Recap // 100 Tape Albums of Soviet Rock (100 Магнитоальбомов Советского Рока)

The entirety of translated Chapter 3 (dedicated to sound engineer/producer Andrei Tropillo) from Alexandr Kushnir’s book 100 Tapes of Soviet Rock (100 Магнитоальбомов Советского Рока). Archives can be found here.

Thanks to everyone supportive of this venture.

Part 1

Andrei Vladimirovich Tropillo was born March 21, 1951. “Same day as Johann Sebastian Bach” as Tropillo, who never suffered from excessive humbleness, likes to clarify. To be fair the man that recorded nearly all of Leningrad rock in the 80s knows his worth…

Part 2

Positive conversation with Soviet authorities had its impact on Tropillo Sr. Upon hearing Battle with Fools (Битва с Дураками) almost 20 years later he confessed to his son: “Had a feeling the doors will open now and black paddy wagons will start being loaded with people.”

Part 3

One of the concerts saw Andrei using trimmed letterheads of Komsomol certificate as numbered tickets with the image of Lenin standing in front of Smolny. The super-cockiness invited certain authorities to look deeper into Tropillo’s work.

Part 4

The console was definitely unique. Packed into wooden frame it was made of parts created at the defensive plants of the nation and resembled a hybrid of vacuum cleaner and ground-to-air missile.

Part 5

In order to get involved somehow with the long-suffering treasury of the psych department, Tropillo started working at the faculty where he carrying out hard-to-pronounce tasks such as “research into safety of war operators”. Using such scientific innovations as a shield Andrei Vladimirovich gained the trust of University administration and systematically proceeded to collect money from the accounting.