Luna and her boyfriend New name: Singer Luna

Singer Luna (Kristina Gerasimova, at the time of her marriage performed under the pseudonym Bardash) is a Ukrainian singer whose musical career, which began with posting songs on YouTube in 2014-2015, reached its peak of popularity in the period 2016-2018.

Attractive appearance, a pleasant voice and a nostalgic style of performance, typical for the pop music of the post-Soviet space of the 90s in modern processing, allowed the performer to gain wide popularity among an interested audience.

Childhood and education

Kristina Viktorovna Gerasimova was born on August 28, 1990 in the city of Karl-Marx-Stadt (now Chemnitz) in the GDR. Her parents lived in this German city during the military service of the father of the family. After the unification of Germany in 1990 and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Gerasimov family moved to Kyiv.

The period of life in Germany had practically no effect on Christina, who was then still small, although in an interview she recalled her mother's stories about joint walks around the Dresden Art Gallery or her birth in a boat sailing along the Elbe.

From early childhood, Christina strove for music and art, which was greatly facilitated by the girl's parents. Their considerable merit was that Kristina Gerasimova studied at a music school in vocal and piano classes.

According to the singer's own admission, the event that determined her desire for a musical career was a trip to Cuba in 2002. Being away from her parents, Christina did not study, but only composed songs, enjoying the special Cuban atmosphere of freedom and joy.

In 2007, the future singer Luna successfully graduated from the Kyiv school number 53 with in-depth study of the German language. The next step was studying at one of the Kyiv universities at the Faculty of Journalism. Although directing and music attracted the girl much more than the profession of a journalist.

The beginning of a musical career

In 2009, Christina met with her future husband Yuri Bardash, a music producer, founder and soloist of the hip-hop group "Mushrooms".

Interview with Christina Gerasimova

Relations with Yuri have never been easy. According to the recollections of the singer herself, first her pregnancy, then post-natal depression ruined relations between the spouses, and in 2014 they decided on a temporary separation. It was during this period that Christina experienced a creative upsurge, wrote more than 30 songs and, after putting music on the text, published compositions called “Moon” and “Wingray” on her YouTube and Soundcloud accounts. The new performer quickly attracted the attention of the audience.

According to Christina's memoirs, in her childhood she was already interested in music of a certain genre and direction. Her circle of interests firmly included Zemfira, Mumiy Troll, Linda and Guests from the Future. This greatly influenced the musical style of the Moon itself in the future. Christina's songs belong to pop music, while the performer herself and her fans associate the specifics of her compositions with the nostalgic aesthetics of the musical culture of the 90s of the last century.

Rapid takeoff

Christina consolidated her success on October 15, 2015 with a video for the song "Autumn", which she filmed in the courtyard of the house. The simplicity and originality of the environment and the text itself aroused great interest among connoisseurs of popular music. The video quickly collected several hundred thousand views, and this success eventually became the beginning of the singer's career.

Moon - Autumn

Christina's first public performance took place as part of the autumn fashion show "Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days", where she managed to conquer the audience with her simple love songs. It is noteworthy that in the following years the singer took part in this event more than once, leaving her mark even in one of the fashion collections, items from which were decorated with lines from the texts of the Moon.

The period from the end of 2015 to May 2016 was completely devoted to preparing for the release of the first studio album by Christina Gerasimova called Mag-ni-ty. It was for his release that the singer took the pseudonym Luna. It was presented in full at the debut solo concert of the singer in Kyiv. A number of lyrical and memorable compositions (“Moon”, “Autumn”, “Magnets”, “Bottle”, “Distances” and “Boy, you are snow ...”) immediately conquered major Ukrainian and Russian radio stations. The album was produced by Luna herself.

Until the end of 2016, the main occupation of Luna and her partners was touring the CIS countries and Israel, and on November 3, the singer's debut Moscow concert was a success. In parallel with this, on October 28, 2016, Luna released the mini-album "Sad Dance".

Constant touring and separation from her son inspired Luna to create songs on the theme of love at a distance, which were included in the second studio album, Island of Freedom. The release was scheduled for November 18, 2017, and the song "Free Love" became the main single of the disc, the video clip for which collected a record number of views on YouTube for the singer - 4.8 million. Shortly after the release, the album reached the 3rd place in downloads in the Russian section of iTunes.

Clip making

In addition to some of her own videos, a vivid example of which was the video for the song "Autumn", in 2011 Kristina Gerasimova filmed and edited a video clip for the song "Not You" for the popular singer Yulia Nelson.

