The future is upon us

The Narkomfin Building is home to deep secrets and terrible stories, traces of the utopias and catastrophes of the twentieth century. In this special edition of the radio show, Samoe Bolshoe Prostoe Chislo (SBPCh, The Largest Prime Number) will explore archive testimony and criminal cases connected to the building at 25 Novinsky Bulvar.

"It would probably be more accurate to call this work an audio installation. With the help of music and voice we tell the story of the Narkomfin Building. It is not a logical narrative, more of an attempt to express the horrors of the 1930s in a building that was considered a model for the future. What happens when the future erases everything in its path? We would like to give the listener a feeling of how dreams are destroyed, how the state pulverizes those it lauded yesterday, how the future comes to an end."

The work uses materials prepared by Oksana Polyakova and Darya Bobrenko (Garage Field Research).

Cover: Moisei Ginzburg and Ignaty Milinis, 2nd Building of the Council of People’s Commissars, internal view of corridor of Type F apartments. Illustration from Moisei Ginzburg’s book Dwelling.

Bio

Samoe Bolshoe Prostoe Chislo (SBPCh) has long been on the Russian-language indie scene. In its 17-year history, the group has changed line-up many times and recorded 16 albums, overcoming an incredible labyrinth of genres: post hip hop, ambient, IDM, indie pop, and much more. Today, SBPCh is frontman and author of lyrics and music Kirill Ivanov, vocalist and co-author of lyrics actress Evgenia Borzykh, and sound producer and bassist Stanislav Astakhov.