The foreseeable equilibrium in the future remained only in our hopes and dreams... as the imminent war with Azerbaijan over Artsakh broke loose. That meant few things. First of all, it meant that once prospering and blooming Soviet Republic would become Independent, but economically poor and wretched. Secondly, that meant political blockade. Surely, this sentence will invoke gloomy memories of no electricity, zero degree temperature, wooden and kerosene stoves, long overnight queues for bread, no heat or water. Surely this would also invoke memories of first hopelessness. In 1991 Armenian join the Commonwealth of Independent States as Levon Ter-Petrosyan is elected to be the first president. As political parties rallied for power (only to be crashed time and again by the ruling H-H-Sh), older people found themselves with the attitude of "I don't give a damn anymore". Youngsters either sought a refuge in something spiritual or, as a vast majority, chose to spend their days meaninglessly, thus contributing greatly to the satyrical "rabiz" culture (may I be forgiven for creating razbirat.com?) But most of all, the very word "patriotism" which reunited the whole nation in 1988, was more of a comic paradigm. This very lack of patriotism and search for a better life spawned a huge wave of people emmigrating from Armenia: one of the biggest exodus from motherland. But those who stayed found a shelter from harsh reality inside music. But Armenian humor and inner strength kept the fire burning. KVN team from Yerevan managed to win several championships in a row among former Soviet Republics, while another Armenian team created a furror in the famous "What?Where?When?" (Chto?Gde?Kogda?) game by overthrowing the long-time champions from St.Petersburg, Russia.

Approaching tough conditions with their peculiar sense of humor, artists kept working. Edward Zorikian released his first album entitled "Imprisoned illusions" ("Bantarkvats anurjner") in collaboration with Artsruni. The album featured love ballads as well as politically cynical tunes. Gurgen Melikian also released a very skillfully crafted album containing his own songs and some folklore melodies. Demo-tapes and bootlegs by rock-bands flooded the town. While the country was having hard time recuperating from blockade and aftermaths of the earthquake, the inactive war was still going on across the borders especially in the newly annexed Nagorno-Karabakh territory of Armenia. Severe military drafting operations and tough living conditions reflected on music and lyrics of many bands. It will take few years for the youth to re-energize.

Wasted Generation Wasted generation. When the day began They just started off one by one Wasted generation. Your blue uniforms Banners of batallions on the resting bones Wasted generation. Something's deadly wrong Are you teeny children or the dice of war? Wasted generation. Playing on the streets You were drafted in, boots on your feet Wasted generation. Scarlet ribbons tied Rifles ready loaded marching to a fight None of us forgotten. Nothing to forget Drinking morning coffee with the list of deads Strangers, 1994

One of the early songs of "Strangers". No comment

Suddenly a new pseudo-bohemian movement showed signs of life. More freedom of speech mixed with hard economic conditions and unstable political situation took its toll on the emerging youth generation. Young people with a more liberal mindset started focusing on an alternative lifestyle from wearing a different clothing upto listening to a different music. Historically a society suffering from an abundance of conservatism, Armenians who liked to think "different" did not seem to fit. However the society itself was also changing. Slowly like a lumbersome grizzly bear, but still changing... partly due to an increasing western influence, partly due to an overgrowing pessimism about current lifestyle. Alternative newspapers began to appear. Weekly newspaper named "Bravo" was one of such... it featured articles borrowed from foreign journals simultaneously demonstrating first signs of Armenian entertainment industry. Pages flourishing with naked yankee chicks standing in New York subways were next to Ray Bradbury's short stories and a portrait of Axl Rose exposing himself in public. Even though that newspaper did not feature anything but low quality yellow-press information like that, the editors still did a fine job in bringing a new light to the *hungry* Armenian society. New TV programs like "Third Channel" showed action movies and music videos. The prominent life of cinematography in Armenia turned into a beautiful oblivion as the "Armenfilm" studio wasn't unable to produce any more movies due to the lack of budget. True, who in hell would go to a cold chilly cinema theater... Most of the theaters shut down anyway, others either leased their space or started showing masterpieces of worldwide porn industry. Still some producers and animators such as Robert Sahakyan continued their work by gathering funds from elsewhere. Sahakyan's animations became among the most famous in the whole former Soviet camp. Jobless actors in the mean time were trying to put together shows that would barely gather any crowd. Still, keeping the candle burning was important enough to everyone who was somehow involved in the spiritual life of Armenia.

Music played an important role in changing the mindset. "Ardzagank" duo with Bayatian and Petrosian (nicknamed Bearded and Bald) re-appeared in the spotlight with new records and a new recording studio. The primary focus of "Ardzagank" studio was on recruiting young talents. The town raved about their yearly musical shows in Yerevan Concert Arena featuring newfound teenage stars. Another recording studio "Asparez" concentrated more on the existing stars such as rabiz singer Aram Asatrian or a young rap-star Grisha Aghakhanian. In any case, both studios showed quite a success. Then finally, in came the music festivals...

