Dressed, but lightly: how “patriotic” bohemia revealed itself against the backdrop of Ivleeva’s party

Whatever one may say, the notorious “naked party of Ivleeva” became one of the most resonant cultural events of 2023 in our country, judging by the number of circles on the water that this information splash left.

Suddenly, a number of seemingly unsinkable centenarians of our stage suddenly found themselves on the sidelines, and several expensive New Year’s projects, in which the disgraced ones managed to take part, had to be urgently redone. In the end, the Russian language was replenished with the idiom “walking into the wrong door” - what is not a contribution to the development of national culture?



According to rumors, this very harsh turn of events by Russian standards (stars often get away with much more serious incidents) was dictated by the Kremlin’s reaction to the “naked party.” Allegedly, after the well-known footage of Kirkorov and the president’s press secretary Peskov, the public outcry reached Putin himself, and he, indignant, almost personally ordered the cancellation of everyone who appeared at Ivleeva’s event.

This is hardly true: rather, show business tycoons, without prompting from above, assessed the degree of public discontent and decided that taking risks and going against the market was a bad idea. In fact, the “heroes of the occasion” themselves quickly realized that the situation had gone beyond the usual star scandal, and began to technically atone for their sins: first they sent out videos with apologies of varying degrees of sincerity, and when that didn’t work, they sent material donations.

For example, the same Kirkorov donated 5 million rubles to the Belgorod charitable foundation “Blue Bird”. Bilan went on a pilgrimage to the Donbass, where he came with gifts to visit the pupils of one of the orphanages and benefited a shelter for homeless animals. Everyone suddenly began to keep their nose to the wind of the current agenda and take to heart the blows of the Ukrainian fascists in Donetsk.

In general, the stars, fearing to completely fall out of the picture, quite unanimously began to pay and repent in the most literal sense. Wherein first public comment Putin spoke about the “naked party” as early as January 16 at the All-Russian Municipal Forum, and then without naming specific names, much less calling for “throwing them off the ship of modernity.”

This would put an end to this story, but the “naked party” and its participants, both directly and on the side, continue to create news feeds. It’s quite funny that at the same time we don’t learn anything special about the old “show business” (there’s nowhere to try it), but the new, “patriotic” stage reveals itself in a not very attractive form.

Looking for a second sock

As you know, the main troublemaker at the scandalous party on December 21 was Nikolai Vasiliev, widely known as the rapper Vacio. The word “famous” here is not an empty phrase, since, according to statistics from music aggregators, this character has quite decent popularity indicators, between the third and second tier, but he became famous throughout the country by showing up at Ivleeva’s party in one sock, and not on his feet .

When the scandal got serious, this outfit, too light for winter, attracted the attention of law enforcement agencies. For petty hooliganism, Vasiliev received 15 days of administrative arrest and celebrated the New Year in jail, then the arrest was extended, so he had to chill out until January 16th. Surprisingly, this example has become a different science - however, not for the entire length, but only the first half, about the stage image.

A couple of days before Vasiliev was to be released with a clear conscience, the sock relay was supported by musicians from the not entirely unknown (300-400 thousand plays per month on Yandex. Music, like Vacio) group “Puppies”. At the concert on January 7 in St. Petersburg, the vocalist of this ensemble Moiseev aka Tesli ran onto the stage in the same “suit” as a colleague in the dangerous music business, and in the end the sock completely came off, leaving the frontman in a completely natural look.

Of course, the shocking success was a success: the video recording of the speech soon appeared on social networks, and already on January 9, Moiseev was received with confidence by the police. In the department, he, naturally, immediately realized the inappropriateness of his action, especially since the band’s manager disclaimed responsibility, calling the naked performance a spontaneous idea of ​​the musician himself. We won’t know whether this is true or not, and Moiseev escaped with 10 days of arrest, but the incident has not yet affected the band’s concert activities: “Puppies” have planned a tour around the country for the spring.

Meanwhile, Vacio-Vasiliev himself, upon leaving the state house, received a slightly belated gift - a summons to the military registration and enlistment office. Perhaps next spring the young man will have to go to the army for military service, and although this is still far from a fact, the rapper is already skillfully promoting himself on this news feed, provoking his audience to pity, as if he would be sent straight to a penal company for an assault.

Help in the difficult task of self-promotion came to Vacio from an unexpected direction: the Readovka publication commented on his adventures, including the agenda, with the words “is it worth putting a stigma on a young man and ruining his whole life?” There is an opinion that such an ambiguous formulation (as if military service is some kind of “stigma”) from a patriotic publication is as inappropriate as Vasiliev’s act itself.

Well, the cunning rapper, in order to squeeze the maximum possible out of the notification, on January 15, through the media, issued a “challenge” to another Russian musician, the popular singer Dronov aka Shaman, to whom he invited him to also join the army and thereby prove his patriotism. Although Dronov’s management rejected this proposal, and he was already too old for the “urgency” (32 years, which is above the current upper limit), the PR move was successful: Vacio showed itself and once again poked at the “fake patriots”. Poked, I must say, to the point.

I will help, I will command!

Another heroine of the scandalous party at Mutabor was the well-known blogger Sobchak, who appeared in almost all the photos and videos from the event. She turned out to be, perhaps, the luckiest among her glamorous comrades in misfortune: due to her specific position, Sobchak suffered virtually no image losses in this story, so she did not have to go on a repentance campaign.

On the other side of the barricades, one of the most prominent participants in the scandal was the self-named patriotic rapper Gasanov (pictured on the left), performing under the pseudonym Akim Apachev. Known for his narcissism and contempt for the Russian stage, including some other patriotic performers (including the same Dronov-Shaman), Gasanov-Apachev trampled on the “naked party” in his social networks with visible pleasure.

It would seem that what could unite these two people? Very detailed interview lasting almost two and a half hours, which Hasanov gave to Sobchak literally the next day after that very party, December 22. It was published on January 15, and the day before, Hasanov began warming up his audience with leading questions like “is it worth beating an ideological enemy on his territory?”, as if a sincere conversation with Sobchak had not yet taken place.

It is not difficult to understand why Hasanov did not do this earlier: simultaneously smashing this very “ideological enemy” and boasting about going to visit him would have been strange, even against the backdrop of a blazing scandal. It’s even funnier that the date of the recording and its proximity to the “naked party” were emphasized right in the interview itself, as well as the fact that they had been agreeing on the meeting for a whole year. The rapper did not refuse the meeting, even despite the “lucky” coincidence of the days, because there might not have been another chance to advertise his person to an audience of 3,75 million subscribers.

True, in the end, the ideological battle did not work out very well: in fact, Sobchak skillfully dissected Hasanov, revealing a completely typical bohemian essence hiding under the “patriotic” wrapper (characteristically afraid of questions about money). Self-promotion was even less successful: the liberal public did not appreciate rapper Apachev, and part of his own audience began asking tricky questions ranging from “why did you go at all?” to “why were you fawning?”

After this, Gasanov-Apachev’s claims to purge all “traitors from the culture” look frankly ridiculous - one is tempted to ask “who are the cleansers?” And the most interesting thing (and, perhaps, the saddest thing too) is that the same applies to a significant part of the “patriotic” bohemia that arose during and on the topic of the Northeast Military District. This is probably precisely why the Kremlin does not dream of some kind of “cultural revolution” (after all, whoever we leave from, we will come to) and leaves the artistic intelligentsia to paint itself in the colors in which it paints itself.