Levan Lomidze and the group Blues Cousins. Biography

Tell us how you became a guitarist. How it all started and what influenced your choice.

It all started when I almost accidentally attended a B.B. King concert in Tbilisi in 1975. He performed at the Philharmonic, opposite my school. I was a schoolboy then. Few people knew that B.B. King was coming to Tbilisi; even in Moscow they didn’t know about it. Western rock/blues musicians did not give concerts in the USSR. But in Georgia in those years there was still more freedom. And thanks to this, not only B.B. King came to us, but also, for example, Luther Allison and many other interesting bluesmen.

And so I saw B.B. King live and at the concert I caught his pick, which he threw into the audience from the stage. The pick was personalized (autographed). And the next day I met him on the street, he was walking along Rustaveli Avenue (this is the central avenue in Tbilisi) - B.B. King was walking in a Georgian “Aerodrome” hat, like Vakhtang Kikabidze wore in the film “Mimino”.

And after B.B. King’s visit, I fell in love with the blues. In general, by that time I understood music quite well, for my age, of course. I previously learned to play the piano. I was 11 years old.

A long time passed after B.B. King's visit, I was still playing the piano, but the blues phrases that I heard at the concert were sitting in my head. And then a couple of years later, my neighbor, a former drummer, showed me “with one finger” how to play the blues scale on the piano. Of course, I did not previously know about the existence of this range. These are the magic notes on which all blues guitar solos are built, not just blues guitar solos.

And then I realized that the blues is a completely different music and a completely different world, and then I started trying to improvise on the piano. And then I transferred these notes to the guitar. I didn't know how to play the guitar. They just showed me some basics - here is the first string, etc. And then I would just find these blues notes on the guitar neck - find this scale and play it up/down on the guitar.

And then I gradually began to understand more. For example, that some notes can be extracted without “pressing” on a certain fret, by making a tightening. This is how my first bends turned out.

Where did you even get the guitar? What kind of instrument was this?

There were no special problems with the guitar. Firstly, there were acoustic guitars, which my father gave me from time to time, but we broke them and did not know how to play these instruments. And then I began to focus my attention on the electric guitar.

By the way, it would be appropriate to remember here about another simply magical incident in my childhood. I was walking around the city. It was in the evening after some circle or section, I was going home. I pass by some house of culture in Tbilisi. And I go into it. It's like someone is calling me. And it's completely dark there. This is a huge house typical of Soviet times. There is no one in the lobby. I go up to the second floor, then to the third floor. I still don’t understand why I went there. I open some door and find myself on the balcony. Imagine a balcony in an opera hall. A large large hall and no one there. It's completely dark and I'm standing on the balcony. And only the stage is fully lit and only one person is sitting there. And he plays the electric guitar. He has an amplifier (the big one is above him). And he is alone on stage and his face is not visible. But these notes, these sounds that reached me - these were magical sounds.

After all, in fact, if you read the very first ancient instructions for the Fuzz guitar effect, it was written there that Fuzz acts on the human nervous system. Whether positive or negative, Fuzz turns her on. Apparently something like this happened in me.

First B.B. King, then this incident at the cultural center. And I began to think where such sounds come from. And I listened to different blues works. And I thought why the guitar in them doesn’t sound the same as an acoustic one. Then they explained to me that there was a lotion. And they explained it to me incorrectly, they said that it was called “wah”. And I started looking for the "wah". And the department store sold Soviet “wahs.”

In general, this is how it all started. Then my father finally bought me an electric guitar. Semi-acoustic. I don’t understand the name, but it was Soviet. She had two sensors. And then, as usually happens, various homemade guitars began.

But it took me a very long time to understand where these magical guitar sounds come from.

How did you learn to play the guitar? How did you work out? How did you master this instrument? Did you go to a teacher or did everything yourself, taking and analyzing notes?

Yes, I myself, independently analyzing the records. I only went to the teacher once. It was some kind of Lenin Prize laureate, etc. He teaches guitar. I came to my first lesson. I see he teaches some three chords, but these are not blues chords, but so-called “thieves” and explains about arpeggios. And I didn’t find anything in common with my hobbies.

But there was a girl there and she was playing something like that on the guitar (singing). I approached her and asked what it was. And she says - don’t you know, this is rock and roll.

