>>127329307
Soviet union got gradually less strict with this through the 80s. But there are several things to it.
You couldn't really buy "foreign" records at a regular store, especially anything racy like punk/metal etc. was a no-no. Regular record stores only sold Soviet records, for most part. Anything "foreign" people generally got from relatives / on trips to Eastern Germany or other western republics. You wouldn't hear foreign music on radio much either. Ironically—the few artists that were somehow allowed in USSR got absolutely huge, e.g. Italian guys like Celentano / Cutugno, or Modern Talking.
So immediately, just getting access to influential Western music was a problem.
Vice versa, starting a band like Kino "officially" was virtually impossible. They'd get censored to hell. They'd have to get good gear somewhere (Soviet instruments were obviously terrible and outdated), record albums, sell them, play gigs. They couldn't really do it "officially".
While in the 80s the government didn't police music THAT hard, there was still an unspoken "social credit" system in the country. This meant that if word got out that you played in a band like Kino, many social doors would be immediately closed for you, and though you wouldn't get thrown in jail, there'd be enough pressure on you otherwise—threatening your job, education, general life perspectives, or those of your parents, etc.. Basically, you'd become a black sheep of the society.
Finally, we got it relatively easy in the 80s, but we almost didn't. At one time, we almost got a leader who was a KGB guy, who wanted to crack down on everything. He passed away rather quickly though. Got replaced by Gorby, who basically was the opposite, wanted more freedom for everyone. So Tsoy and Kino got very, very lucky we had Gorby when they peaked.
