In a sign of the growing rejection of the regime of Russian President Vladimir Putin and his brutal war on the toilers in Ukraine, support has continued to mushroom for the St. Petersburg street band Stoptime.
The group — 18-year-old Diana Loginova, a pianist and music student at the Rimsky-Korsakov St. Petersburg State Conservatory; guitarist Alexander Orlov; and drummer Vladislav Leontyev — became known across Russia when in August the St. Petersburg news outlet Bumaga posted a video of them performing a cover of “Eto bylo v Rossii” (It was in Russia), a hit song by exiled Russian singer Monetochka. “It was in Russia so it was a long time ago. But they can’t steal this dream, it will stay with me,” the chorus says. It has been viewed on social media more than half a million times.
In an interview with Bumaga, Loginova, who performs under the name Naoko, explained why Stoptime plays songs that take on Putin by artists in exile, like Monetochka and Noize MC, who Moscow has blacklisted as “foreign agents.”
“If I feel that a song has a message and the author was able to convey a feeling of love,” then I want to perform it, Loginova said. “Right now, art is the only language — at least in Russia — through which you can express what you think.”
In September, Marina Akhmedova, a well-known pro-Kremlin spokesperson, complained online that the trio announced their upcoming street performances “almost as if they were rallies.” State Duma member Mikhail Romanov, a member of Putin’s United Russia party from St. Petersburg, called for government action against the group after seeing a video of what he called “teenagers jumping around to the songs of foreign agents.”
The Stoptime trio members were arrested, convicted of blocking a subway entrance and sentenced to two prison terms of about two weeks each time. They’ve been threatened with further prosecution.
Support for anti-war musicians grows
This provoked an outpouring of protest inside the country and abroad, especially among young Russians. Posters calling for their release and other protests have appeared on the streets of St. Petersburg, Moscow, Yekaterinburg and elsewhere.
House concerts, street performances and protests abroad in support of Stoptime are sprouting under “Music is not a crime,” #FreeStoptime, and #FreedomNaoko. More than 6,500 videos of their performances have been posted online, using the Russian hashtag “svobody naoko” (freedom Naoko).
In a public act of defiance, dozens of people lined up at the Russian Presidential Administration’s reception office in Moscow Oct. 25 to sign a petition calling for the band members’ release. The petition was initiated by Yekaterina Duntsova, a former TV journalist who ran as an anti-war candidate in the 2024 presidential elections, before Putin had her candidacy disqualified.
A picture of people signing the petition was run in the Moscow Times and other opposition media. It was accompanied with a close-up of a signer’s backpack that was adorned with a big “Free Stoptime” slogan in Russian as well as a peace symbol, and a number of buttons, including one saying, “Give peace a chance.”
An online petition calling for the release of the band members gathered over 47,500 signatures.
After Loginova was arrested, she announced she and Orlov were getting married, saying the guitarist proposed to her in the police van.