LEGENDS FROM THE 1990S: LADO BURDULI

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NOVEMBER 10, 2024

January 29, 2014 · by ingesnip · 



Lado Burduli Live In Paris 17.05.2009 – Photo By Pierre Terrasson

After Georgia declared its independence in 1989, the Soviet Union fell in 1991 and a civil war followed. Harsh and chaotic times prevailed for another decade afterwards. However, the 1990s are regarded as a decade of creative intensity. Despite a non-functioning educational system, a repressive government, and no resources, a group of young Georgians broke conventional rules to create their own music, poetry and other forms of art. Living legend Lado Burduli is one of them, he became famous in the chaotic 1990s as rock musician, bringing new and innovative changes to the Georgian art scene. Though he came from a family in the so-called “intelligentsia” and had a classical music education that included performing in the opera, Lado soon realized that being a classical musician was not the road he wanted to travel.

‘Imagine there are two paths covered with snow: one has many footsteps, and the other has none. I realized I wanted to go for the last one’. He strikes his white/grey long curls back when he semi- jokingly says his life is a ‘bible’ for the younger generations. ‘Because I have stayed true to myself. I am proud that I stayed myself, that I still am who I was before. I stayed on the road, I continued on this road, it is a proud achievement.’ It was not an easy road. Though it was the path he had consciously chosen, he had to overcome several different barriers to stay on it.

‘Lado Burduli is someone who has changed Georgia. In the 1990s I started punk, and I must honestly say it was rather dangerous. People did not understand what I was doing. To them, it was very strange. No-one even knew what was going on in the West and here was this guy is playing this strangely sounding music, wearing even more bizarre clothes.’



Lado Burduli Live In Dresden 12.06.2011- Photo By Ellen Pagel

The West inspired Lado the most. His main influence was Marc Bolan. He also took inspiration from musicians such as Tom Waits, Joy Division, The Smiths, The Cure, and Bauhause. However, it was also a change in mindset which led him to create new art forms, to create things Georgia had not seen before.

‘When I was 15 years old, I lived in Germany for 2 months. This experience changed my visions, my world views. An interesting example of how my ideas on life changed was when I was in a spa. Men and women were all together, naked. And there I was, this young Georgian boy, who thought that girls who wore thigh-highs were sluts, confronted with naked people. To my surprise, no-one had an erection. There was no problem with being naked. Everybody was drinking beers, and chatting. It made me think, it made me realize the world is perhaps not as how it is being portrayed in Georgia. It changed me forever.’

When I asked him how this changed his artistic vision, he had to think. While staring out of the window, he replied: ‘I started to understand I wanted to have other music, and I realized that it had not existed in Soviet times. In essence, I wanted to change this, so I changed the way in which I listened to things, I changed how I looked at things, and from there I developed to the person as you can see me now.’

Lado explained that he initially did not want to become a musician, but a movie director. He was inspired by his parents. His father was a famous actor in the Soviet Union. Coming from an artistic family had an impact on his artistic development. He soon realized that being different was frowned upon during Soviet times. Although there were no major differences between different classes, there still existed a large wall between them. ‘There was a small elite class, which had a western mentality, and then there were other people. The rest, they noticed that you were a stranger, it was not being appreciated.’


Lado agreed that this has changed. ‘Currently it takes some thinking to understand to which class people belong to, and which mentality they have. Globalization changed this.’ But besides the positive effects of globalization, including opening up the national borders, the introduction of the internet and a more free government, there are also some negative side effects.

‘People now have a choice to be who they want to. There is no longer a wall between people and information. However, this has led to laziness. People became very lazy, everything is already invented. It dictates tastes: if you want to be punk, you have to wear this and this. It is as if there exist certain uniforms. Moreover, there is no fight any more in society about why you decide to wear certain things. It is much easier for people currently. They do not realize that the artists who started to fight conformities in the 70s, 80s and 90s, what they had to go through. Nobody realizes, nobody respects you for what you have done. Also, this open information has brought very few new artists to be true and natural. In the past you had to be true and natural. You always needed to be informed, very fashioned, very creative. For me every day was a new day, my life was moving fast.’

Another recent development has also negatively affected the current status of culture in Georgia according to Lado. ‘A major problem in Georgian show business is that (president) Saakashvili wants to be a rock star. I told him: you should be politician, being rock star is my part, your part is development.’ Lado here refers to the monopoly the Georgian government has over the popular arts.