DDT, one of Russia’s biggest rock bands, have had several concerts in Siberian cites cancelled according to frontman Yuri Shevchuk. He has said that local authorities forbade concerts in Omsk, Yugra, Kemerovo and Tumen. Shevchuk is a noted critic of the Putin regime.
“Dodgy officials gave the orders by phone, which makes it almost impossible to sue them,” said a statement published on the DDT website. “Apparently, there isn’t enough ‘erotic patriotism’ our shows for them. But we won’t lose heart, because despair is a sin. We believe that this burly gang of zealous advocates of a “disintegrating order” will soon dissolve in the embrace of a different future,” the official statement went.
Government officials in the Siberian Kemerovo region denied the allegations, saying “this was all about business and risks”.
Yuri Shevchuk has been actively supporting the Russian protest movement, including being involved in recent mass protests for fair elections. He has also taken part in public campaigns in support of the Khimki forest defenders and opposition activist Taisiya Osipova. He also puzzled Vladimir Putin with questions about democracy, freedom of speech and assembly in 2010, during an official meeting between Putin and Russian intelligentsia representatives.
“I don’t know what exactly they are afraid of, but they are definitely afraid,” Shevchuk told Index on Censorship. “They [government officials] were scared by the winter and spring protests against election fraud and they are obviously concerned about losing their material benefits, which is most likely to happen sooner or later.”
Shevchuk added that DDT concert tour’s core idea was “philosophical” and aimed to “make each person ask himself what will happen to him and his motherland”. Authorities don’t need people to be clever and ask such questions, Yuri Shevchuk told Index.
Incidents of this nature are not new to Shevchuk. DDT had problems with concert organisation in November and December 2011 in the run-up to the parliamentary elections. At that time one of the band’s concerts was cancelled and another was rescheduled to the last day before elections — so called “silence day”, when, according to Russian law, no political activism involving propaganda is allowed.
Stopping concerts is a technique often used by the Kremlin to silence critics. Satirist writer and veteran Putin opponent Viktor Shenderovich had a concert in a Saint Petersburg theatre cancelled in April 2010 on the pretext of inspecting the building ahead of repairs.
Similarly, rock musician Vasily Shumov had problems with organising a concert in support of Russia’s leading music critic Art Troitsky, who faced several libel suits in Moscow. The management of some concert halls reported pressure from local authorities, whilst others received notification from the prosecutor’s office that they were suddenly in breach of fire regulations.
Shevchuk assured that the concert tour would continue as there are still some cities where DDT concerts were not cancelled.