It was during those very years that several big festivals took place. The infamous saga of "Candlelight concerts" started years ago by Arthur Meschian, were picked up by singer/songwriter Ararat. Ironically, candlelight concerts became literally under a candlelight because of no electricity. Normally carried out in a chilly hall of the "House of Architects" ("Chartarapetneri toon") they featured a number of talented musicians crouched and shuffling guitar strings with cold fingers.

"Music-4-students" festival started in the small concert hall of Sundukian theatre building. Indefatigable Vahan Artsruni managed to gather all the local talent from various musical areas and organize a phenomenal 3-4 day concert event. The show featured jazz and classical music, solo "bard" singers like Zorikian, Ararat, Melikian and Forsh, and finally some new rock bands. No wonder that masses were lined up to indulge into something so beautiful and long-awaited.

Multitalented artist Vahan Artsruni & his "Artsruni" project in "Firewall" rock-festival, Yerevan, 2003 Download the music of Vahan Artsruni (MP3) From This Road Aditon

Next years marked the beginning of "Gaudeamus". Again organized by Artsruni, it would become a signature event in every calendar year. Usually "Gaudeamus" would take place two to four times a year. Who can forget the first Gaudeamus with Yerevan chamber choir kicking off the show in front of Yerevan State University? And how after announcing "Dumbarton Oaks", it started to rain.. then rain turning into a downpour.

Who could also forget performances by Vostan Hayots and Dumbarton Oaks in Yerevan's conservatory building followed by Empyray and a brand new doom-metal gang "Berdigungs Lauten" (correct me if I missed the spelling) with roars a-la "Napalm Death". Concerts also featured Artsruni himself teamed with Melikian, Zorikian and Ararat. But the highlights of every show were performances by Forsh. Especially adored was Forsh's "Penny" during which the crowd would thrown penny coins on stage.

Another big event worth mentioning was the introduction of the very first FM radio station named simple "Hye FM 105.5". Finally young people stuck at their cold winter homes with no electricity were able to buy AAA batteries and listen to something worthy on the radio: Def Leppard mixed with Yusundu in one bowl with Snoop Dog topped over with Russia's very own Angelika Varum and girls-favorite sweetheart Dire Straits on the side.

Grunge movement brewed in the distant Promised Land America, somewhere in a town called Seattle WA, infested Armenia around 1994. Nirvana's Nevermind became a cult just like it did across the oceans. The pain of Kurt Cobaine resonated in Armenian teenagers quite remarkably, and the harsh punk-reformist tone of not-so-well understood lyrics stirred a lot of musical minds. Some bands took on a new direction of grunge-metal and made quite a success. "Smith & Wesson" and "Ass kissers" liked to shock the audience more with their aggressive style than musical quality, although the crowd seemed to enjoy it. All of a sudden being poor and depraved was considered fashionable. After all, Armenians didn't seem to have a problem in that (ok, ok sarcasm!).. And although pure punk a-la "Greenday" didn't make it big, Seattle grunge of Nirvana, Alice in chains, Pearl Jam found a huge resonance.

Short-lived one-day wonder bands were constantly appearing and disappearing. "Volume II" temporarily created from the wreckage of "Strangers" gave just one concert before... changing their name back to "Strangers". "Spring Delirium", formed from the same wreckage almost did not perform. Neither did "Langoliers". A heavy band "Messia" sounded very promising, but also turned out to be short-lived. But the majority of other well-known bands continued playing on. The quartet of Vostan Hayots, Dumbarton Oaks, Empyray and Berdigungs became the core of Gaudeamus, so for a while they were unofficially considered to be the leading force. Especially entertaining were the latter ones, Berdigungs... amazon jungle music with roaring vocals nobody could understand, lack of melody but a shocking abundance of noise made them "the-band-unlike-any-others". Dumbarton Oaks on other hands were popular even among simpler crowd where heavy metal was a thing out of space.

However competition was growing. Another new band led by old-looking bearded guitarists was "Hieronymus Bosch" playing pure Elvis and Chuck Berry rock'n'roll. "Angels" sang cute Paul-McCartney type melodies and due to that persevered for years gaining some medium-rare popularity. "Titan" persevered for a while before breaking up in 1995.