You have to understand that these were difficult times in terms of musical information. It turns out that this girl had a sailor brother who sailed on a ship abroad and he taught her to play this riff.

So, bit by bit, I collected some pieces of my knowledge and skills. I saw something somewhere, heard something somewhere, asked someone, etc. But of course, for the most part, I analyzed the recordings.

What kind of music were you listening to then?

Well, basically, I listened to the blues. Johnny Winter, Alvin Lee. But to this day my favorite band is Living Blues.

Please tell us how you became a professional musician, that is, started performing somewhere?

I had such a stereotype that I should compose, that is, I should have my own face. Now I understand that the blues is an absolutely unique culture. Blues gives every guitarist the opportunity to open up as much as possible. And before I thought that the blues was some kind of direction, but still you need to do something of your own, using only some elements of this direction.

And with these ideas I created a group. Vakhtang Kikabidze’s son played drums with me for eight whole years. This is my closest friend, we lived next door. We were three friends back then and we formed a group together. We formed a group and rehearsed right in Kikabidze’s office. He gave us the first drums. And then he took us to the Philharmonic and we went to concerts for two years. It’s like warming up in the first part before Vakhtang Kikabidze’s performance. And we played blues with folk elements.

What language was it in?

In Georgian. Kikabidze is generally a fan of blues. And he knows the blues much better than many, many blues musicians. By the way, he himself is a former drummer and a very good drummer. And I remember he played us pure classic shuffle blues performed by E. Clapton. And he said - can you play this? Then I'll take you to the Philharmonic.

And we rehearsed. And we played and Kikabidze liked it and after that we began to perform.

In general, Kikabidze was very erudite in terms of blues. By the way, all the information about the blues. We took records and records from him. He brought it. Well, plus we took microphones, all kinds of equipment, etc. from him.

So he seemed to be taking care of you?

Yes, I took care of you. And not just a little, but quite a lot. And we had our own real group. We did promotion, filmed videos, etc. We called ourselves a rock band. Since it was a blues band, such names did not exist. And we were the first group in Tbilisi. Which released the record. It was a huge event at that time. Such things had to be coordinated with Moscow. I came to Moscow and all sorts of commissions listened to the music. The texts were translated into Russian and they looked to see if there was anything seditious in them.

That is, it was the first group in Georgia to release a record. And in the Georgian language but with modern music.

Yes. It was believed that we were “the first Georgian rock band to release a record.” And we had our own videos. Even a whole movie for 40 minutes. Television allocated 20 thousand rubles. It was a crazy amount back then. And we made a film about our group.

Tell us how you became a guitarist. How it all started and what influenced your choice.

It all started when I almost accidentally attended a B.B. King concert in Tbilisi in 1975. He performed at the Philharmonic, opposite my school. I was a schoolboy then. Few people knew that B.B. King was coming to Tbilisi; even in Moscow they didn’t know about it. Western rock/blues musicians did not give concerts in the USSR. But in Georgia in those years there was still more freedom. And thanks to this, not only B.B. King came to us, but also, for example, Luther Allison and many other interesting bluesmen.

And so I saw B.B. King live and at the concert I caught his pick, which he threw into the audience from the stage. The pick was personalized (autographed). And the next day I met him on the street, he was walking along Rustaveli Avenue (this is the central avenue in Tbilisi) - B.B. King was walking in a Georgian “Aerodrome” hat, like Vakhtang Kikabidze wore in the film “Mimino”.

And after B.B. King’s visit, I fell in love with the blues. In general, by that time I understood music quite well, for my age, of course. I previously learned to play the piano. I was 11 years old.

A long time passed after B.B. King's visit, I was still playing the piano, but the blues phrases that I heard at the concert were sitting in my head. And then a couple of years later, my neighbor, a former drummer, showed me “with one finger” how to play the blues scale on the piano. Of course, I did not previously know about the existence of this range. These are the magic notes on which all blues guitar solos are built, not just blues guitar solos.

And then I realized that the blues is a completely different music and a completely different world, and then I started trying to improvise on the piano. And then I transferred these notes to the guitar. I didn't know how to play the guitar. They just showed me some basics - here is the first string, etc. And then I would just find these blues notes on the guitar neck - find this scale and play it up/down on the guitar.