The clip that Kristina Bardash shot for Yulia Nelson

The successfully completed work gave the girl self-confidence, later clips for the compositions of the singer Inaya and the Nerves group were included in the list of Luna's works. By the way, all projects, except for Yulia Nelson, belong to the Ukrainian company Kruzheva Music, whose founder and owner is Yuriy Bardash.

Luna's personal life

As mentioned above, Kristina Gerasimova in 2009 married producer Yuri Bardash. Being pregnant, Christina and her husband flew to Los Angeles in 2011, where their son George was born soon after.

Moon - Light

All the latest news from the life of the Moon can be found on the pages of the vocalist on Instagram and VKontakte, and you can get acquainted with her compositions and videos on the singer's YouTube profile.

It is known that on April 12, 2019, on Cosmonautics Day, Luna will present a new, very personal album "Enchanted Dreams" in one of the clubs in Minsk.

Dasha Tatarkova

IN THE HEADING "NEW NAME" we talk about promising newcomers: musicians, directors, artists and other creative people - that is, everyone whose name is increasingly appearing on the pages of magazines, in social media feeds and in our conversations and who is clearly on the threshold of great success. Today we will talk about the Ukrainian singer Luna, who records, as she herself calls it, “soulful pop”.

For several years in Ukraine, the musical ball has been ruled by the production center "Lace", which owns the notorious Quest Pistols project. But not just outrageous: "Lace" has formed around itself a whole community of young and talented people: not only musicians, but also producers, photographers, directors, and so on, together arranging a renaissance of local pop music.

One of them is Luna, or Kristina Bardash (she could be seen in the clips of the same Quest Pistols). Formally, she acts independently, rather adopting the experience of the producers of "Lace", rather than integrating into their system. Luna purposely maintains the image of a DIY project by filming clips on her knee and posting her tracks on VKontakte. Kristina records dreamy pop, inspired in equal measure by modernity and native 90s.

In "Lace" Bardash initially worked as a photographer and director with her husband, Yuri, who founded the center. So, a couple of years ago, the Moon appeared: Christina's friends called her to the studio and offered to try to sing over Angelica Varum's track. Over time, she decided to switch from working on other people's projects to her own. Since then, Bardash has gone from timid trial recordings to releasing a full-fledged album, but the feeling that she still sings with an eye on the pop music of her childhood remains.

The album "Magnets" sounds like a live recording of the hits of the 90s, adjusted for the fact that now it's still 2016. The singer herself calls her project “soul pop”, says that Linda and “Guests from the Future” strongly influenced her, and believes that “The Cure” would have recorded this in 1984 based on a creative and sometimes erotic romance between Robert Smith and Alla Primadonna Pugacheva.

Luna gradually recorded her debut album over the course of two years. Although the singer does most of the things on her own, during this time she found like-minded people who helped her find her sound: Alexander Voloshchuk helped with production, and Igor Galart with mixing. "Magnets", in accordance with the title, is an album about the mutual attraction of people: on the one hand, those who recorded it, on the other, its lyrical heroes. The singer herself says that this is a record about a difficult period in her life associated with relationship problems and postpartum depression: "Magnets are an attempt to comprehend relationships between people through a metaphor of natural attraction."

Luna does her best to maintain the image of a new sincerity: for example, she spontaneously shot her video for the track "Autumn" on a small Japanese camera when her son did not want to go to kindergarten. Her slow, dreamy music also fulfills this principle: the lyrics deliberately operate with naive images of youthful love, which Christina sings simply and without frills. However, all this is so well adjusted to each other that it turns out exactly such a pop, which is very lacking in Russian (and not only). You can listen to the songs of the Moon not only in the public "VKontakte" - a live presentation of the album "Magnets" will be held in Kyiv in a few days.

- You have so many publications in the Russian press. Is this the job of management?

No one knocks on the door of journalists and asks to write about me. Esquire invited me to do the shoot. Interview magazine heard the album and wanted to do stuff. I remember how I wrote to you when I shot the video for "Autumn". I doubted - maybe nobody needs these songs at all? Worried all day. Then my clip was posted - it all started. I sent comments that were positive for me, people noticed exactly what was really important to me. Although you admitted in the description of the video that this is such an insidious producer's move.

And Ivan Dorn asked me the same question when we were with him for Interview magazine. He also believed that all this was invented by someone. And I have an internal rebellion every day. They tell me in production: “You have already seen that people like everything, now go and shoot yourself a commercial video. You'll see, a lot of views will go, you'll go on tour. And I say: “No, I want to do it my way.” And I'm constantly in conflict

- Were you worried when Dorn interviewed you?

