This blog-post is the long-awaited part 2. Since the last installment of Husky fanfare, Husky has now not only announced a new Concert on September 3rd in Moscow, but he has announced he will be going on tour to 32 cities around Russia, ranging from Omsk, Perm, and Ufa, to Krasnodar, Saint Petersburg, and Saratov. Ultimately, this means that Husky will be facing some resistance as one only needs a minimal understanding of the Russian mindset and accompanying headstrong attitude. Perspectives towards Husky, and his music, could not have possibly changed that drastically since January since his last public performance. Instead, I would argue that beliefs in Husky's character as a Russian outsider, dissident, and uncouth, dangerous person have only grown, now with the shady and borderline unlawful 'election' of President Vladimir Putin for an additional two terms in office, making his total years now 37 years. EEP in mind, Stalin was only in power for 24 years, and Lenin even less.
Therefore, Husky could face a wall of opposition just like 2018, another slew of phony 'problems,' leading to canceled concerts and final attempted long-winded jail sentence. Of course, this is pessimistic thinking and most likely, nothing of great significance will happen, except for maybe Anti-Dealer and its thug leader, Dmitri Nosov, getting in the way in at least one or two cities. Nevertheless, who am I, a mere Westerner, to pass an accurate judgment on the inner-workings of the Russian wannabe-Intelligentsia? I suspect it would be enough to say that Russia has its own Kim Jung Ung, that now anything and everything is possible. Even in the world, what has been thought impossible is now unfortunately possible, both in the social sphere and in the political sphere. Thus, what is to say that Husky's career is any different? However, this is not the time to get cynical, nor is it the time to become emotionally distraught, one must fall back onto their morals and ethics, their intrinsic ability to know what is right, and what is wrong from a purely objective standpoint.
Getting back to Husky's music, like previously mentioned, he released an album this April, had a feature on an artist's album, and is now performing publically again. He went through nine months of silence, both in-person and online. He is now posting to Instagram again, posting on VK again, and has created a unique website for his tour. As a die-hard fan, I hope that we see Husky utilize his image and associated brand in a fuller way, perhaps creating an International image, rather than a solely Russian-based brand. I must confess that if he did such a thing, I think he would cease to be Husky, so I must concede that point entirely. But it would be grand to see Husky come to the States, Germany, Italy, Australia, somewhere other than Russia. It would be good for him, although who knows what would be suitable for Husky, one could even say does he know what would be suitable for him? His music provides the listener with confusing senses of self, I am not me, but the fact that I am not me makes me myself. He self-flagellates, always instigating an inward fight that one wishes they had the power to stop. As a listener, it is almost as if I am watching someone's demise and having only the power of the stop button, must utilize my small power to make his pain go away.
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Bullet Fool, from Husky's seminal 2017 album, "Favorite Songs for Imaginary People," stands out not only because of the way Husky subverts religious subjects, i.e., God equated to a warhead and Husky's rap akin to a prayer through a mouth full of razors, but because in this particular song I feel and understand Husky not as Husky, but as Dmitri. These characteristics are valid for all of his music though, he reaches through the speakers, headphones, and microphone, and grabs the listener with infuriated love, shaking them until they go unconscious. They eventually wake up in a land unknown to them called reality, and it is from there that Husky is able to work. Husky becomes Orpheus, the listener becoming Eurydice, although now able to choose to follow Orpheus up to the biting surface or stay in the soothing and unchanging Underworld. 'It does not matter to Husky if the audience follows or not, Orpheus fails anyways.' Yes that's true, but unlike Orpheus, he, Husky, is not flown to the abode of the Gods and made a Constellation when he fails. Instead, he is dragged to the surface with a window seat to the Underworld. Unfortunately for eternity, he gets to stare at those who refuse to wake up, enjoying their factious fancies, sex and all, while he sits there unable to do anything but sing. They listen, but do they hear? That is the question raised in this song; he sings, but who is listening? He wants to be the bullet, not the gun; he wants to be a tool to wake those entranced by the love of soulless materiality, malicious political lies, and everything in between both heard and seen, up from their purposeful, or not, slumber.
I am going to analyze every Couplet (there are three like usual) and not line by line nor the chorus, one for the sake of length, and two for the sake of interest, as I know many of you do not actually read the entire article, but instead skip around or do not even look past the first paragraph. Here we go for those still with me; hopefully, you enjoy what you are about to read (or not). 😎
Couplet 1
Sun jams on the visor, in a backpack poems in my own language. On a random bus, I fib into the recorder, I'm always out of focus, I am always in the background. Concentrated like suicide, I wander around the city, dreaming to copulate around nonsensical whores of both sexes. And from the fragments of clouds, God like a warhead.
The meaning of the sun's presence on the visor could push the narrative that this is not any more special than yesterday, nor is today going to be any different from the possible future. It is mundane, through and through, the sun's rays beating down on everyone, no matter who they are. The 'poems' are Husky's verses; he is continuously writing and rapping, singing to himself like a "ridiculous and wretched man." His account of his lying into the recorder could allude to a faltering of confidence in the very statements he makes, a loss of self, and assurance of musical and mental self. Because of his loss of personal identity, he wanders around the city in a depressive state, unable to manage even the most straightforward human actions except dream of animalistic urges. Husky is known for his uses of biblical symbolism, and picturing God as a warhead, dropped onto the human race to cleanse the race of the disgusting pestilence, could be equated to the Great Flood that cleansed the whole earth all those eons ago.
