It's Only Rock n Roll with hosts Phil Blizzard & Russell Mason

Back in The USSR - Pink Floyd & flying a rock tour on an army plane

• Phil Blizzard + Russell Mason • Season 1 • Episode 3

Share episode

Phil Blizzard and Russell Mason joins concert producer Jacek Slotala for a hands‑on journey taking us from Polish postcard singles to Pink Floyd’s sold‑out Moscow shows. 

This fascinating, incredible story is told by the fixer who cracked Gosconcert and flew tours on army planes. We share how food, language, and nerve turned red tape into roaring crowds without a single lyric censored.

A postcard single pressed in 1960s Poland. A phone that never stops ringing. And a plan bold enough to fly a rock tour on a Soviet army plane. This conversation pulls back the curtain on how Western music crossed the Iron Curtain, from jam‑packed Leningrad halls to Pink Floyd lighting up Moscow without a single lyric censored.

We trace the path from Pagart, Poland's state monopoly, to the first real breakthrough: Wishbone Ash in Leningrad, chosen for taste and temperament. Food, not lights, became the make‑or‑break factor, so the team toured with a portable kitchen, UK‑trained Polish chefs, and pallets from West Berlin. Those breakfasts backstage did more for morale than any rider. Then came a bigger swing: assemble a new band, the Lost Empires, and barter shows for flight hours to reach Siberia. Gear lashed into an Antonov, crew in army seats, and a bucket with a lid for a loo—proof that ingenuity beats infrastructure when the music matters.

The Pink Floyd chapter is a masterclass in production under pressure. Fifty‑six trucks replaced by cargo jets, a customs bridge to win crucial hours, and a last‑minute hotel wipeout solved with roubles and relentless door‑knocking. When national mourning paused a show after a tragic explosion, the band added a makeup date at the end to keep faith with fans and still make Helsinki. Along the way we meet interpreters who could silence police, legendary road crew soldering mid‑tour, and the caterer who trained a generation. No propaganda, no grandstanding—just the quiet power of concerts to ease tension and make strangers sing the same chorus.

We also look at milestone tours that reset expectations: Procol Harum reopening Poland, Tina Turner building her Private Dancer comeback from bare floors, and how language, respect, and precision got Western acts invited back. 

If you care about live music logistics, cultural diplomacy, or the sheer stubborn joy of making the impossible run on time, you’ll feel right at home here. 

Press play, subscribe for more untold tour stories, and leave a review with the wildest backstage fix you’ve ever heard—what would you have done in that Moscow hotel scramble?

It's Only Rock and Roll is a Phil Blizzard Radio Production - for your production email philblizzardmedia@gmail.com

SPEAKER_00:

Welcome to our latest edition of our Rock and Roll Podcast. We love it, don't we, Russ? Well, it's a big one, it's a big one in so many different ways. We've got big bands, we've got big logistics to try to get equipment across Europe behind, would you believe it, the iron curtain using aeroplanes aircraft. So who we got on the show today, Russ?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, we've got my old friend Jacksy Latala, who's sitting in uh Warsaw, Poland, and uh I had the privilege of uh working with him or helping him a little bit, not as much as probably I should have, but uh back in the day um it was 1989, and uh it was Pink Floyd in Moscow. Uh and this is pre-Klasnost or just around Gorbachev's time when it was still pretty shut. And um Yatsek was instrumental in bringing a lot of bands, uh Western bands, to the Soviet Union, and uh uh with the ultimate one being uh obviously Pink Floyd. Um before I think I said 10 nights, uh my memory escapes me, but actually it was five nights. Uh and uh 11 nights was it? Okay, there you go. Anyway, I'd like to just introduce Yatsik. He's uh he's got lots to say and lots to share with us, and we're really excited to talk to you Yatsik because uh you know we sometimes as we get older we become a little bit more nostalgic about these things, and we look back and think, how the hell did I pull that one off? So welcome, Yatsik, and um tell us a little bit about please how that all came about. How did you start doing and promoting artists behind the Iron Curtain?