It felt like before an exam. Although I know him - I photographed him a couple of years ago, we were friends with him. One day I met Ivan on the street. He says: “Oh, little one, can you take a picture of me?” I say: “Listen, Vanya, I'm already doing something else. And in general, I really want to become so cool so that we can make a fit with you. And when at the end of the interview he reminded me of this, I ran home happy and wrote a new track in a second.

The fact is that after the album "Mag-ni-you" I could not write anything for two months. This glory has fallen. And I, like any normal person, got a little covered. I had a star disease, only it was expressed not in the fact that I was arrogant, but in some kind of fright. And I was so inspired by Dorn's words that he feels vitality and honesty in me that I wrote a new track. The song is called "Sad Dance", I also decided to name it.

Following the premiere of the EP "Sad Dance", a video of the same name was released

- Do you understand where the talk comes from that the Moon is a fabricated project?

Of course not. Although I had questions why I don’t have so many views. But Luna is not a mass project, I have come to terms with that. And I continue to bend my line. They send me house remixes of "He Doesn't Walk With You" and they tell me that it will tear everyone apart, but I don't want to. Yura says this to me: "Mushrooms" - this is exactly what to do right now. And Luna… Her audience is gradually growing, but I think it will be for a long time. And in fifteen years this sound will be appreciated in the same way, because it is not in trend. I understand how to reformat into a more pop project. But me what publications are now contacting me.

- The interest of journalists is a fleeting thing. Today you are in fashion, tomorrow you need someone new.

I understand. But it doesn’t seem to me that I caught the hype of new items and it’s empty in the back. I live by this, I have plans, deep roots, a connection with the cosmos. And well, I don't care at all. My heart is calm.

- You didn't have many concerts. Are you afraid that something will not work out in Moscow?

I was afraid in Kyiv, it was the first concert in my life, I woke up every day at 5 in the morning, and in my head: "Concert, concert." And I spent my energy before the concert and at the concert I was in the last stages - what can I give? And what can I even do? I really expected that after the Kyiv concert there should be more performances, this did not happen, but I was not upset. Because if you start waiting for something, you can quickly grow old. I am on a relaxed wave, and I am pleased with my team, the creative team of the Moon. These are my musicians, this is Alina, with whom we develop ideas and grow together. I have already become liberated on stage, even if I sing alone under minus, I will absolutely keep people's attention. I have something to give, I want to tour.

My husband has a large production, I see how everything works there. I see how clips need to be shot, how important it is to launch them on time, and why it is not necessary to shoot ten clips a month, as I would like to. But I need to walk this path myself, make these mistakes. Every day I gain experience, grow up, I am only 26 years old, and until recently I did not understand much. And I wouldn’t have understood if I hadn’t stepped on all this rake myself. If a person does not eat and drink, he will die in four days. I also feel like I'm going to die if I don't go and shoot my videos the way I want and write my songs the way I want with my own musician that I choose and that suits me.

It seems that journalists, and behind them the audience, do not quite understand how my project works. They probably think that they invested money in me, shot clips and hired sound producers who created my musical image. In fact, this is a DIY project that arose as a result of a somewhat spontaneous collective work - mine, Sasha, other musicians, who together make up Luna prod. This is a life that begins in the morning after family affairs. Directly across the street from the house at Luna Prod. is our musical world. I have long been not alone in this vision of mine, behind the Moon there is its own lunar team, consisting of creative people who have found each other.

"Autumn" is not the first video of the Moon, but it so happened that after its premiere on "Afisha" they paid attention to it - and this is what it led to

There are several new Russian indie pop projects that I want to list with you, separated by commas. This is Yana Kedrina (“Cedar of Lebanon”), and this is the “None of Your Business” group. Do you know something about them?

I was at the live "Cedar of Lebanon" in Kyiv, I have her favorite song, I like it. Alina, who makes all the videos for me, did the visualization at her performance. I came with her, danced cool. Alina even told me: “By the way, many people compare you with her, they say that you repeat after her.” Somewhere we do touch, but she's more electronic and underground, I'm more pop. At my concert they stand and sing along, at her place they grabbed the wheel and dance, roughly speaking. I only saw the cover of “None of Your Business” - there is a girl and a bunch of men. I saw but didn't listen. . Cover is cool.