And then I gradually began to understand more. For example, that some notes can be extracted without “pressing” on a certain fret, by making a tightening. This is how my first bends turned out.

Where did you even get the guitar? What kind of instrument was this?

There were no special problems with the guitar. Firstly, there were acoustic guitars, which my father gave me from time to time, but we broke them and did not know how to play these instruments. And then I began to focus my attention on the electric guitar.

By the way, it would be appropriate to remember here about another simply magical incident in my childhood. I was walking around the city. It was in the evening after some circle or section, I was going home. I pass by some house of culture in Tbilisi. And I go into it. It's like someone is calling me. And it's completely dark there. This is a huge house typical of Soviet times. There is no one in the lobby. I go up to the second floor, then to the third floor. I still don’t understand why I went there. I open some door and find myself on the balcony. Imagine a balcony in an opera hall. A large large hall and no one there. It's completely dark and I'm standing on the balcony. And only the stage is fully lit and only one person is sitting there. And he plays the electric guitar. He has an amplifier (the big one is above him). And he is alone on stage and his face is not visible. But these notes, these sounds that reached me - these were magical sounds.

After all, in fact, if you read the very first ancient instructions for the Fuzz guitar effect, it was written there that Fuzz acts on the human nervous system. Whether positive or negative, Fuzz turns her on. Apparently something like this happened in me.

First B.B. King, then this incident at the cultural center. And I began to think where such sounds come from. And I listened to different blues works. And I thought why the guitar in them doesn’t sound the same as an acoustic one. Then they explained to me that there was a lotion. And they explained it to me incorrectly, they said that it was called “wah”. And I started looking for the "wah". And the department store sold Soviet “wahs.”

In general, this is how it all started. Then my father finally bought me an electric guitar. Semi-acoustic. I don’t understand the name, but it was Soviet. She had two sensors. And then, as usually happens, various homemade guitars began.

But it took me a very long time to understand where these magical guitar sounds come from.

How did you learn to play the guitar? How did you work out? How did you master this instrument? Did you go to a teacher or did everything yourself, taking and analyzing notes?

Yes, I myself, independently analyzing the records. I only went to the teacher once. It was some kind of Lenin Prize laureate, etc. He teaches guitar. I came to my first lesson. I see he teaches some three chords, but these are not blues chords, but so-called “thieves” and explains about arpeggios. And I didn’t find anything in common with my hobbies.

But there was a girl there and she was playing something like that on the guitar (singing). I approached her and asked what it was. And she says - don’t you know, this is rock and roll.

You have to understand that these were difficult times in terms of musical information. It turns out that this girl had a sailor brother who sailed on a ship abroad and he taught her to play this riff.

So, bit by bit, I collected some pieces of my knowledge and skills. I saw something somewhere, heard something somewhere, asked someone, etc. But of course, for the most part, I analyzed the recordings.

What kind of music were you listening to then?

Well, basically, I listened to the blues. Johnny Winter, Alvin Lee. But to this day my favorite band is Living Blues.

Please tell us how you became a professional musician, that is, started performing somewhere?

I had such a stereotype that I should compose, that is, I should have my own face. Now I understand that the blues is an absolutely unique culture. Blues gives every guitarist the opportunity to open up as much as possible. And before I thought that the blues was some kind of direction, but still you need to do something of your own, using only some elements of this direction.

And with these ideas I created a group. Vakhtang Kikabidze’s son played drums with me for eight whole years. This is my closest friend, we lived next door. We were three friends back then and we formed a group together. We formed a group and rehearsed right in Kikabidze’s office. He gave us the first drums. And then he took us to the Philharmonic and we went to concerts for two years. It’s like warming up in the first part before Vakhtang Kikabidze’s performance. And we played blues with folk elements.

What language was it in?

In Georgian. Kikabidze is generally a fan of blues. And he knows the blues much better than many, many blues musicians. By the way, he himself is a former drummer and a very good drummer. And I remember he played us pure classic shuffle blues performed by E. Clapton. And he said - can you play this? Then I'll take you to the Philharmonic.

And we rehearsed. And we played and Kikabidze liked it and after that we began to perform.

In general, Kikabidze was very erudite in terms of blues. By the way, all the information about the blues. We took records and records from him. He brought it. Well, plus we took microphones, all kinds of equipment, etc. from him.

So he seemed to be taking care of you?