SPEAKER_03:

I I could say it's a very simple story because my uh my aunt, my my mother's cousin, uh she was very entrepreneurial. And back in the 60s, can you believe, she came up with an idea of actually printing postcards with singles, one-side singles of current hit, knocked off mainly from uh radio and then the author's rights and uh publishing rights and stuff like this was completely ignored at that time. But what it made, it actually uh was allowed by the current regime in Poland as a kind of a uh safety fuse that young people hadn't access to the same thing as the as the Western music, uh as the Western uh uh young people had, more or less. Obviously, the other one was uh just jamboree, uh uh uh autumn festival in Warsaw that is until today going on, and it's a it's a very important event in Poland. So so basically, I I was I had an access to music, I loved music, and I still love music. You don't stop loving music, and this is how it all started. And then when I um when uh I got to university time, you obviously want to make some more money, and there was a Polish institution called Pagart that uh they had a monopoly in import and export of music, and uh they uh on a part-time uh terms they they hired me to advise and to uh um translate when the empresarios were coming uh to Poland and uh they were trying to organize some concerts and stuff like that. And this is how I got involved, and this is how it started. He offered uh some groups for uh in Poland for Turing, and it was convenient for Brian, as you know Brian very well at the beginning, because I was paid by Pagart and he didn't have to pay me, but I was his go-for.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, we know Brian well, but I tell you, I think we both agree that um uh Brian was very good at getting the axe, and you were very good at executing the logistics and doing the rest, which is actually really absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

Brian was great in in he had a fantastic relationship with the agency and and the other other providers and managers and agents of of uh of the um of artists, and uh he was good in arranging that. Then I was very good in actually working with artists uh on the ground on the tour because they always had a term their tour manager, uh, but later, actually, when we really developed very well, they didn't even bring their tour managers because our tour managers were up to the standards and even a little bit more. We we even bought uh a kitchen, uh a portable kitchen, which we ordered in in states to to tour with us, and uh that was my that was my part of the of the deal. Brian was getting artists, I was marketing them with Ghost Concert or Pagard or any other agency, and we were doing that.

SPEAKER_00:

So you were making things happen on the ground by the side of it, yeah. So and I I guess in uh those days trying to achieve what artists would like when they're on the road. You know, you mentioned about the kitchen, they want good food, they want comfortable hotels. How were you able to uh satisfy those demands of those artists when touring Russia?

SPEAKER_03:

That was a problem, yes. Uh obviously when we were touring in uh when when when we had concerts booked in Moscow or in uh in Leningrad at that time, today St. Petersburg, it was not that complicated because they had kind of uh umish international standard uh hotels, and they were let let me put it that way, there was not nothing to be lavish as the the rock stars were uh accustomed to touring in Western Europe, but they were acceptable. But they were acceptable. The biggest problem was actually food and and and eating, so this is why we had to buy uh we had to buy our own equipment, and the first thing that we installed in the hall was always kitchen and catering, and uh we had two chefs from Poland uh trained in the UK, and uh and everyone was very happy, they got very good uh uh notes, and uh they really liked the food. Everybody was sort of even at certain stage we had people coming for breakfast uh to the hall because they they liked the food that it was prepared there. We were shopping in we were shopping in uh in Berlin, in West Berlin, and bringing it and trucking it all all the way to uh to Russia.

SPEAKER_02:

Winding back a little bit, obviously, um in Russia it was slightly different. There was an organization called Goss Concert. Yes, and obviously you moved from Poland into Russia because I I guess you saw it as another potential, well, huge market, massive market. I mean, the Soviet Union was just huge. And uh when that happened, uh what what were the first bands of note that you you you introduced there? And I think the tours were quite long, weren't they?

SPEAKER_03:

Uh it wasn't that easy, Russell. It wasn't that easy. You you may not remember that it took me almost three years because I it was my idea, because Brian focused on uh eastern bloc countries like Poland, East Germany, uh, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, uh, sometimes Bulgaria, but very rarely. Uh and that was his focus. He he he was afraid of going into Russia, Soviet Union at that time. I, in the meantime, I graduated uh university, uh, I read law there, and uh, you know, my my perspective and my understanding of Soviet Union was that something is changing there. Pierre Stroika and uh Gorbachev was making lots of changes, he was opening up in many areas, so I said, well, one of the areas that they have to open up is culture and uh and start the exchange. Uh so I convinced Brian and he said, Okay, let's try. And uh I actually moved more or less uh to London, and from London I was going uh to Moscow to try to convince Ghost Concert to allow us to bring Western bands. And my door opener was a Polish gentleman, Richard Korzyc, who's who passed away a few years ago, who was the main uh booking agent for Polish bands in the Soviet Union, because this is what was allowed within the Soviet bloc. The exchange was quite uh quite large, and the Soviet artists were coming here, and Polish and Czech and German, and there was a lot of exchange, but Western, very in Eastern Europe, the Westerns were coming, but to Soviet Union, no. So uh I was trying to break that, and I thought that these people, they're young people, they are hungry like we were for good music, for something that they hear over the radio, or they they get smuggled, some tapes and records and stuff like that. So I thought there must be a market and we have to open it. We have to bring what we have here, we have to bring it to the Soviet Union. And I I I met beautiful people there, absolutely beautiful people, some good journalists that were helping me. There were some very good people, but I couldn't break for two and a half years, I couldn't break Ghost Concert because I was sort of badly rooted into people that were only concentrated on Eastern bloc music. But finally they were saying, well, you know, this guy, don't go, never go to this guy because he is uh there for political reasons, he doesn't make any decisions, and you know, he's very much against Western culture. And it was Mr. Kisielov, who was the deputy director of Gosconcert. And I said, Listen, this is my last time I'm going to Moscow after two and a half years. I go talk to the guy straight. So I went to him, he says, Oh, I see you here for quite a long time. What are you up to? And we started to talk because I spoke Russian and I took classes of Russian to learn and be able to communicate with these guys in their language because they somehow felt intimidated by the fact that somebody speaks English to them and they do not speak well English. So I prefer to speak broken Russian because that gave them this privilege of actually correcting me. And they say, Well, you know, great that you made an effort and you speak Russian. No one of those guys uh from uh UK or US spoken Russian, so I was the only one that represented the British uh company, Baruchy, and spoke Russian. So therefore, I went to this Kiselov. They were saying he's political, he's KGB, God knows who it is. Doesn't matter. But he said, so what do you want? I said, Well, we've got bands. This is the list of bands, and this is what we are trying to do. Concerts, he said, so which one you would do first? So I looked at the I looked at the list and I said, Wishbone ash. Because this is something that these people understand here, and they they know this music and they like it. Young people like it. He said, Do you think so? I said, Yes, I spoke into the journalist. Whom do you speak to? I told it to the journalists. He said, Well, good people, yes, they understand. Okay, go to London. Let me think about it. So I went back to London, and by the time I got back, there was a telex. If you remember, we were communicating telex from Ghost Concert saying, We're buying 10 concerts in uh Leningrad of Wishbone Ash, and this is how it all started. Okay, so this guy that for two and a half years I was told don't talk to him because he is the obstacle, he actually uh solved the problem within he was the door opener. He was he opened the door, yes. He was the brave guy who said, Yes, I want the Western music to try to break into uh Soviet Union as it is today. So so you had success. It was a great success, phenomenal success.

SPEAKER_02:

You had um uh Wishbone Ash. Um, I mean I work with Wishbone Ash. I remember Steve Upton was uh was the the drummer. I I I knew him quite well.

SPEAKER_03:

Great guy, absolutely fantastic guy. I remember long evenings at the uh Polkowski Gastinica Hotel when we were sitting and talking.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, Steve was a great guy, absolutely and and also um the guitarist I can't remember both guitarists, Laurie Wisefield Jamie Crompton, yeah. Jamie American guy, yeah, and then yeah, the guy who went to play with Tina Turner in the end, Lori Wisefield or whatever, later on. Maybe he wasn't on that tour, he was later on, but anyway, great band, nice guys. Um, so how long was that very easy going, very easy going. How long was that first tour, Yatsen?

SPEAKER_03:

It was 10 concerts only in uh uh in in Leningrad. Oh, okay, okay. So how did Leningrad and uh and and that time we didn't have catering, we we didn't know what what is the biggest problem, what is the biggest issues. We we were learning. This was a the the brilliant thing is that we chose Wishborn Ash because these guys were easygoing, understandable, they were real, perfect to work with. Brian obviously was not convinced that it will go on because uh he wasn't sure whether the wishbone ash is uh is is something that um you know it's not a one-off, and he didn't want to invest at that time. But later we uh uh we started doing other acts and it it went very well. It went very well.