They have an album a week after yours, and they were also asked questions: there was Luna's album with references to pop music of the 90s, now yours - what does it all mean?

Did they react well?

- They laughed it off. I think any creative person doesn't really like being compared to someone else.

And I think this is normal. As for the trend for the 90s, I did not calculate anything. People ask me if I'm afraid to stay in the 90s when the trend changes, but I'm not in the 90s anyway. It just happened. I apparently have a sense of what will be fashionable. So with the Superstar sneakers, I saw them at the vintage market in LA - no one wore them then - and I thought: “Damn, they will be fashionable soon.” And a year later they all wore them.

Have you ever cried over music?

And more than once. I am an emotional person, I take everything very close to my heart - not even criticism, but my internal processes. I wake up in the morning - and it seems that Sasha does not understand me. But not because he didn’t write a song for me, but because at the rehearsal he somehow looked at me the wrong way. But now it's easier for me - I got carried away with astrology, learning new energy sciences. This allows me to switch, because when I'm idle, I start to pin. Now I have the release of an EP and clips, four shootings in Moscow, I'm such a class. And when I did everything, then I need to occupy myself with something. Otherwise, I start to think about what it is better not to think about. Here I am crying. This is also reflected in the songs, there through the line “tears”, “my tears”. But then again, if I cry, it means I like it. And there's no getting away from it.

Louna is a Russian rock band. Some journalists call it a "side project" of another well-known rock band called The musicians themselves, however, they refute this definition in an interview. They insist that the group Louna is an independent project. The band gained popularity in 2010, when they released their debut album called "Make it louder!" Immediately, the songs of this group topped the popular "thematic" charts.

Group name

It happened, as you might guess, from the word Luna. The final touch was the letter "o" added to the title by guitarist Ruben.

Genre

The genre of this group can be defined as experimental alternative music. Some consider it to be alternative metal. The work of the group is at the junction of many styles and genres of recent times. Louna is one of the most unusual projects on the Russian stage today. In her songs, you can hear the echoes of the alternative line, which is the main one. At the same time, there are grunge notes (post-grunge - in the official version). It is safe to say that the genre to which the work of this group could be attributed does not yet exist. Therefore, it makes no sense to build analogies. The assignment to such a genre as alternative metal is somewhat far-fetched. We can consider the work of this team as an experiment that has already proved its worth. Louna has thoughtful, vibrant lyrics. They are aimed at combating various vices of modernity, including social injustice and religious fanaticism.

Composition of the group

The vocalist of the Louna band is Lusine Gevorkyan. She currently participates in 2 teams at the same time, also speaking in the Tracktor Bowling team. Today, a large number of people believe that she is the founder of the alternative vocals of our country.

The second participant is Vitaly Demidenko, who is better known as Vit. This is the band's bassist. He also competes in Tracktor Bowling. Vitaly has his own fan club.

The band's guitarist is Ruben Kazarian. In combination, he is the author of texts in English. Reuben has played in bands such as Ens Cogitans and Southwake.

Another guitarist is Sergey Ponkratiev. He has also been seen working with the two bands mentioned above - Ens Cogitans and Southwake.

Drummer - Leonid "Pilot" Kinzbursky. He is a talented drummer and a longtime fan of Tracktor Bowling.

Create a group

The creation of the team dates back to September 2008. It was then that members of Tracktor Bowling, a Moscow alternative band, Vitaly Demidenko and Lusine Gevorkyan founded this band. They were also joined by guitarists Sergey Ponkratiev, Ruben Kazaryan and drummer Leonid Kinzbursky.

In the work of the collective, the bet was immediately placed on a powerful sound, as well as on the intellectual content of the texts. Louna's songs charge the listener with energy, make him think.

First performances, first awards

On May 23, 2009, the band's first performance took place. It is considered the date of his birth. The performance took place in the Tochka club in Moscow. A young and not very famous team in 2009 became the owner of the RAMP award, having received it in the "Discovery of the Year" nomination. The rock band Louna later gained great fame in the musical environment. Louna has been a headliner at various rock festivals. In 2009 - at Extreme Girlzz Fest, in 2010 - at Metal Summer Fest" and "Neighboring World", in 2011 - at "Invasion" and Kubana, in 2012 - also at "Invasion" and Kubana, etc.

Debut album

The debut album of the group "Make it louder!", As we have already said, appeared in 2010, in the summer. Its release was made in the autumn of the same year. In the history of the team, this event was a turning point. A pronounced uncompromising social position and non-standard music provoked the interest of the general public, as well as the media. Note that the leader of "Cockroaches!" took part in the recording of the debut album. (Russian punk band), as well as Ervin Khachikyan, keyboardist of the band System Of A Down.