Yes, I took care of you. And not just a little, but quite a lot. And we had our own real group. We did promotion, filmed videos, etc. We called ourselves a rock band. Since it was a blues band, such names did not exist. And we were the first group in Tbilisi. Which released the record. It was a huge event at that time. Such things had to be coordinated with Moscow. I came to Moscow and all sorts of commissions listened to the music. The texts were translated into Russian and they looked to see if there was anything seditious in them.

That is, it was the first group in Georgia to release a record. And in the Georgian language but with modern music.

Yes. It was believed that we were “the first Georgian rock band to release a record.” And we had our own videos. Even a whole movie for 40 minutes. Television allocated 20 thousand rubles. It was a crazy amount back then. And we made a film about our group.

On the eve of the anniversary of his band Blues Cousins, the famous blues guitarist gave an interview.

On February 16, 2018, as part of the ART-Atmosphere Music Festival, a show by the famous blues guitarist Levan Lomidze “The Anniversary of the Blues Cousins ​​- 25 years!” will take place on the stage of the Central House of Artists cinema and concert hall!

Levan Lomidze has long earned the fame of the largest Russian bluesman and a place in the top ten guitarists. Since 2002, together with the Blues Cousins ​​group, he has held more than 100 blues concerts across the United States. In 2000, the guitarist was awarded the Audience Award at the Blues sur Sein 2000 festival in France, and the Blues Cousins ​​group was named the best among 57 groups. At the anniversary concert, Lomidze will perform the brightest songs from the repertoire of past years, as well as new works.

Levan, tell us a little about the upcoming concert at the Central House of Artists. How did you create the program? Is it completely new?

For me, as well as for the entire team, this is a very important event, and we are drawing up the program with great enthusiasm. We want this day to turn into a holiday not only for us, but also, first of all, for our listeners, because they have loyally supported us all these years.

The best representatives of Russian blues and jazz will appear on stage with us: Konstantin Nikolsky, Sergey Manukyan, Vyacheslav Gorsky, Evgeny Borets and others. These are people whose cooperation has always enriched the creativity of our team. Everything is planned in the best blues traditions: there will be a lot of improvisation, impromptu and surprises.

What compositions are you planning to perform? And what special have you prepared for the public?

We will present our new album “I Was Born In Georgia”, songs from which will be performed live for the first time. In addition to works from the new album, the program will include the best hits of the 20th century from blues to rock, from B.B. King to the Beatles. And of course, what’s an anniversary without gifts?! The first two hundred spectators to enter the hall will receive our CD as a souvenir.

The concert is dedicated to the anniversary of your musical group. If you compare what it was like 25 years ago and now, what has changed and what has remained the same?

Over the course of 25 years, the group has certainly changed radically. She became mature and endlessly confident, but her passion for music and the pleasant excitement before each performance remained unchanged.

At what age did you become interested in music? How did you come to your current life?

I became interested in music back in 1975, as an 11-year-old schoolboy, quite by chance attending a concert by the great B.B. King. Then I discovered a whole world for myself - a world of limitless freedom. It sounds pretentious, but believe me, it’s true!

What attracted you to the blues? What does music mean to you?

Blues is a world without frames and rules. Anyone can look there, even without special skills, but to live in that world you need to put in a lot of effort and love.

Do you remember your first guitar?

My father gave me my first guitar. It was a Soviet-made acoustic instrument. And he made sounds.

What advice do you have for young performers who don’t yet know which musical instrument to choose for themselves? How do you know if this instrument is yours?

I advise young people to rely more on themselves than on others when choosing an instrument. Only your heart can tell you which instrument is yours.

What direction are you moving in now? What are you working on?

There are many plans, but the main priority is our concert activities. With the release of each new album, the program also changes. Introducing something new without damaging the old is quite a difficult task. This is what we are solving.

The conversation was moderated by Svetlana Astretsova

Levan Lomidze is the first Russian guitarist recognized in the homeland of Blues. In 2002, a long-term contract was signed with the Washington Blues Community to conduct 5 tours across the United States, including performances at the most prestigious blues festivals in America. In total, more than 100 concerts were held. At the Blues Sur Sein 2000 festival (France), Levan was awarded the audience sympathy prize, and Blues Cousins ​​was named the best among 57 groups. According to the results of a survey of listeners of the Doctor Blues program (Open Radio), Levan Lomidze was recognized as the best Russian blues musician of the year. In 2005, the American company Jazz Stream Records released Levan’s live album – Live in USA. The latter fact was a real breakthrough for Moscow blues. According to the magazines Audio-Video, Music Box, Guitars. ru, Levan is recognized as one of the 10 best guitarists in Russia. Levan was awarded by the mayor of Moscow for the “Rock Against Drugs” campaign.

