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'Our time in the Kremlin kitchens will stay with us for ever. You know how these things are. An unexpected meeting over the cumin seeds creates the strongest of bonds. We became as one and without even planning we ignored our employers’ own unsavoury methods and became dreadful cooks: our cuisine proved fatal for some. First we did Brezhnev. Then Chernenko. Andropov followed. Heady days. Nobody suspected a thing. So we decided to free the motherland from the yoke of the politburo: we’d poison them all, à la carte freedom granted by the lowest of the proles. It was not to be. Gorbachev dismembered the union, and before we knew it we were hiding the vodka from Yeltsin. Worse was to come. They privatised the Kremlin catering - something about poor standards in the kitchen - and we patriots were principled but destitute, losers to sinister capitalists Robochef. We headed east: Ekaterinburg; Novosibirsk, Irkutsk. We took up a new trade and became itinerant musicians. We hid in Kamchatka but still Robochef came for us. So we fled across the frozen wastes of the Bering straits. It’s too much to tell but we do, in our songs. We came to rest in Maglai in Bosnia. We found an orphaned girl in the Pioneer scouts who played the forbidden trumpet (only boys and men were allowed to do this in the Balkans). So we adopted her and her trumpeting troupettes. But we were still hunted. We hid behind the music. Then London, to hide in plain sight. So here we are – we are so far, and so good. We are in London, safe for now from the evil mastermind who controls Robochef. If he finds us, we’ll move on again. But in the meantime, we play, all the songs we learned on our way, donated by the kindly people we met. That's why we are here.' If you doubt us and our amazing tale, look at the evidence in this old footage, sent to us by an anonymous friend.

Its difficult to have wars, hate your neighbours, or practice the dishonesty that goes by the name of diplomacy when you are dancing!

Roaring in from the steppes, the taiga and the tundra of Siberia, by way of the Caucacuses, Persia, Turkey, the Middle East, the Balkans, playing music of the people for the people, loudly, come:

The Tundrastic!!

The Steppmatic!!!!!

The Taiga - Taiga burning brightly!!!!!!

TRANS-SIBERIAN MARCH BAND!!!!!!!

We play Balkan Ska, Klezmer reggae, russo-mexican trumpet tunes, afghan love songs and ottoman battle marches: And stuff like that!

Photo Credits (a) TSMB, (b) Andy Fovey and (c) 'Photo Booth' (Main picture).

Free prizes at our gigs! for best Russian/former Soviet Union hats and for the best horse dance!

Time to dance!!!! Here we are at Glasto, in the mud and then at Offline!