Growing popularity

In February 2011, the team presented the single "Who do you believe?", Made together with the vocalist of the Lumen group Rustem Bulatov. In the summer of the same year, at the invitation of the Invasion-2011 organizing committee, Louna performed on the main stage of this festival along with such Russian rock stars as Alisa, Gleb Samoilov, DDT, Kipelov, Splin, Lyapis Trubetskoy , "Pilot", "King and Jester", "Chayf", "Bravo", "Bi-2" and others.

The composition "Fight Club", included in the debut album, in January 2011 entered the rotation of "Our Radio". And a week later - and in the "Chart Dozen" (rock chart). This song rose to number two and managed to stay for 16 weeks on the chart. In the future, already in the summer of the same year, another song of the group - "Make it louder!" - reached the top of the hit parade in a month and did not give up positions for 2 weeks.

The expert council of the "Chart Dozen. Top 13" (annual award) group Louna was nominated to the final in 3 nominations - "Best Soloist", "Song of the Year" and "Breakthrough". In addition, the team was invited to perform at the awards ceremony, which took place at the Crocus City Hall on March 7, 2012. Louna won the award, winning the "Song of the Year" ("Fight Club") nomination.

Second album

The group's second album, Time X, was released in February 2012. The disc included several protest-themed tracks. In addition, the album included several lyrical compositions. In the same year, in March, solo concerts were played in St. Petersburg and Moscow, dedicated to the release of the second album. 14 new songs are included in it. The leader of the well-known group took part in the recording, as well as Alexander Ivanov, the leader of the NAIV group (which broke up in 2009) and the current Radio Chacha project.

In an interview, S. Michalok said that he likes to collaborate with musicians from Louna. He noted that the bulk of duets in rock and roll and on the stage are created when producers want to benefit from it. However, Louna is not a commercially biased project.

A new assault on the "Chart Dozen"

The song "Everyone has the right" has been in the rotation of "Our Radio" since February 2012. She stayed in the "Chart Dozen" for more than two months, reaching third place. The composition "Mama" in August 2012 led the hit parade for three weeks in a row. In total, she stayed in it for more than three months.

By June 12, 2012, the group's performance at the "March of Millions" refers. Along with the main studio activities, the recording of an English-language album is also being prepared. The band, according to the musicians, has plans to perform at the largest rock festivals, including world-class events.

"People look up" - a song that started on the air of "Our Radio" on November 16, 2012. A video was also shot for it by Svyatoslav Podgaevsky, who had previously made clips of this group for the songs "Mama" and "Make it louder".

Louna conquers America

In 2013, on January 25, it became known that the band's first English-language album would be released under the name Behind a Mask. It will be released by Red Decade Records. Mama was first played on Chicago's 95FM W.I.I.L. radio on March 22. After that, 138 Americans called on the air. About 75% of them stated that they liked the song. One even confused the vocalist Louna with the lead singer of In This Moment. The single "Business" was released on March 26, followed by a big-budget video with the same name, which was presented to Western audiences. Also in 2013, on February 24, the group's English-language website began to operate. At the same time, the track list of the future debut album appeared.

Based on the popular vote on February 24 of the same year, L. Gevorkyan was recognized as the best rock vocalist in Russia. She went around Helavis, Zemfira and Olga Kormukhina. The vocalist of the group Louna won the "Best Soloist" award, which she received from the hands of a famous actor.

The band's first English-language album was released on April 30, 2013 (Behind a Mask). It received favorable reviews in various US online publications.

A US city tour took place in the fall of 2013. Louna played shows in 26 American cities with The Pretty Reckless, a US band, and Heaven's Basement, an English band. Louna traveled 13 states in 44 days. As part of the tour, in addition to live performances, the group gave numerous interviews, performed on a Chicago radio station with an acoustic set and was received with great interest by American radio listeners. The band's songs were in the rotation of the seven largest radio stations in America, and the composition called Up There in the WIIL FM hit parade took 13th place. At American concerts, all albums and paraphernalia were sold, which indicates a high interest in the work of the band.

Album "We are Louna"

The albums of the Louna group have replenished their list on December 1, 2013 with the appearance of a new one - "We are Louna". It was recorded with the help of crowdfunding, that is, with the money of listeners. The fundraising was recognized as one of the most successful in the history of musical crowdfunding in our country. In the fall of 2013, a large-scale tour of the United States took place.