Levan addressed his guests and listeners: “Hello, the first 200 spectators will receive a gift - our new CD “I Was Born in Georgia”. Original compositions from which will be performed for the first time. Works from the classics of blues, jazz and rock will also be performed.”

______________________________________

- It’s too early for you to sum up the results, but 50 years is such a long journey, during which you can achieve considerable results. What achievements of your “first fifty” are you really proud of today?

When I review the results of my life, I am amazed. Is it really possible to accomplish so much in one life? Because if they told me 20-25 years ago what would happen in the future, I would not have believed it. I was an ordinary person, a Soviet schoolboy, a pioneer. When Western musicians came, it was something alien for us. We ran around looking for the first foreign records from resellers. And then some time passed and I had the opportunity to play next to them, record music, make friends, perform on the same stage. It turns out that everything is possible in life! I think the biggest achievement is that we managed to release the disc in America, and that the American record company Jazz Stream Records took the initiative. We had a big tour, we played 50 concerts in 3 months. And we were offered to make an album during this tour. Then it turned out that our recording was the first disc of an Eastern European blues musician released in the States.

- In what part of the USA did you tour?

We had a contract with the Blues Association, which is based in Seattle and covers the four surrounding states. This is the northwest of the USA, closer to Canada, Vancouver... And we traveled around them all! The Jazz Stream Records label provided us with a special bus with equipment and thus three live concerts were recorded. From this material the album "Alive in the USA" was made. It is still sold on CD.

- You probably took part in many, many music festivals?

Yes, thanks to music we have traveled to many countries, we have been to Asia, America, and even Africa. But the very first takeoff was the Blues Sur Sein festival in France in 2000 - the largest blues festival in Europe. I had worked in the West before, but we had never performed at this level before; it was a large-scale festival fifty kilometers from Paris, 57 groups were invited to it. And it was we, Blues Cousins, who won the People's Choice Award! It was very unexpected. And the festival became our springboard - we began performing all over the world, touring America.

- In what role did you participate in the Suzdal blues festival TOTAL FLAME?

I was the art director of Total Flame for three years. It seems to me that it was very successful. The festival is really cool. Its organizers are guys with taste, everything sounds very good. Two years ago, I remember, I was on stage for more than 12 hours straight. On the first day of the festival there was a non-stop jam with Russian and foreign musicians. And our team was on stage constantly, from 12 noon to 2 am, without exaggeration. It was still cold and it was raining. But we held out! With pleasure!

- Tell me, how does your historical homeland, Georgia, help you in your creativity? Georgian culture of sound, chants...

I am grateful to my roots, first of all for the triplet. Because blues is triplet music, and Georgian, and simply oriental songs fit very easily into the blues rhythm. I can say that the rhythm of blues is truly native to me. And, of course, in Georgia everyone sings. I also sang for five years in the institute choir. There were 100 of us, we sang folk songs, went on tour to Romania and Bulgaria. But still, I never considered myself a vocalist. Blues is very democratic in this regard. There are no hard claims. If the performer has excellent vocals, good. But if the voice is not very good, you can compensate with guitar playing.

- It is believed that a blues musician should be unhappy, preferably a drinker. You can also make an attempt on the sheriff's life. And somehow you don’t really meet the blues standard.

This is just a hyped myth for Hollywood. I had difficult moments in my life, a terrible accident several years ago, but for some reason I didn’t want to play and sing in the hospital. In fact, I believe that a person wants to play the blues, especially such energetic music as blues-rock, when he feels good. I'm in a good mood and I'm enjoying playing. In general, everyone has their own blues! There is Peter Green - a great English guitarist, author, he is loved for his minor, sad compositions. And there is Johnny Winter, for whom it’s the other way around. And there is the great B.B. King.

- So do you sing “black” blues or “white”?