Couplet 2
Lonely bipedal, hundred-hand horde, people smell like soup, like old-woman c**t. Lines and lines for a skin doctor, I never feel, I don't want to anymore. I don't want to hookup, I want Jericho. On a bullet a fool riding, hungry heretic, and rolling and rolling with a wheel along an avenue. Lonely youth with a shot-through face.
We are introduced to the homogenized horde, the grotesque abomination of singular-patterned semi-conscious aliens, neither human nor foreign. Among them, Husky walks alone, observing the smell and sight of the farther-than-fallen angels. The obscenity is needed, as it points to a recurring symbol, both on stage and off in his music, the grandma figure, which is played by his manager in concert. It symbolizes, perhaps, his revulsion at baseless human passions, and thus Husky created the grandma figure to showcase this mentality. The observable queues are those who have engaged in excessive levels of sexual gratification and now have procured STD's galore. Now they must wait in line for the Venereologist, the 'skin doctor' to cure them, but nothing can cure their habits within the mind. Again, Husky uses biblical references as, now revoking the bodily urges, he seeks Jericho, the city whose walls were torn down by the act of blowing through horns given to the Jews by Joshua. Obviously, it is more than that; Husky no longer is satisfied with the make-believe, self-pleasing world and thus, calls for the walls between him and the real world to be torn down. Remember, Husky wants to be the bullet, so he rides the bullet that will strike the 'lonely youth,' with the flavor of self-deprecation as usual. Like a wheel, he cannot fight the forward momentum of reality, and thus must relinquish control to the movement of Nature. Husky, the lonely youth, gets shot in the face with the bullet of 'truth,' and is now awake, for better or worse. You decide, Husky already shot you.
Couplet 3
Close the gate, cockatoo! My rap, it is a prayer, only with a razor in the mouth. I am a miscarriage of the insides of Russia. In the capital, I am like a grain of rice in the belly of the Vietnamese. Jesus Christ ordered a barrage, an I lift up a toast for class holocaust. Brothers swallow their snickers and chuckles. Daddy's kids, collect the guts.
The powerless parrot can only, quite literally, parrot what its owner tells them. Thus, the bird reference serves as a symbolic representation of those who, both under the control of the upper echelons of society and their complete lack of self-control, can only act out the will of another opposing force, in essence, stuck inside the walls of Jericho, never to escape. Husky points to the dual nature of his raps, they are a supplication to his listeners to venture away from their comfortable delusion to perturbing reality. Concurrently, his raps provoke the eternal political beast, they anger his aggressors, and cause him to be hated by specific populations; hence he 'cuts' himself with every song, album, and concert. He continues his abject persecution towards his character and says he is one of the millions within Moscow, indistinguishable from the person next to him. The Lord himself commands a barrage to be constructed, 'artillery fire in front of a line of troops to protect them.' Simultaneously, Husky salutes the upper-crust's onslaught on the classes below, eerily similar to Stalin's policy of 'collectivization,' where peasants had everything taken away from them to make them depend solely on the government for assistance to live. In an odd pairing of events, Husky's entourage finds this to be a comical showing, and perhaps even Husky finds this situation hilarious. The embodiment of God himself is currently fighting for his children, yet the privileged enemy is also fighting as well, who will win no one knows, but so far, nothing has changed for the better. Putin's brainless followers, 'Daddy's children,' act out, without evaluation, his pernicious will, ratting out those who go against the grain, and furiously fighting those who rebel for the sake of freedom. They, eventually, with time, become useless and ultimately are absorbed by nature into the eternal domain of death. Guts here could be the grotesque depiction of those deemed 'unworthy' by the powers that be, and so they are nothing more than bile to be cleaned up by the governments' handymen and women. Thrown out like the trash, they are never to be missed or thought of again.
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The desolate characterization of human suffering caused by a life full of only baseless gratification and endless governmental tyranny can cause even the most hopeful, forward-looking individual to stop and consider what exactly makes them happy, why, and how they ended up where they are. According to this song, Husky's identity is one of a martyr for those who want to wake up and taste freedom, no matter how joyless, soul-crushing, or dark the new reality may seem. In the long run, with time and much rumination, you can look to the rising sun and realize the truth behind the phrase, 'I chose.' A life without choice is not a life, and Husky knows that, in order to live, you need a reason, and Husky has found his reason. As a fan, I am overjoyed that he has returned to performing, it could be thought of like a big F*** you to the Russian government and critics alike who, try as they might, have no power over Husky. He will continue to operate as a beacon of hope for all the misfits, outcasts, and rebels in Russian society who feel first-hand the stifling power of a government hell-bent on conformity, but who are too scared to say it publically. Husky's future is bright, and I want to be a part of the world he is crafting because, ultimately, I want to die and leave this Earth knowing that I chose.
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