Pyotr Mamonov

Pyotr Nikolayevich Mamonov (, ; 14 April 1951 – 15 July 2021) was a Russian rock musician and the frontman of the Moscow band Zvuki Mu. Early life Pyotr Nikolayevich Mamonov was born on 14 April 1951 to an engineer and a translator of Scandinavian languages. During his childhood, he lived on Bolshoi Karetny Lane. During his teens, he would dress as a stilyaga and often got into fights, one such incident resulting in a scar across his stomach (which can be seen in the film Igla, which he starred in over 20 years later). Mamonov's parents separated in the mid 1950s and his mother began a relationship with Nikolai Bortnichuk, also an engineer. This relationship resulted in the birth of Mamonov's half-brother, Aleksei Bortnichuk, on 13 July 1958. His first band was a cover band named Express, who were active in the mid-to-late 1960s and early 1970s, playing covers of popular rock bands such as the Beatles, the Rolling Stones and Led Zeppelin, although Mamonov himself preferred black R&B, soul and rock 'n roll music. During the 1970s, he suffered from depression and worked various jobs, including as a boiler operator and Norwegian translator (he learned the language from his mother). He lived with the artist Olga Gorokhova between 1979 and 1981. Gorokhova stated that Mamonov would listen to a lot of Weather Report's music during this period. Zvuki Mu In 1982, he began Zvuki Mu. The name originates from a series of affectionate names beginning with the syllable mu which Mamonov and Gorokhova would call each other, though the earliest occurrence of the name Zvuki Mu occurs in some of Mamonov's poetry from the late 1960s. Between 1986 and late 1987, he wore a moustache – it can be seen in images of Mamonov from that period, such as the images inside the booklet of the compilation Mamonov '84–'87.