The Bolshoi

The Bolshoi were a London-based music group prominent mostly in the mid to late 1980s. They are best known for the hits "Sunday Morning" and "A way" or "Away" (the name is interchangeable and has been noted as both on different albums/singles).

For the Russian theatre and opera company, see Bolshoi Theatre.

The Bolshoi
Background information
OriginEngland
GenresPost-punk, gothic rock, alternative rock, new wave
Years active1983–1988
LabelsBeggars Banquet
WebsiteTheBolshoi.co.uk
MembersTrevor Tanner
Jan Kalicki
Paul Clark
Nick Chown

History

The band formed in 1984 in Trowbridge, Wiltshire. The original lineup consisted of singer/guitarist Trevor Tanner, drummer Jan Kalicki, and bassist Graham Cox. Tanner and Kalicki had previously played together in the short-lived punk band Moskow, where Trevor performed as Trevor Flynn (his mother's maiden name). Early gigs supported the likes of the Cult, the March Violets and the Lords of the New Church. After eight gigs bass player Graham Cox was replaced by Nick Chown. In 1985, the band released their debut single, "Sob Story", followed by the mini-album, Giants and their hit song "Happy Boy". Word of mouth was such that the Bolshoi were able to sell out many of their early headlining performances.

The band moved to London in 1985, and their lineup expanded to include Paul Clark on keyboards. In 1986, they released their first full-length album, Friends, and expanded their touring schedule to the U.S., South America and Poland. It was followed in 1987 by the album Lindy's Party, on which the sound was more pop-oriented. TC Wall, reviewing the album in Underground magazine, described Lindy's Party as "completely confident, commercial, professional, and dangerously catchy" and "a fine album that'll be caressed for generations."[1]

Stylistically, the Bolshoi was difficult to categorize. The band has been described as a proto-goth band, similar in their live act to fellow Beggars Banquet signees, Bauhaus. Tanner was recognized for his dark, pensive lyrics that belied a social responsibility and awareness.

After the release of Lindy's Party, the band recorded a fourth album, but problems with their record label management impeded its release, and they disbanded as the 1980s drew to a close. The previously unreleased fourth album, titled Country Life, had been lost for years but has now been resurrected by Beggars Banquet with extensive help from Tanner's current record label-head and Creative Director, David Paul Wyatt Perko. This new release is now available as one of five CDs in Beggar's 5-CD box set, put out via Beggar's imprint, Arkive.

In December 2018, the Bolshoi's official Facebook page announced that Trevor Tanner and Paul Clark were recording a new album, under the name The Bolshoi Brothers.

Discography

Studio albums
  • 1985: Giants
  • 1986: Friends
  • 1987: Lindy's Party
  • 2015: Country Life (recorded 1988, released 2015)

Compilations
  • 1990: Bigger Giants (Beggars Banquet Records)
  • 1999: A Way - Best of the Bolshoi (Beggars Banquet Records)
  • 2006: A Life Less Lived: The Gothic Box (Rhino Records)
  • 2015: The Bolshoi 5 CD Box Set (The Arkive)

Singles
  • 1985: "Sob Story"
  • 1985: "Giants"
  • 1985: "Happy Boy"
  • 1986: "Books on the Bonfire"
  • 1986: "A way"
  • 1986: "Sunday Morning"
  • 1987: "T.V. Man"
  • 1987: "A way II"
  • 1987: "Please"
gollark: As far as I can tell, basically every website supports HTTPS nowadays, but DNS over HTTPS is still rare partly because of governments and ISPs being annoying about it.
gollark: I mean generally. Look at DNS. They didn't even have DNS over HTTPS or DNSSEC until fairly recently, and they're still not widely used.
gollark: Yeeees, it's weird how people didn't seem to even consider security and privacy in lots of computer things until seemingly recently.
gollark: ```2: enp0s31f6: <BROADCAST,MULTICAST,UP,LOWER_UP> mtu 1500 qdisc fq_codel state UP group default qlen 1000 link/ether 8c:0f:6f:79:3c:11 brd ff:ff:ff:ff:ff:ff inet 192.168.1.3/24 brd 192.168.1.255 scope global dynamic noprefixroute enp0s31f6 valid_lft 76132sec preferred_lft 76132sec inet6 2a00:23c7:5415:d300:8152:48aa:288d:30ee/64 scope global dynamic noprefixroute valid_lft 315359952sec preferred_lft 315359952sec inet6 fdaa:bbcc:ddee:0:8809:32c8:2206:c1f1/64 scope global noprefixroute valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever inet6 fe80::c1c0:d8c0:f52e:773f/64 scope link noprefixroute valid_lft forever preferred_lft forever```
gollark: No.

References
  1. Wall, TC (1987) "The Bolshoi Lindy's Party", Underground, October 1987, Issue 7, p. 11
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