SPEAKER_00:

Must have been a really big learning curve that first series of dates in one location. That obviously helped with it being in one location, not having to embrace logistics of going across the country. Exactly. How did you follow that?

SPEAKER_03:

Um, I don't remember whether this was wish that was precious Wilson or Smoky, but one of them I can't remember the the sequence, but uh we did Precious Wilson.

SPEAKER_02:

You did Susie Quattro.

SPEAKER_03:

Susie Quattro was later, Precious was first.

SPEAKER_02:

Uh and and you created you created your own band as well. Do you want to tell us a bit about that? The Lost Empires. That was later.

SPEAKER_03:

That was later when we did Smokey, Susie Quattro, Bonnie Taylor, uh Status Quo, everybody. We couldn't think because you know uh the market at that time in um in Soviet Union, it wasn't Russia yet, it was Soviet Union still, was uh rather uh very complicated to cater. Why? Because for instance, they didn't like soul music at all. You know, we we proposed uh uh Stevie Wonder. I'm sure Stevie Wonder would do perfectly now. Well, but then they said, Well, not really, this is not our type of music, you know. So it was very difficult at a certain stage, and um uh uh Jamie Crampton from uh Wishbone Ash, I stayed with Stephen and Jamie. I stayed in touch. Uh and and Jamie said, Listen, I would like to tour in Siberia. I said, What you what are you talking about? I mean, logistics to get you to Siberia, it's a mission impossible. I I he says, Listen, I want to go to Siberia and play music. These people also want music, and and he sort of intoxicated me with that idea, and we started talking. He was in LA, he had uh uh his girlfriend that I don't know whether he'd married or not because I lost touch with him, unfortunately. Uh, but Jamie was in LA and so enthusiastic about coming back and and going, and and I said, So whom would you do? He says, I can go solo with a Russian band. I said, nah, nah, nah, nah. That won't work. Um, that won't work. Why don't we put together a band? He says, I can put together a band very quickly. So uh he started, we started talking about it, and uh we did uh um eight track uh eight-track recordings, and we did four video recordings uh of the band. They wrote music, original music, and it it turned to be uh a good music and and a brilliant band. And uh uh I proposed this to Ghost Concert, and I said, listen, this is an upcoming band in US, and uh we will uh they will be a huge hit. I gave the tape to uh Melodia, which is their record company, they issued I I don't know, I think two or three million records, uh, and all of a sudden uh the TV started to play the videos, and they uh and Ghost Concert uh uh uh wanted to do a 100 concert tour, including Siberia. But because the Ghost Concert was actually afraid to about logistics and stuff, I said, why don't we fly the equipment? You have this huge planes and stuff. He says, No, the planes are uh uh uh uh uh they exclusively are run by the army, and then so I had to go and speak to the army general uh to actually try to arrange the plane. So we started Bargain. He said, Okay, I'll give you the plane for two weeks, but you have to uh play 10 concerts for the army. I said, No, no, no, two concerts for the army. He said, No, no, no, five concerts for the army, and we finished with uh, I think four concerts for the army, and we we had it for over two weeks, I think 15 days, a big plane where we put the equipment, sound equipment, light equipment, everything in, plus the people uh in the army seats, so you can imagine how it was, and the bucket is a toilet with a lid, but for and say let me finish. And the the only the the the fantastic thing about it is the the name of the band. The name of the band was The Lost Empires. We name it The Lost Empires. I still have uh uh a tour jacket that for me, which says the Lost Empires, uh uh Soviet tour.

SPEAKER_02:

Wow, wow, that's a collective item. Um, I I something cropped up there where you were saying about them them wanting to desperately wanting to go to Siberia. What they feel what they could have done, the easiest route to that would have been put a placard against the government in Red Square, they would have gone very quickly, no Yatsing.