2014 in the history of the group

In 2014, work was underway on a video for the song "With You". It came out June 30th. In May of the same year, the group played two anniversary concerts for their fifth anniversary in the capital, and one in St. Petersburg. At the fifth anniversary, her friends performed with the group. Among them, Ilya Chert, Rustem Bulatov, "Cockroaches!", "Elysium", "Brigade Contract", "Prince", "Stigmata", "Fantastic" and others can be noted. There was also a documentary called "We are Louna" .

2015

In 2015, the premiere of the composition "Road of a Fighter" took place in the "Chart Dozen". The song immediately hit sixth place, and a month later topped the hit parade.

In February, the group returned to concert activity. Also, interest in it from the media increased: the team began to be more actively invited to the air of various radio stations. From January to May of this year, the group visited 40 Russian cities, covering almost all regions. This tour, which was called "Even Louder!", is by far the largest in the history of the band. Practically in all cities of this tour there were full houses. According to the unanimous opinion of metropolitan and regional promoters, Louna is currently one of the most sought-after rock bands in Russia.

On May 30, 2015, the discography of the Louna group was replenished with the collection The Best of, which included the best songs. Bonus tracks - "The Way to Yourself" and "Freedom" (acoustic arrangement). "In me" - a song included in the album in a version recorded together with D. Rishko.

On November 3, Luna performed in Moscow - a Kiev singer, about whom only the lazy have not been talking about for the past six months. The Village met with Kristina Bardash before and after the first solo album in Moscow to reflect on her phenomenon.

“Boy, you are the snow that will not be, I will prove that you are blind, like other people,” - on a chilly November evening, a thousand people in a club near Tverskaya sing a girl’s song in chorus, which was known only in narrow circles a year ago. In August 2015, Christina Bardash from Kiev posted a hypnotic clip on YouTube " Moon", and a couple of months later - a video" Autumn”, Filmed on a film camera by the singer herself, posing in the frame with her three-year-old son. Just a year later, I'm standing in a crowd of steamed Muscovites who have learned the simple lyrics from these clips from the first to the last line.

Undoubtedly, journalists helped to learn them: only in the last few months Christina was interviewed by Ivan Dorn and the editors of all important Internet sites, glossy photographers and progressive English-language magazines fell in love with her - on the day of the concert, i-D called Luna the star of the Ukrainian musical revolution. I meet Kristina in the dressing room of the Izvestia Hall club and immediately feel that she is tired of persistent attention - strict and restrained, the singer sits in front of the mirror and immediately seems to establish an invisible distance, although she easily switches to you. “I decided not to give interviews for the next six months or a year,” she echoes my thoughts. “I would like communication with journalists to remain a mutual exchange.” Ethnic music is playing in the dressing room, there are flowers and a large dish of nuts on the table, there are a couple of hours left before the concert.

Kristina Bardash is 26 years old and has lived most of them in Kiev, except for early childhood in Dresden, where her father served, and two and a half years in Los Angeles, where she lived with her husband, producer and founder in the early 1910s. the most important Ukrainian pop-label Kruzheva Yuriy Bardash. In the USA, Bardash gave birth and raised her son Zhorik - the hero of the future video for the song "Autumn". “Two and a half years did not tie me to the States,” Luna recalls. - Nothing inspired me there, I went a little crazy. But a year later it dawned on me what I learned there. The taste has changed, the style has appeared. You have not worked for two years, but only go to museums, exhibitions, fairs of vintage things, look at the latest collections. In short, you are culturally educated. Of course, traveling is very important. But in Kyiv, somehow it’s better to be creative.” In Ukraine, Kristina was engaged in photography and music production, filmed clips for Noggano and the singer Iya, who was promising at the time of her collaboration with Laces. One way or another, in recent years, Bardash has been closely associated with her husband's label, but it seems that now that the camera lens is directed at herself, she is much more comfortable. I express this thought to Christina, and she nods confidently.

Bardash claims that the name of the Luna project was fixed after he and the poetess Lisa Gottfrik composed the song of the same name from the debut album Mag-ni-ty. After meeting Christina, it seems that there could be no other name: she talks about her passion for meditation and astrology, about the four elements, the imbalance of which shortly after the first big solo album in Kiev deprived Bardash of the strength to create music for some time. “I struggled with this for a long time in personal ways that I don’t want to talk about,” she says. In the middle of the conversation, Bardash's Kyiv friends burst into the dressing room with a screech, and we will talk with one of them, the energetic mulatto Annette, outside the door. Annette says that she lives in Kyiv, works as a cook, and made friends with Luna about six years ago on the set of the video for the main project "Lace" Quest Pistols, in which Yuri Bardash filmed Kristina. “She hasn't changed at all since then. If to characterize it in one word, it is “space”,” Annette argues without hesitation.