I still sing “white.” My style is called blues rock. How did the blues develop? It originated in America, but initially it was not popular among whites. Blues music migrated to London, where the first truly popular blues bands, such as Blues Incorporated, appeared. Then this style crossed the ocean again and began to gain popularity in the United States. The Americans themselves write that the British gave this music a white tint - more intellectual and positive. Then the general public became interested in listening to her. There is even one song by a black bluesman - “They took my blues and ruined everything.” But for some reason, not so many people listen to true “black blues”; they prefer the style of Eric Clapton and Gary Moore.

- Is there such a gradation as commercial blues and non-commercial blues?

Of course have. Non-commercial blues is hard for the average viewer to listen to. For this there must be a special environment, a prepared audience. Usually in America, at festivals, one day is devoted to non-commercial, “pure” blues, as a tribute to art. But on a more popular day, when more spectators come, they hang out, have fun, have fun, commercial blues are played.

- Do you include old blues “black” compositions in the program?

Processed - yes, of course. We have several of these items processed beyond recognition. I played really “black music”, but at the same time it was very difficult to look at the audience... And I can’t blame them. A man comes after work, on his way to the subway, he wants to relax. And they load it again.

- I watch how you communicate with the public, you simply hypnotize them, bewitch them. How important is the energy of the audience to you?

It's very important to me. When I play, I always peek a little at the viewer. If I feel that the viewer is not engaged, I am ready to die at that time. Maybe it's too much, but I can't do it any other way. I want my viewer to leave a happy person!

Levan Lomidze and Blues cousins ​​at Alexey Kozlov's club

Levan Lomidze photography

It all started when I almost accidentally attended a B.B. King concert in Tbilisi in 1975. He performed at the Philharmonic, opposite my school. I was a schoolboy then. Few people knew that B.B. King was coming to Tbilisi; even in Moscow they didn’t know about it. Western rock/blues musicians did not give concerts in the USSR. But in Georgia in those years there was still more freedom. And thanks to this, not only B.B. King came to us, but also, for example, Luther Allison and many other interesting bluesmen.

And so I saw B.B. King live and at the concert I caught his pick, which he threw into the audience from the stage. The pick was personalized (autographed). And the next day I met him on the street, he was walking along Rustaveli Avenue (this is the central avenue in Tbilisi) - B.B. King was walking in a Georgian “Aerodrome” hat, like Vakhtang Kikabidze wore in the film “Mimino”.

And after B.B. King’s visit, I fell in love with the blues. In general, by that time I understood music quite well, for my age, of course. I previously learned to play the piano. I was 11 years old.

A long time passed after B.B. King's visit, I was still playing the piano, but the blues phrases that I heard at the concert were sitting in my head. And then a couple of years later, my neighbor, a former drummer, showed me “with one finger” how to play the blues scale on the piano. Of course, I did not previously know about the existence of this range. These are the magic notes on which all blues guitar solos are built, not just blues guitar solos.

And then I realized that the blues is a completely different music and a completely different world, and then I started trying to improvise on the piano. And then I transferred these notes to the guitar. I didn't know how to play the guitar. They just showed me some basics - here is the first string, etc. And then I would just find these blues notes on the guitar neck - find this scale and play it up/down on the guitar.

And then I gradually began to understand more. For example, that some notes can be extracted without “pressing” on a certain fret, by making a tightening. This is how my first bends turned out.

Where did you even get the guitar? What kind of instrument was this?

Best of the day

There were no special problems with the guitar. Firstly, there were acoustic guitars, which my father gave me from time to time, but we broke them and did not know how to play these instruments. And then I began to focus my attention on the electric guitar.

By the way, it would be appropriate to remember here about another simply magical incident in my childhood. I was walking around the city. It was in the evening after some circle or section, I was going home. I pass by some house of culture in Tbilisi. And I go into it. It's like someone is calling me. And it's completely dark there. This is a huge house typical of Soviet times. There is no one in the lobby. I go up to the second floor, then to the third floor. I still don’t understand why I went there. I open some door and find myself on the balcony. Imagine a balcony in an opera hall. A large large hall and no one there. It's completely dark and I'm standing on the balcony. And only the stage is fully lit and only one person is sitting there. And he plays the electric guitar. He has an amplifier (the big one is above him). And he is alone on stage and his face is not visible. But these notes, these sounds that reached me - these were magical sounds.