SPEAKER_03:

Ah, I tell you something. In a red square, when uh when uh this German guy landed with his plane, uh, we wanted to do uh Michael Jackson. But unfortunately, uh unfortunately, uh in a red square, we got permission uh from the mayor of uh and later the president of the um of Moscow to do it. We started actually planning, and uh the uh crowd control company from London they said has to be free concert. We were ready to do it, but unfortunately, the local Pepsi Cola uh representative said, no, no, no. Uh in Moscow, people will pay three thousand a thousand dollars for concert for Michael Jackson. So it's it can't it doesn't have to be free concert. Uh and Brian and myself, we took a decision that we're not gonna take a risk if specialists for cow control are telling us not to do this as a ticketed uh um uh uh venue, so it has to be a free concert, and um we pulled out, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_00:

I just had a thought there regarding what Russell was saying about doing a protest in uh Red Square, and uh okay, behind the uh Iron Curtain in those days, you know, we know stories about the KGB and all the activities going on. Did you feel you were being spied upon, especially you know, you got a plane off the military and uh flying a uh a hairy rock band across the country? What was it like? And did you felt you were being sort of spied upon and every phone call was being monitored and those sort of activities?

SPEAKER_03:

Well, look, uh yes, there was a lot of protest, we we had a lot of political mingle and and stuff like this. We tried not to get involved, we tried never comment that we were we were sort of agnostic about uh you know being uh a cultural ambassadors of the West. Yeah that that is it. We we we never got involved. We obviously had uh very uh let's say let's put it this way, very dubious uh interpreters who hardly spoke English, but they were interpreters touring with us and with our bands and and solving the problems with police when whenever they occurred when the band, for instance, got frustrated, they couldn't speak to their wives for a week, they couldn't be connected on the phone uh with their wives in in the UK. And in in as a part of their rage, they threw the TV set out of the window, and then police intervened in the middle of the night. And it turned that I had to take one of those dubious interpreters who didn't speak good English but uh was very effective in action. They went to the police, and police immediately released the guys because uh she was probably higher ranking or anything like that. Those guys obviously we were surrounded, we were surrounded.

SPEAKER_00:

So your guys throwing TV uh out of hotel rooms were from the school, uh the Keith Moon rock and roll show.

SPEAKER_03:

I'm I'm I'm sure that was the case. Yeah, um, the boys were uh I I think everybody was sort of paranoid about it that they're being listened, they're being watched or recorded. Uh so we never had a major accident or uh a major incident in uh in that. And uh we basically tried not to get involved in politics. We were trying to give the young people in Soviet Union what they wanted at the moment from the West, a bit of uh a feeling that they are part of the rest of the world, they are like the rest of the world, they do uh they listen to the same music and they have access. You know, when they when we made uh the the uh status quo concerts in in Moscow because they didn't want to tour, and uh it was such a huge success because they all were singing aloud the same music, same thing, same thing happened with Floyd.

SPEAKER_01:

So fascinating insight.

SPEAKER_03:

That's what it was. It was a part it we gave them what they wanted, and I think that uh this uh sort of uh made it easy also for the for that time regime that there was less maybe tension because that tension was uh was eased up by the concepts available, which we made it happen to.

SPEAKER_00:

Yeah, fascinating insight behind the scene.

SPEAKER_02:

I don't know if you remember Yatzek, you obviously do, because you used to provide them for us. Uh it used to work both ways, used to provide them with artists, but um Simon Walton and I working in the Gulf, we used to get artists from you, uh like the Bolshoi Ballet and uh the Lithuanian ballet and uh the Red Army choir and all Cossacks and everything, and um uh because they wanted much needed dollars from us. Uh but I uh talking about this KGB thing, I remember when we used to get the list of personnel, we used to it was spot the KGB guy because on the list he had some stupid designation that made no sense at all. It's like, yeah, he's the guy, and all the dancers, of course, all the young guys on the crew were chasing all the ballet dancers, but um they were very aware that this one guy or two guys on the tour were keeping an eye out, you know, and there was all this sort of cloak and dagger thing in our mind about, you know, but uh quite quite interesting. We we were we were uh aware of it and made a thing of it and had a joke about it, but uh it worked the other way as well, you know.

