Autograph (group)

The early years

The Autograph group was founded on May 4, 1979. The first group included the guitarist of the group “Leap Summer” Alexander Sitkovetsky (guitar, vocals), Leonid Gutkin (bass guitar, bassoon), Leonid Makarevich (keyboards), Andrey Morgunov (drums) . In the fall of 1979, they were joined by Chris Kelmi (keyboards and vocals, ex- “Leap Summer”) and vocalist Sergey Brutyan . Morgunova for drums was soon replaced by Vladimir Yakushenko. In this composition, in 1980 the group gained all-Union fame, taking second place at the rock festival in Tbilisi , as well as a special award for the song “Ireland. Ulster ”to verses by Margarita Pushkina. Musical monopolists of the USSR, the Melody company and the Roskontsert company, began to cooperate with the group. The autograph mini-disc with the compositions “Ireland. Ulster ”,“ Fasten your seat belts ”(I side) and“ Bluff “Caprice” ”(II side). Chris Kelmi and Vladimir Yakushenko leave in the fall of 1980, Viktor Mikhalin takes the drums for the next nine years. In the spring of 1982, vocalist Brutyan was forced to leave the music and engage in scientific activity (philology) at the request of his father, a KGB officer . His place is taken by 19-year-old Arthur "Golden Eagle" Mikheev , who previously sang in the group " Magic Twilight ". In this line-up, Autograph is successfully giving concerts in the USSR and abroad.

Peak of Popularity

The peak of the group's popularity occurred in the 1980s. Having traveled all over the Soviet Union on tour, Autograph became the first Soviet rock band to achieve real commercial success abroad, performing in more than 30 countries around the world. The group conducts tours of the socialist countries: Czechoslovakia, East Germany. In Hungary, Autograph travels around the country with the group P. Box (1984), in Bulgaria it is an honored guest at the Golden Orpheus festival (1983), in Poland - at the festival in Sopot (1987), where it becomes a laureate of the festival with individual prizes audience and the press, and the best song of the festival "Peace in yourself." In 1984, the band released its first studio album, recorded at Mosfilm Studios. The first full-length album, entitled Autograph, was released on Melodies in 1986, as well as a double concert magneto-album. On July 13, 1985, the only band from Eastern Europe took part in the world-wide television concert Live Aid for Africa , speaking to 2.5 billion people. In May 1986, Autograph, along with Alla Pugacheva and other stars, performed at the Olimpiysky sports complex in the charity concert Account 904 in support of Chernobyl firefighters. In 1986, Sergey Mazaev and Ruslan Valonen (Dubrovin) joined the group. In 1987, the group took part in the Soviet-American concert Our Move, together with Santana, Doobie Brothers, Bonnie Raitt, James Taylor. Autograph performed at countless international festivals in England, France, Denmark, Austria, Finland, Germany and Switzerland with John McLaughlin , Murray Head, Kenny Rogers, Tom Cochran, Glass Tiger, Ten Years After , Southside Johny and the Jukes, " opened "concerts for Chicago in Canada, worked with producer and composer David Foster in Canada and Moscow. In 86-87 years, the group made long tours in France, and before that - in Finland (with probably the most locally popular Finnish group of that year Popeda ), after which both groups gave a series of “sold out” concerts at the Green Theater of Gorky Park in Moscow. Sitkovetsky focuses on promoting the group abroad. In January 1988, the group first entered the United States. After two years working with American manager Mary Becker, in 1989 the band signed a contract with Frank Zappa's former manager Herb Cohen in Los Angeles, California. In 1989, the album "Stone Land" was released in Moscow.