After all, in fact, if you read the very first ancient instructions for the Fuzz guitar effect, it was written there that Fuzz acts on the human nervous system. Whether positive or negative, Fuzz turns her on. Apparently something like this happened in me.

First B.B. King, then this incident at the cultural center. And I began to think where such sounds come from. And I listened to different blues works. And I thought why the guitar in them doesn’t sound the same as an acoustic one. Then they explained to me that there was a lotion. And they explained it to me incorrectly, they said that it was called “wah”. And I started looking for the "wah". And the department store sold Soviet “wahs.”

In general, this is how it all started. Then my father finally bought me an electric guitar. Semi-acoustic. I don’t understand the name, but it was Soviet. She had two sensors. And then, as usually happens, various homemade guitars began.

But it took me a very long time to understand where these magical guitar sounds come from.

How did you learn to play the guitar? How did you work out? How did you master this instrument? Did you go to a teacher or did everything yourself, taking and analyzing notes?

Yes, I myself, independently analyzing the records. I only went to the teacher once. It was some kind of Lenin Prize laureate, etc. He teaches guitar. I came to my first lesson. I see he teaches some three chords, but these are not blues chords, but so-called “thieves” and explains about arpeggios. And I didn’t find anything in common with my hobbies.

But there was a girl there and she was playing something like that on the guitar (singing). I approached her and asked what it was. And she says - don’t you know, this is rock and roll.

You have to understand that these were difficult times in terms of musical information. It turns out that this girl had a sailor brother who sailed on a ship abroad and he taught her to play this riff.

So, bit by bit, I collected some pieces of my knowledge and skills. I saw something somewhere, heard something somewhere, asked someone, etc. But of course, for the most part, I analyzed the recordings.

What kind of music were you listening to then?

Well, basically, I listened to the blues. Johnny Winter, Alvin Lee. But to this day my favorite band is Living Blues.

Please tell us how you became a professional musician, that is, started performing somewhere?

I had such a stereotype that I should compose, that is, I should have my own face. Now I understand that the blues is an absolutely unique culture. Blues gives every guitarist the opportunity to open up as much as possible. And before I thought that the blues was some kind of direction, but still you need to do something of your own, using only some elements of this direction.

And with these ideas I created a group. Vakhtang Kikabidze’s son played drums with me for eight whole years. This is my closest friend, we lived next door. We were three friends back then and we formed a group together. We formed a group and rehearsed right in Kikabidze’s office. He gave us the first drums. And then he took us to the Philharmonic and we went to concerts for two years. It’s like warming up in the first part before Vakhtang Kikabidze’s performance. And we played blues with folk elements.

What language was it in?

In Georgian. Kikabidze is generally a fan of blues. And he knows the blues much better than many, many blues musicians. By the way, he himself is a former drummer and a very good drummer. And I remember he played us pure classic shuffle blues performed by E. Clapton. And he said - can you play this? Then I'll take you to the Philharmonic.

And we rehearsed. And we played and Kikabidze liked it and after that we began to perform.

In general, Kikabidze was very erudite in terms of blues. By the way, all the information about the blues. We took records and records from him. He brought it. Well, plus we took microphones, all kinds of equipment, etc. from him.

So he seemed to be taking care of you?

Yes, I took care of you. And not just a little, but quite a lot. And we had our own real group. We did promotion, filmed videos, etc. We called ourselves a rock band. Since it was a blues band, such names did not exist. And we were the first group in Tbilisi. Which released the record. It was a huge event at that time. Such things had to be coordinated with Moscow. I came to Moscow and all sorts of commissions listened to the music. The texts were translated into Russian and they looked to see if there was anything seditious in them.

That is, it was the first group in Georgia to release a record. And in the Georgian language but with modern music.

Yes. It was believed that we were “the first Georgian rock band to release a record.” And we had our own videos. Even a whole movie for 40 minutes. Television allocated 20 thousand rubles. It was a crazy amount back then. And we made a film about our group.

I'll say what I think
27.07.2013 05:25:59

I think that Levan is a happy person, whether he thinks so or not.
Thomas Aquinas argued that musicians are not subject to the Inquisition because God speaks to us through them. Although I am an unbeliever, I agree with F. Aquinas on this issue, and with regard to Lomidze - 100 percent.