Of all the bands of the Arkhangelsk scene Svyataya Luiza stands closest to Oblachny Kray through two people: the vocalist and lyricist Vladimir Budnik and the bass player Andrey Ilyichev. Of Ilyichev Bogaev wrote: "our good friend... a like-minded man — I always liked the way he plays".
Budnik had been known in Oblachny Kray for a long time. In April 1982 he joined the recording of "Selkhozrok", and in November of that year he sang all the vocal parts on "Velikaya Garmoniya": he has a piercing, as if breaking voice, and the lyrics suited him. The best-known story is from 1984. Rautkin was studying in another city, and Tropillo and Bogaev were looking for a vocalist for "Ublyuzhya Dolya". Bogaev thought of Budnik, flew to Arkhangelsk, woke him up and brought him to the studio in Leningrad. Budnik recorded the vocals in most of the songs and sang some together with Bogaev. His voice was nothing like Rautkin's, but in energy, Bogaev says, it was in no way inferior.
With Ilyichev it went differently, but more brightly. In spring 1987 he played bass in Oblachny Kray: together with Dmitry Leontyev he took the stage at the first Arkhangelsk festival and, on 25 April, at the open Melodiya listening session in Moscow (here is how that went); Moskovsky Komsomolets named his profession — an electrician. Then his place was taken by Andrey Lukin. Ilyichev has a page of his own on the site.
As for Svyataya Luiza itself, it was, according to the connoisseurs quoted by Pravda Severa (5 February 1988 — the same issue as the conversation with Bogaev: the fragment on our site), "the most delicate, most refined art rock" with "exquisite and capricious" melodies. Its trademark number is named "Minister of Sorrow"; the leader and lyricist is Vladimir Budnik. The author of the piece is no connoisseur and does not presume to judge, but does not hide how struck she was: "how much noise just three people made!". Another view is Alexander Kharev's: "What signature music Vladimir Budnik had! By the way, they did not graduate from a music school."
Svyataya Luiza played at the away "session" at Permilovo in 1985 (in Nikolai Kharitonov's film Budnik sings while the clowns listen attentively to him), Bogaev recorded it too on his tape recorders, and in 2018 the band took the stage at the "Pod Tankom v 6" gathering; Artemy Troitsky called it "a living heavy symbol of Arkhangelsk rock". In 2012 Budnik sang in "Arkhangelsky rok-n-roll", the track the "Arkhangelsk team" recorded for the Oblachny Kray tribute.
More in the series: who was friends with whom, Autodafe, Svyataya Luiza, Scena, Blues Inspector on TV, Pod Tankom.
Used here: Bogaev's memoir (chapters 7, part 1, 7, part 2, 5, part 2); Pravda Severa, 5 February 1988; A. Kharev's interview (a newspaper of the late 1990s) and the description of the film "Concert at Permilovo 1985" ("Podtankovskaya Gvardiya").
