In 1989, Finnish film-maker Aki Kaurismaki recruited a local band named the Sleepy Sleepers to star in his new film “Leningrad Cowboys Go America’.

After the movie, the musicians liked being the Leningrad Cowboys so much that they kept performing as them.

One night in a bar, they got into some heavy drinking with a couple of members of the Russian Red Army Ensemble. The RRAE was composed of men who had actually been in the real Soviet Army band, and were now making their way as a commercial enterprise in the brave new world, performing traditional Russian songs.

The details of the ensuing brilliant idea and hook-up are fuzzy, dissolved in various esters of alcohol.

Together, they became something that neither could have been alone. The symbiotic parternship was extravagantly successful, in both creative and career-enhancing ways.

Needless to say, I encourage you to search out their other vids on YouTube. They can seriously rock. I posted this one because it was the most melancholically joyous one I found. In its own way, it’s the Blues.

Here’s ‘You’re My Heart, You’re My Soul‘ from their latest album, ‘Zombies Paradise’. It’s a teensy bit more punk than the other vid.

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