Russia

The vast expanses of the Russian landmass at one time hosted the largest population of Jews anywhere in the world, even more than the US or Israel. Still today, Russia has the fifth largest Jewish population. Many had ended up in Russia after centuries of the Jewish Diaspora. As a result of Joseph Stalin's nationality policy, the Soviet authorities established the Jewish Autonomous Oblast in 1934.which provided the Jewish population of the Soviet Union with a large territory in which to pursue Yiddish cultural heritage. Another large number fled to Russia in the face of the advancing Nazi anti-Semite death march, before the Iron Curtain slammed shut. More than 250,000 Jews died defending Russia from the Nazi onslaught of Russia.

Jewish folklore is still richly ingrained in the Russia psyche. One of the great tales of Jewish folklore is the legend of the Golem (in Hebrew: גולם‎). The Golem is an animated anthropomorphic being, created entirely from inanimate matter. In the most famous tale the Golem was an entity created out of clay, brought to life by inserting into his mouth a shem (a capsule containing the unspeakable Name of God) along with a magic formula. Also the word emet (Hebrew word for truth) was inscribed on his forehead. To immobilize it, one must pull the shem out of its mouth & cross out the first letter of the word emet, leaving the Hebrew word met, meaning dead.

All this is leading to this latest post, Zmet by the Russian group Der Golem. It was founded by Dmitry Zubov & Roman Sidorov in the late 90s. They both had been in industrial bands prior to this time. Dmitry Zubov, a musician from the Moscow suburb of Fryazino, was in the post-industrial band Hypnoz, started in 1993. Aside from Hypnoz, Dmitry played in several other projects: Zuboff Sex Shop (post-punk / new-wave), Circle of Iron Tape (harsh noise), BRZB (electronics, with Alexey Borisov), & Cisfinitum. Dmitry died Oct. 25, 2011.

Roman Sidorov was in the cult Russian dark ambient/ black metal project Старуха Мха (The Crones of Moss) with his wife Alva. Also he worked on a post-punk drone project called Седативное or Sedativ. The music of Sedativ featured mid-tempo guitar, melancholic, sparse & hypnotic. Roman himself described Sedativ’s music as psychedelic suicidal post-punk. Roman suffered from severe depression & took his own life in 2003.The only Sedativ album (10 untitled tracks) was written & recorded sometime during 2002 – 2003. The only copy was apparently discovered in the wake of Roman’s suicide on Sept.23, 2003.

Zmet was released by the band on cassette in 1999. They also did a split with the band Misery in 2000.

Der Golem on Zmet are: Roman Sidorov – guitar & vocals; Dmitry Zubov –drums & analog symthesizer. 

 Der Golem – Zmet cassette, Grief Records, 1999. 

decryption code in comments

Side A -

Нет (No)

Оригинальная Мелодия  (Two Original Melodies)

Древние Звёзды  (Kapula’s Night [Ancient Stars])

Bravo

Солнце Мёртвых  (Suns of the Dead Ones)

Целуя Твои Корни  (Kissing Your Roots)

Пан  (Ban)

Птицы  (Birds)

Исход I  (Exodus pt. I) & Исход II (Exodus pt. II)

Once again, do svidanya.

NØ