Officials got afraid of Tsoi: the rock festival in Naberezhnye Chelny was postponed to August

Ivan Zubov

A new scandal related to the tightening of censorship erupted in Tatarstan. On Sunday, June 19, it was planned to hold a rock festival dedicated to the 60th anniversary of the legendary Viktor Tsoi in Naberezhnye Chelny's Victory Park. However, the city department of culture unexpectedly forbade the musicians to perform some songs from the stage, such as, for example, “Our Hearts Demand Changes”, “Pack of Cigarettes” and some others.

One of the organizers of the festival, musician Yevgeny Afanasyev told reporters about this:

“Stupid, this is not a New Year's party! Yes, we were allowed to sing. But not all. It was forbidden to perform iconic songs of Russian rock and iconic songs of Viktor Tsoi. It's like forbidding a bird to fly and a hare to jump. (...) You can breathe, but every other time. Exactly. I don't see anything criminal in these works. We do not put forward slogans. We are not a political party. We are musicians!"

In addition, the groups "Aria", "Voskresenye", DDT and others were supposed to play at the festival. Probably, the appearance of Yuri Shevchuk also confused the officials, who at first agreed on the event, and at the last moment began to demand changes to its script. When this did not work out, the festival was decided to be canceled altogether.

However, later the officials changed their minds and postponed the event to August, seemingly removing all restrictions on the repertoire.

I wonder for how long?