The trail around the rapidly debuting singer Luna, woven from outer space and esotericism, low-budget VHS videos mounted on the knee, light erotica and muffled minimalist sound, could not help but puzzle critics - just think, the wife of the producer who successfully reshaped the Quest Pistols group in the Quest Pistols Show , begins to send handicraft clips to the correct editorial offices, persistently calling himself a DIY project and talking about the primacy of sincerity in his music. Luna says that she produces herself, but she does not deny the help of the team either. So, her sound producer Alexander Voloshchuk is responsible not only for the sound on the records of the Moon, but also for the songs of the 17-year-old R'n'B star "Lace" Andro, which journalists without hesitation dubbed the gypsy The Weeknd. Voloshchuk plays bass at Luna's concerts. The rest of the musicians were gathered before the first solo concert in Kyiv in May this year. There are two of them - keyboardist Andrey Latik and guitarist Alexander Karev. “Latik is the Kiev version of Johnny Jewel, who plays in The Chromatics and Glass Candy. He collects old synths, he has 12 of them, and all of them are tuned for such a sound, ”says Voloshchuk. “This is a Kiev party, everyone here knows each other. Guitarist Shurik is the best friend of Sasha Voloshchuk, continues Bardash. - When we had a meeting about the first concert, Sasha told him: “You understand that this is a serious group? It's not just a heifer." Spouse Kristina denies participation in the project, although in her community on VKontakte sometimes Yuri Bardash is also the producer of Luna.

Christina writes simple texts that settle in her head for a long time both herself and in the company of co-authors: for example, the ballad “Boy, you are snow” that ends the first album and the cold “Airplanes” were written to her by a long-familiar author who works with Lace, whose name is Christina asks not to be identified. “He suffers from a mental disorder and is generally quite a complex person, but he easily found a common language with me. Sometimes he comes and says: “Christine, give me money for medicines, and I will write a song for you?” I agree, and here we get Airplanes. Well, you heard "Airplanes", right? There is a very strong text. It could have been written by either me or him.”

Behind the scenes, Christina Bardash has an armor of managers, PR agents, photographers and cameramen. They all fuss and move at an accelerated pace - in contrast to the crowd of spectators in the hall, lazily walking past the pina colade bar. I greet every third person - journalists, photo editors, producers, creative students and just nice faces from the Facebook feed are everywhere. “I often put the Moon on my sets,” says a familiar editor-in-chief and organizer of fun gay parties. - It's going great. The last time I put on the song “Boy, you are snow”, so my friend burst into tears, walked and could not calm down. A few minutes later, Christina Bardash, in a black bodysuit and a white lace dress that compliments her elven appearance, rises to the stage, the audience roars deafeningly - and then they don’t stop singing along to the songs with the same passion that betrays what each of them played in headphones on repeat this summer.

Behind Luna there are only three big solo albums: in Kyiv - in May of this year, in Riga and Yekaterinburg - as part of the current Eclipse tour. Knowing this, you are impressed by what you see: the musicians are comfortable together, behind Christina's back, video installations in the spirit of the songs picturesquely replace each other: astrological symbols, a night highway, scenes from anime. At the end of the track “In the city of fashionistas”, Christina picks up a smartphone and takes pictures of herself and the fans on the front camera - the image is projected onto a large screen. Looking intently into the lens with his big eyes, Bardash speaks to the audience: “I know that real fashionistas have gathered here today: all the designers, all the most beautiful girls and their husbands.” The Moscow public looks at each other, not recognizing themselves in the listed strata of the population. Deliberately naive phrases either escape by accident, or echo the infantile image: “A knife hurts, like love”, “Often the outside world prevents your dream from coming true, so you have to listen to your heart” - Bardash’s real immediacy eventually reveals itself not in clips and interviews, but in random words thrown from the stage.

Closer to the end of the concert, when the center of the hall sings a new song together with the Moon, and couples inspired by romantic lyrics sway along the edges, I step back to look at the singer's merchandise - sweatshirts, T-shirts and iPhone cases. It, like any product produced by the Luna team, looks super relevant: Cyrillic font on gloomy shades and simple styles; something like this, with some discounts, would look like a collaboration between Gosha Rubchinsky and H&M, who took the cover of "A Star Called the Sun" as a reference. “She even has cool merch,” a nearby girl sighs.

