DISCLAIMER/INTRO: THIS PROFILE IS RUN BY A FAN AND HAS NO AFFILIATION WITH NOBODY FROM PIKNIK. NEITHER DO I MAINTAIN ANY CONTACTS WITH THE BAND MEMBERS, SO MY VIEW ON BAND'S ART MAY DIFFER FROM THE OFFICIAL ONE. THE ONLY REASON I'M RUNNING THIS PAGE IS TO SPREAD WORD ABOUT THE MOST FABULOUS ROCK ACT TO EVER EMERGE FROM RUSSIA. FOR NON-RUSSIAN SPEAKING FOLKS THIS HERE PAGE IS ONE OF THE VERY FEW SOURCES OF INFORMATION ABOUT PIKNIK ON THE WEB. THE NEW VERSION OF THE OFFICIAL PIKNIK WEBSITE HAS A PAGE AUTO TRANSLATION TOOL, SO FROM NOW ON YOU CAN ALSO EXPERIENCE THE BAND'S SITE TO THE FULLEST. WELCOME TO THE FASCINATING WORLD OF MUSIC OF PIKNIK.
PIKNIK is absolutely unique phenomena in Russian rock scene. It's uniqueness is based not only on band's approach to music, which main feature is that it's melody driven, but also on philosophical message the band has been trying to get across to their listeners for over a quarter of century by now. Those, who've been with the music of PIKNIK for quite a long time must know what I'm talking about. Once you get caught by the charm of the music and poetry of Edmund Shkljarskiy and, of course, his voice, you will not be able to recover from that illness. I'm having this PIKNIK syndrom for about 20 years already, since I first been introduced to the band's music, and there's no treatment for this...
Started in 1981 in St.Petersbourg the band PIKNIK was a member of Leningrad rock club and didn't include any of the current band's members until later that year Shkljarskiy entered the band. PIKNIK's debut album "Smoke" was recorded the following year and proved Shkljarskiy to be a gifted songwriter. From the very beginning the band seemed to be completely different from the rest of Russian rock bands of that time, both in terms of music and lyrics. Never been straight political in his lyrics, like many rock bands in the perestroyka era, Shkljarskiy demonstrated an alternative approach to songwriting where the main themes were mythology, reflections on philosophical texts, love and relationships or some surreal characters that dwell in Edmund's imagination...
Being influenced by oriental culture and philosophy, Shkljarskiy with PIKNIK recorded 2 of their best albums in 1986 and 1988, Hieroglyph and Rodom Niotkuda respectively. The albums were pressed on vinyl by the biggest (if not only) record company Melodija and that's when PIKNIK gained wide recognition among listeners in the former Soviet Union...
Despite of the obvious success, the band's TV and radio appearance was almost non-existent. I only remember seeing them twice on the TV, while the other popular rock acts were televised quite often back in the days. I always thought it was Edmund's conscious choice not to be media-active, but maybe it was just a consequence of band's once being banned, as the official site states. Anyways, starting from the late 80s the band began to tour much and by the mid 90s PIKNIK's live performances transformed from the regular rock concerts into the full-fledged artistic shows with way too many participants including fireswallower, cello-woman, etc.
In December 6, 2006 PIKNIK faced the irreplaceable loss. Sergey Voronin passed away, the band's keyboardist who had been with PIKNIK since 1984. Band members decided not to search for another keyboard player. The new album Mrakobesie i Jazz was out in February 2007, this very month PIKNIK celebrated their 25th anniversary by giving a grand performance in Moscow's Luzhniki venue.
It's really impressive how through all these years PIKNIK is still keeping it up and rocking.
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