Mikael Balasanyan, leader of "Hieronymus Bosch" Listen to the music of "Hieronymus Bosch" Evening Life

"Strangers" started off as a pure bluesy team. Changing their lineup half a dozen times, they finally found a golden mine in 1995 with the introduction of a more progressive art-jazz-rock sound and interesting mix of musicians: keyboards+bass+drums+saxophone. Add to that a husky grunge-like sound with eerie Celtic melodies. Then add to that heavy bluesy rhythm and sprinkle it with sarcastic lyrics on a dark background. Simmer this mixture on a medium heat of psychodelia and serve it hot. August 1995 saw their rise to a stardome with a hugely successful concert in Sundukian theatre hall. Same year they started to perform the infamous weekly free "Basement concerts" which included not only their own creations, but also instrumental jamming and impromptu improvisations. Blues hits like "Old bluesman's will" were equally popular to hardcore "Wasted generation". And surely, who would forget the interesting blend of Queen's "We will rock you" with Armenian Kochari dance melody. In 1996 "Strangers" started experimenting with their sound adding interesting elements of psychodelia and jazz which resulted in great hit songs like "Roden's will", "..But the river flows away" and "St.Rangers" with their peculiar aggressive keyboards and sarcastic vocals.

An interesting trend was forming. There were bands like "Credo", "Titan", "Empyray", "Vostan Hayots" who kept performing good solid rock'n'roll.. the style that you would normally hear from a lot of foreign bands. Some weren't ashame to copy Megadeth literally note by note, others remained more original attempting to seek their own distinct sound.

And there were bands like "Strangers" and "Dumbarton Oaks" whose style was hard enough to describe with one word. They liked to jam, to toss a whole variety of styles into one giant bowl. They even liked to amuse the audience by performing one song in a number of different ways.

"Gaudeamus 1996" festival was the apex. This time Vahan Artsruni not only decided to bring in fresh bands, but also invited legendary Russian group "Krematorium" (or "Crematorium"). First time in Armenia, Krematorium's arrival was widely expected and warmly greeted. As always, "bard" singers were featured along with oldies like "Vostan Hayots" and "Empyray".. "Dumbarton Oaks" managed to disband by that time and were not featured in the festival. That year's Gaudeamus turned out to be the most successful one with two bands: Krematorium and Strangers delivering a stellar performance and totally stealing the show. The act of "Strangers" (who were relatively new to Vostan and Empyray) was greeted with a shocking exultation by the crowd. The Russian legend "Krematorium" was the main act of the festival. According to the leader of the band Armen Grigoryan (Russian Armenian), music fans in Yerevan have changed drastically over the course of 10 years. He later admitted that he did not expect such a wild welcome by Armenian crowd.

Listen to the music of Krematorium: Sebastia Kondratiy Katmandu

The year of 1995 marked the end to the 4-year economic blockade of Armenia. Starved and cold people were finally getting out of their damaged material homes to get a glimpse of light. Energetic starvation also came to an end, and electricity finally was fed into apartments and buildings. Businesses were slowly picking up. New influx of cash from first-world countries, new investments and foreign missions commenced their operations. A Russian-brokered ceasefire ended the Nagorno-Karabakh fighting leaving the land under the control of Armenia. After a long hybernating sleep, the country and the people were ready to recuperate.

Independent Republic of Armenia was entering a new stage...

...extreme westernization? western extremization? English dictionary anyone?

Like mushrooms after a cute spring rain, casinos, nighclubs, bars and outdoor cafes were opening their doors literally on every corner of the street. According to the witnesses (unfortunately, me not being one of them) the Central Opera square saw about 15 outdoor cafes at one time. Imagine, what a great abundance of choice an average Armenian citizen would have while passing by the landmark of Yerevan's architecture: famous Opera house. Cafe from the left in barocco style, cafe on the right in rococo style, cafe in the middle in cherokee indian style, walk straight and you will see another cafe with Sting's photo on the menu, Sting's photo next to every entree and beverage.. and the name of the cafe would be... good guess! Sting's cafe! The swan lake populated by swans years ago now was populated by skateboarding teenagers. Former Lenin Square (now Republic Square) started to feature its famous singing fountains which were completely disabled during the crisis years. So what that the Republic Square was filled with people from villages? You want something intellectually challenging? Go to the Poplavok cafe and listen to modern jazz performed right there on the streets. Hard to believe that only a couple of years ago this place was filled with starving Ethopians.. oops, I meant starving Armenians chopping off woods on the streets to warm their frozen bones. Care to buy paintings or look at the products of skillful craftsmen? Good old vernisage which started in early 90's selling paintings, now sells everything. Want some nightlife? Dozens of clubs are awaiting for you ornated into marble, ebony and ivory featuring music of Chicago warehouses. Try your luck in casinos or short-lived bingo bungalos. Perhaps, you may win a brand new Mercedes or BMW which are abundant in the city. Hungry? Why wait? Walk to the Proshian street right next to American University (former Communist Party building). Proshian street will feed you with delicate Haykakan Khorovats (or shish kebab as green foreigners call it). Proshian street will offer you grilled chicken.. after all, Proshian street is nicknamed Grille Avenue... Then head up to Marshall Bagramian street and... I better stop here! Anyway, Renaissance is in the air!