After the concert, as after a successfully passed exam, Christina jumps on stage in euphoria, and then leaves, but not for long - a few minutes later an enthusiastic guy rushes past me shouting: “She allows me to take pictures with her!” Success, luck, a new victory for Ukrainian music in the country of youth, brought up on soulful pop songs about the complexities of love.

I stop by for the afterparty of Luna's concert at a popular club on Taganka. It is full, there are many people around who flashed a few hours ago in Izvestia. At the door I run into a well-known promoter and co-owner of the establishment. Talking about the heroine of the evening, he snorts: “Absolutely commercial project. Now these will begin to appear every six months. It's a pity that singers who try so much harder don't get that kind of attention. By the way, today for the first time in my life I was asked to assign a security guard to the artist. Well, I added, of course - I have three of them, they are all beautiful.

The Moon is indeed often talked about, using expressions like "commercial" and "producer project". She is compared to Lana Del Rey, the bombshell of 2012, a diva with an exquisite legend that was spread around the world by journalists, but if Lana appealed to the aesthetic spirit of the American 60s, then Luna is now described using highlights from the post-Soviet 90s and chaotic zero : Sveta and projects of Max Fadeev, Linda and the Total group, Irina Saltykova and Anzhelika Varum. Kristina Bardash herself willingly lists these and related names when she talks about the favorite music of her parents, and thinks deeply after the question about the music that is important for her from today - most likely, it's the excitement before the concert. But in fact, after a solo album in Moscow, it becomes clear that all the talk about sincerity or its imitation, about the independence or involvement of the Moon in the husband’s production center is actually meaningless: when a full house starts chorus of a song called “Sad Dance” in chorus, and men in the hall they begin to write to their ex-girlfriends, what's the difference, how many people were behind the production of the dance? The success of Luna, which was ensured by the spectacular arrangements of the people of Kiev, who listen to the Western trend better than many, the animal charisma of Christina Bardash and the infantile lyrics, which took the main thing from the songs about the playboys of Natasha Vetlitskaya and the well-aimed pearls of Ilya Lagutenko, is a consequence and continuation of the process of legitimizing music, which is somewhat years ago was considered shameful. “The breadth of all fields, the depth of all seas, the height of clouds, the beauty of your shores does not allow me to drown” - such an ideally simple and accessible sensuality was cherished by Eva Polna and Yuri Usachev; in 2016, she just needed to be given a shape that was appropriate not only at house parties, but also at the Science and Art club. Luna did it.

“It seems to me that this is a good example of myth-making,” I talk about Christina Bardash with a familiar music critic, former editor-in-chief of a notorious music publication. “It took us so long to create a myth around an artist that everyone would believe in, and finally it happened.” On November 3, on the day of the Moscow concert, Luna releases a video for the song "Knife", which illustrates her gradual departure from this DIY myth well - it was filmed by the Moscow production group Great Fruit, also not indifferent to nostalgic aesthetics, and filmed a video for the store "KM20", the fashionably revived brand of sneakers "Two balls", the festival "Swallow" and producer Lay-Far. Whose hands Kristina Bardash created herself with, someone else's or her own, her rapid rise to the status of the most fashionable Russian-speaking singer is intriguing - and it may well last as long as teenagers who grew up after the collapse of the USSR touch simple songs about parting, sung to the sound of vintage synthesizers. That is quite a long time.

“What difference does it make whether we are a commercial project or a non-commercial one? - A few days later I call Bardash and Voloshchuk in Kyiv, and we discuss the results of the tour and plans for the future. - Well, commercial. For me, a non-commercial project is the group "Ludska Like". Often musicians say they don't care about money. I love money, for smart people it's good. If they are invested in development, it only helps to achieve excellent goals. And about
90s - I don't like that we are being dragged into the past. We are not from the 90s, not from the past. I understand that there is a trend and I have nothing against it, but our music is much wider.” “This is an exploitation of the trend,” Voloshchuk interrupts Kristina. - Whatever you do, they say: “Ah, the nineties!” The revolution is in fashion, everywhere. By the 90s, everything is tied in a row now. ” “Yes, revolution. - Bardash thoughtfully completes the thought. - They don’t rotate on the radio, they don’t show on TV, and a full audience sings all the songs by heart. How so? This is a revolution for me personally. And I will continue to develop in this direction.