The decline in popularity and the breakup of the group

In 1989, Autograph passes through the USSR as part of a joint tour with Aria . “Autograph”, whose complex music has already gone out of fashion, does not have the same success. Falling popularity affects the situation within the group. Leonid Makarevich leaves for health reasons at the end of 1988. At the end of 1989, Sergey Mazaev and Viktor Mikhalin left the group. Place last takes Sergey Krinitsyn. On February 20, 1990 in Saransk, after 1333 appearances, Sitkovetsky announced the dissolution of Autograph. According to him, the cause was tiredness from the tour and a creative impasse. After the breakup, an English-language album and a CD-reissue of magnetic albums of the early 80s called Autograph-1 are released. The debut American album “ Tear Down the Border” on Bizarre Records was released in 1991 with a slightly different style, but, in general, based on the “Stone Edge” material. One of the band's most popular songs, “I Need You,” was performed by Rick Springfield in the blockbuster Iron Eagle 2 .

After the collapse

Subsequently, Arthur Berkut tried to recreate the group in 2001 under the name Autograph XXI Century with the musicians of the Mavrin group: Pavel Chinyakov, Alexander Mosinyan and Arthur's wife Oksana Mikheeva. He did not succeed, since the copyright to the name of the group belonged to Sitkovetsky. As a result, the group turned into a solo project “Golden Eagle”. In 2005 , Autograph temporarily reunited in the classical composition in honor of the 25th anniversary and conducted a tour of Russian cities, culminating in a triumphal concert on June 23, 2005 at Olimpiysky. The concert was the first in the history of Russia using the Live Surround 5.1 sound technology; it was recorded on CD and DVD “Autograph. 25 years later. " In a video message on March 30, 2012, Sitkovetsky and Gutkin announced that the group was preparing a box set edition with all the albums, which would include material not previously published. September 1, 2012 "Autograph" performed in the framework of the festival "Legends of Russian rock" in the Green Theater of Moscow.

The style of "Autograph" was very different from the prevailing trends ("new wave" and bard song) in Russian rock. The main focus of the group was not on the lyrics (many of which were written by Margarita Pushkina ), but on the instrumental skills of guitarists and keyboardist ^[1] . The repertoire of Autograph had many purely instrumental compositions. By melody, the group approached the Soviet VIA , such as Earthlings , Zodiac , Flowers , and the soundtracks of Eduard Artemyev , however, it differed from them in a significantly greater severity and complexity of instrumental parts. Foreign publications compared Autograph with such groups as Yes and Electric Light Orchestra ^[1] , thus relating it to progressive rock.

Studio Albums

• 1984 - " Autograph-2 "
• 1986 - "Autograph"
• 1989 - The Stone Land (reprinted in 2005)
• 1991 - Tear Down the Border
• 1996 - " Autograph-1 " (records 1980-1982)

Live Album

• 2005 - 25 Years Later

Singles

• 1981 - “Ireland. Ulster / Fasten your seatbelts / Blues "Caprice" »
• 1985 - Truth / Monologue
• 1989 - "Peace in Yourself"
• 2005 - The Ship

Composition at the time of collapse

• Alexander Sitkovetsky - guitar , vocals (1979-1990)
• Leonid Gutkin - bass guitar (1979-1990)
• Arthur Berkut - vocals (1982-1990)
• Ruslan Valonen - keyboards (1986-1990)
• Sergey Krinitsyn - drums (1990)

Former members

• Andrey Morgunov - drums (1979)
• Chris Kelmi - keyboards , vocals (1979-1980)
• Vladimir Yakushenko - drums (1979-1980)
• Sergey Brutyan - vocals (1979-1982)
• Leonid Makarevich - keyboards (1979-1988)
• Victor Mikhalin - drums (1980-1989)
• Sergey Mazaev - vocals , saxophone (1986-1989)

Timeline

• Alekseev A.S. Who is who in Russian rock music . - M .: AST: Astrel: Harvest, 2009 .-- S. 16, 17. - ISBN 978-5-17-048654-0 (AST). - ISBN 978-5-271-24160-4 (Astrel). - ISBN 978-985-16-7343-4 (Harvest).

• Official site of the Autograph group
• Autograph Group History