Tales of Fishermen and Fish

The Tuzlov Brothers is a project whose participants are the Karp and Yakov Tuzlov brothers (Denis Tretyakov - vocals, guitar, and Oleg Tolstolutsky - vocals, button accordion, bass), according to his own statement - “a musical ensemble created in the village. October ( Novocherkassk , Rostov Region) "," recorded and mixed by Jacob in Samanny Kut near Novocherkassk in the summer of 2015. " The name of the Tuzlov River , one of the tributaries of the Don, is chosen as a pseudonym. Tolstolutsky - member of the groups “Church of Childhood”, “M. Ya. S. O., Through the Looking Glass, Dead Aksai and other ensembles.

The songs are stylized as an urban romance ; these are “Rostov songs for the Kuban accordion and the White Guard seven-stringed” ^[4] . The definition of the genre fluctuates between the author’s song and “banter chanson” ^[5] , “tangible romances - Cossack and urban, waltzes, author’s song; favorite “parallel stage” and alternative chanson ; long-term practice of yard playing music; Soviet non-conformist culture in those communities where, in the first place, they were interested in metaphysics, and not social science ” ^[6] .

As Rolling Stone magazine writes in its review of the first album: “It was recorded last summer near Novocherkassk, in places special and in the atmosphere, so to speak, of southern Russian Gothic - according to Tretyakov, things worthy of the cannibalistic horror of the first season have long been going on there” A true detective . " With obvious audible pleasure, the “brothers” sing Tretyakov’s lyrics to the button accordion with guitars — in the manner and motives of romances, Cossack, courtyard and thieves' songs. And they admire the Russian eternal htonia and draw inspiration from it with glasses - in short, one sheer horror without end and edge for the advanced metropolitan professional (even if he came from the same outback a couple of years ago) ” ^[7] . According to the reviewer, the album is characterized by “excellent humor in the endings of songs, changing the perception of their listeners, and, of course, typical for Tretyakov, thin poison spilled everywhere. And, most importantly, some kind of sharp, nagging sense of love for this unhappy, terrible and wretched Russian life. But as the album progresses in the songs, an increasingly ominous, obscene mood rises that is so familiar to fans of the “Church of Childhood”. And the precipitate in the end remains, frankly, that one more. " ^[7]

Another review of the fantasy world of these songs writes: “like mystifiers of the era of romanticism , Tretyakov turns to local exoticism and creates a semi-fairy-tale world where the shepherd Vasily turns into a wolf , and the“ ancient fish catfish ”drags Colonel Tuzlov to the bottom, but before that the battle takes place,“ the last the battle of Colonel Tuzlov “, which in its epic nature is not inferior to“ Moby Dick ”” ^[5] . The critic believes: “genetically, the Tuzlovs are related to Alexei Khvostenko , Yulia Belomlinskaya , Yuzu Aleshkovsky , who took the author’s song to literature, or, conversely, to the Palevo group, which made an injection from absurdity and psychedelic into the same author’s song. “Tales of Fishermen and Fish” - an alloy of a ballad (“The Last Battle of Colonel Tuzlov”), an urban, prison and Cossack romance (“We were young”), a yard and thieves song (“Three Friends Lived in the Village”), mixed with horror stories (“Brown-eyed”), flavored with necrorealist irrationalism, so familiar to fans of the “Church of Childhood”, but this time with a distinct touch of folk carnival (...) A military Cossack song is, as it were, recreated and re-written. The canon of the genre comes into conflict with the surrounding reality, which does not give rise to its heroization, which drives the lyrical hero crazy in the literal sense of these words. The provincial space in the songs of the Tuzlov Brothers somewhat resembles the county towns of Gogol or even Ilf and Petrov , but only remotely, perhaps no one has yet written about the Don locus as Denis Tretyakov did ” ^[5] .

The album, according to reviewers, occupies a special place in the work of Tretyakov: "... The Tuzlovs finally came up with a musical arrangement that brilliantly matches both Tretyakov’s cracked voice and his wild verses. This style may come up with some special name like" chthonic "chanson", "outsider folk", "black earth KSP" or "Novocherkassk romance." The bottom line is that the indifferent guitar-harmonica accompaniment does not distract the soloist from the daring hopelessness, but emphasizes the absurdity and horror of what is happening in The harmonist plays as if without regaining consciousness, because if he begins to listen to the lyrics, he will immediately get drunk and cannot play " ^[8] . They note a difference from the main mood of his previous projects: “If we draw parallels with the project“ Church of the Childhood ”, then the Tuzlov Brothers are qualitatively different. They, of course, also have an anguish and an existential appeal to the universe, but of a different kind. It’s fun to listen to the “Tuzlovs” in a good way, this is the case where the otherworldly funny is intersected with the otherworldly terrible. Here are cut off hands on the mezzanines, and a cross exchanged for vodka, and the moans of a dead Soviet veteran ” ^[9] .

1. The last battle of Colonel Tuzlov
2. Three friends lived in the village
3. My dear mother of god
4. Imperial waltz
5. A life
6. The walking of Athanasius Kolyvanov for the royal casket
7. Sweeping snowstorm
8. Case in Elanskaya
9. Brown eye
10. Song of the Old Knife
11. Ode to the Soviet Dead
12. Grandma Vali's story
13. Song of the wolf in the shoes of the shepherd Vasily
14. We were young (romance)
15. Waste

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