for us – the first Theodor Bastard concert at the Sundukyan Theater in Yerevan. We fell in love with Armenia instantly and for a long time. We really hope we will return to this magical land again!
