Music
Press
"Similar in philosophy are Valery and the Greedies - originally from the northern port of Petrozavodsk and founded in 2008. The current line-up is Anatoly Nikulin (guitars and vocals), Grigorii Anushkin (drums), Lev Sibikovskii (guitar), and Dmitrii Ignat'ev (bass). The band adheres admirably to a lo-fi sound that foregrounds zeal over finesse. In fact, one online fan asked not long ago whether the band could ever make it to the mainstream. An answer was forthcoming at Formspring.
The group explained, first of all, that a large number of Western sounds have long been absorbed into their aesthetic. All the way from The Stooges and Ramones to UK outfits of the early '80s (New Order, Orange Juice) and early '90s (Happy Mondays). The major obstacles to wider renown are now listed as public taste and the ability to be public - or perform widely. "The sad condition of so many run-down clubs can be exhausting, not to mention how we're constantly offended by event organizers who feel they're 'doing you a favor.'"
The justification for a browbeaten outlook continues: "The public today can be split into two factions. Firstly, those folks who rarely see us live - and ignore our efforts. The other half doesn't even know we exist... Promoters are to blame here, together with concert organizers, and journalists from the glossy mags... They ignore what we do, so our ideas will never reach the public, neither through their texts nor through the gigs they arrange... Judging by all that, we simply cannot change the status quo nor - probably - will we even try."
Just playing becomes a major effort, in and of itself. Hence the lo-fi, "garage" sound - in several senses of that adjective.
Desire and actuality constantly bump heads: "Why d'you play such cr*p?" asks one confrontational individual. The band responds: "We play very cool music, actually. If somebody doesn't like it, well that's their problem." Another curmudgeonly soul asks why the group has since moved from Petrozavodsk to St. Petersburg - away from their hometown. The answer? "We love everybody [in our hometown and beyond]. Not everybody loves us, though. Things used to be better, but the gigs in Petrozavodsk didn't go well. We eventually got the impression that a 'well-ranked' and even 'respected' group had been shoved aside... on its own streets." And so the hard work continues - fighting upstream towards the mainstream, so to speak."
- David McFadyen, "Far From Moscow".
"Punksters have always loved to dance and abandon their bodies to grooves. All of that embarked on once at Hacienda headed by such groups as Joy Division, Section 25, A Certain Ratio. On the other side, at the same time in the USA were some groups living up to the melomans` expectations, for instance, James Chance & Contortions, and ESG. However, the Petrozavodsk/Petroskoi, Russia-based quartet Valery & The Greedies revivifies and revamps this glorious dance rock/dance punk tradition, making it out in a very eminent way. Indeed, Where`s Satan? is one of the best groove rock albums I have listened throughout the 00`s and 10´s. And you are used to think that the Klaxons is a good one..."
- Recent music heroes
Discography
"Demo" (2008, DIY)
"Goddamn Pop!" EP (2009, Spat! Records)
"Where's Satan?" (2011, Yaizekletka Records)
"Sweet Karjala" (2012, Yaizekletka Records)
Photos
Bio
The band was formed on 29 February, 2008 and in August it released its first demo including 6 songs most of which are still discussed in the web with the slightest mentioning of the group. The social web and file hosting services helped to make the debut demo quite popular, with such songs as «She Will Come», «The Game» and «Jesus» becoming the main trademarks of the band.
Before starting to give regular concerts the band had made a debut performance in Moscow and established contacts with the American label «Spat! Records» which agreed to release the group’s songs on iTunes and Amazon.
Stirred up by the public’s interest the band started to create a new program and announced recording the album, but its motion wasn’t big enough, so «Goddamn Pop» was released on «Spat! Records» as a mini-album (EP) in July, 2009.
At about the same time there began shiftings in the band: the 2nd half of the year saw significant changes in the group’s membership. But in spite of the difficulties the work wasn’t stalled - within this period of time the band wrote a lot of new songs and took part in some concerts, including the «Graves Jibes Fanzine» festival in Saint-Petersburg and a joint concert with the «Scofferlane» in Moscow. By the year 2010 the original members of the group convened again and developed a new concert program and a new sound.
The video «Frustration», actively rotated on the Internet, helped to awake public’s interest, and as a result the group set out for a tour which was well done in September, 2010. Valery & The Greedies gave concerts in Moscow, Rostov-Na-Donu, Krasnodar, Novorossiysk and Anapa and received a positive response from the local public. For this mini-tour the «Yaitsekletka Records». Label released the compilation «They will come» which included the songs of different periods. For some songs it was the first edition in Russia. On their return home the group performed as a support act for «PTVP» and gave a solo recital. After that Valery & The Greedies disappeared until March, 2011. During this time another shifting took place in the group (a new bassist took over the responsibility), and on 21 March, 2011 there was a turning point for the group when it performed as a support act for the German band “Zann” and was practically unrecognizable. The new program was totally different from what the group had created before and from what people were used to within the local stage. The public was puzzled and confused: Valery gave up it’s post-punk fads practically entirely, abandoned the «Joy Division» heritage and took James Brown’s funk sermons and Talking Heads’ primitivism as a basis.
Since August 2011 the group is partially located in Saint-Petersburg as some of its members moved there.
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