Sdelan Ya v SSSR! I Grew Up in the USSR! Oleg Gazmanov, People’s Artist of Russia

Oleg Mikhailovich Gazmanov (1951- ), People’s Artist of Russia, “the bard of the Russian people”. Oleg Mikhailovich is shown here after a concert in Tskhinvali in South Ossetia for the Russian forces and Ossetian militia that successfully and heroically defended the city against the recent Georgian invasion.

This is, perhaps, the “anthem” of the Russian national revival. It was released in 2005, and it is wildly popular throughout Russia with all age groups and all nationalities. It speaks of the entire history of Russia, both Imperial and Soviet, and it illustrates the creative fusion of all that was good of Tsarist Russia and the USSR that occurred during the presidency of Vladimir Putin.

Oleg Mikhailovich is very popular in Russia, not least for the fact that he never bowed his head to the Americans, even in the dark days of the ’90s. He sings unabashedly patriotic songs, and he is, perhaps, the most-recognised pop singer in Russia today. Oh, yes… the pro-American puppets in the Ukraine and the Baltic states ban his music, but, people get it from the internet or DVD copies anyway. Censorship is powerless in the face of the people’s will!

The Ukraine and the Crimea, Byelorussia and Moldova, it’s my country! Sakhalin and Kamchatka, the Ural Mountains, it’s my country! … Ryurik, Romanov, Lenin, and Stalin, it’s my country! Pushkin, Yesenin, Vysotsky, Gagarin, it’s my country!