Dyagileva disappeared in 1991 at the age of 24 and is believed to have drowned, possibly a suicide. Simone talked about what Yanka Dyagileva’s music means to her, and why depressing songs mix surprisingly well with stand-up comedy.
Why did you decide to make an album of Yanka's music?
It’s not because of some logical chain of thought. You just become obsessed with an idea and you can’t not do it. I heard this woman’s music and loved it. And I was intrigued by the thought that there had been this woman in Russia who made this really raw and powerful music and traveled all over the Soviet Union by herself on trains and performed in this DIY way in apartments and dormitories.
Were you familiar with her music while she was alive?
Yanka’s music was never commercially released in her lifetime; it was mostly circulated on cassette tapes. Her first album was released in Russia some years after she died. I moved here in 1976, and my parents weren’t on the cusp of the Soviet punk scene, so I didn’t hear about her until much later.
How did you discover her?
The first time I remember ever hearing her name, I was taking a walk in Brighton Beach. Two guys were on the street playing guitar and singing in Russian. I stopped to listen, and we got into a discussion about the local Russian rock scene. They invited me to a show at The Elbow Room, which was the main venue for Russian rock at the time. While I was there, one of them handed me cassette tape of Yanka’s music and said, “I think you’ll really like it.”
I've seen Yanka described as a Russian Patti Smith. Do you consider that accurate? What American musician would you compare her to?
It’s not really accurate. In the sense that she was a poet, you could say she was similar to Patti. I think her style contains certain uniquely Russian elements that make it difficult to do the “recommended if you like…” thing. She was creating her own hybrid of music.
Some of Yanka’s lyrics are pretty depressing. What do you make of lines like “From great knowledge comes only sorrow” or “Nobody knows how fucking rotten I feel?”
The song with “Nobody knows how fucking rotten I feel” was the first song she wrote. She wrote it during a university lecture at some technical water-engineering institute. In the Soviet Union, if you didn’t have a clear understanding of what you wanted to do after high school, you became an engineer. So, she was at a dreary engineering institute listening to some dreary lecture when she wrote it. I think, and I hope, that there’s some humor there. When I sing that song to Russian audiences, people laugh.
But you’re right. Her music is depressing and is identified as such. I have friends who don’t like it for that reason. I’d say it reflects a difficult time in Soviet history and the fact that she had a difficult life. Her mother died of cancer when she was young. Her stepbrother died from a medical error. She grew up poor and remained very poor until she died. And it seemed like she battled serious depression at a time when you couldn’t just go get Prozac.
Eugene Mirman is acting as host for your concert at Joe’s Pub. How do you know him? What will he do?
I don’t think he knows what he’s going to do [laughs]. We’re working on that. I’ve known Eugene since I was five. We went to elementary school together [in Massachusetts].
Isn’t there something strange about having a comedian perform while you sing depressing songs?
It is an odd combination, but I think we’ll make it work. I’ve played at Rififi a couple of times for Invite Them Up [Mirman’s comedy show with Bobby Tisdale, now on hiatus]. I would sing my own very depressing songs in English and somehow it went OK.
Alina Simone performs with Eugene Mirman on April 4 at Joe’s Pub