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, absolutely, because uh you you know, like Boris Barishnikov, who who on the tour of Balshoi when they were in New York, he he he defected and few of these people defected earlier. And I think that these uh KGB agents were there to make sure that no nobody does it again. Yeah, yeah. But I think that the optimism at that time when we were working with them, the optimism within the country of Soviet Union that something is changing, that uh Gorbachev gave it to them a hope that they are opening, that something is changing, uh, made it less uh uh uh less possible that they would be defecting because there is no better place than home. So and I'm talking and I'm talking through my personal experience of talking to these people, and uh and this is what they were saying to me. This is not the time to defect, this is time to wait for changes. Yeah, um, just moving on. And we gave them that hope.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, you did. Um, just moving on a little bit then, Yatzek, which I think a lot of our listeners, uh, you know, especially Floyd fans, would want to really know how did the Floyd thing come about? Um, how difficult was it to that was a big fish to hook? And uh was there reluctance? Was there you know, what what were the you know the early stage early stages we can get Floyd and you really made it happen? Can you tell us a bit about that?

SPEAKER_03:

Yes, um it was my idea because um the the the thing was that uh Pink Floyd was the band, not Rolling Stones, not Led Zeppelin, not Black Sabbath, but the Pink Floyd. They were the band in Soviet Union. Maybe when I think and talk to several journalists and uh and friends among young people, their wall album uh was very symbolic for them. Breaking that wall was this is probably the message that they were getting and taking it through the nation and through the society. Uh and I said to Brian, Brian, can we do Floyd's? They are on a tour. He said, No, this is too big. You know, Brian, this is too big, we can't do it. I said, Listen, I are you mad, man? What are you thinking? Yeah, yeah, you sound like Brian. You're mad. You don't mad what you're talking about. You don't know what you're talking about. Yeah, you leave you leave the artist to me. I said, Brian, I can do it. I have a team of people that can do it. No man, I said, talk to whom you have to talk to. Uh, to the the agency was booking the uh the whole tour. And uh, and they said yes. Was that Pete Pete Wilson? No, no, no, no, no. What what what was his oh no?

SPEAKER_02:

He was Harvey Goldsmith. What was his thing?

SPEAKER_03:

It was Harvey, Pete Wilson was Harvey. Uh then he's still ahead of the agency, uh, just slipped off my mind at the moment because I wasn't dealing that much with him, it was Brian's uh Brian's responsibility, anyway. And they said yes. So when they said yes, Brian got excited that he can get a good deal. So he got a good deal, and uh he said logistically it's impossible. But since we already done the lost empires and we had the army plane uh once, so now Arthur said Arthur Matikyan, who was the uh import department, uh said, listen, it will be much easier for me to get the plane to because logistically to travel from uh from Athens to Moscow by trucks, 56 trucks, which this was their equipment. I remember still this very well. Um it would take probably uh about 10 days. It's impossible. So they said, no, why don't we set one of the Antonov? We put everything into the Antinoff, we send a plane for people, and uh and that's what's gonna happen. And everything I seem to remember you had two of them.

SPEAKER_02:

Massive. Um I I just to interject, sorry, Yatsik, just to interject there. My job that you very graciously gave me coordinate the airport. Yeah, the the the bump in and the bump, the the load in and the load out. Yeah, and so I spent 48 hours on the airport in Moscow on the on the track.

SPEAKER_03:

Sorry, but you were part of the success. You were part of the success.

SPEAKER_02:

No, but the the the interesting thing is at two o'clock in the morning, you see some very interesting nationality planes coming and loading up some very dubious looking boxes um to go back and fight their wars.

SPEAKER_03:

So yeah, there's another history connected with this, you know, another history connected to this. Because normally what they do, they did the customs clearance at the airport. And if you remember, there was no customs clearance for very one reason. For very one reason. When the plane was landing with the uh with the band and the crew, um a man from the Goss concert came to me and he says, Yatzek, there are there are two messages for you. One is good, the other is not that good. I said, Give me the not that good. He says, We're short of 100 hotel rooms in Kotel Russia because there is a political rally uh that was called in the last minute in Moscow, and all the uh uh deputies and all the uh uh uh members of parliament and everybody went work came today to Moscow, and they have uh priority to stay in the hotels. So we were knocked out, a hundred rooms were knocked out, and we are short 100 rooms. Wow. I I got wear pants and I said, What can I do? I said, What's the good news? All concerts are sold out. Uh I turned around, I looked at my I because I had a personal driver who wasn't connected with a Ghost concert. I met him through the network, and uh it was an Armenian uh uh Georgian Armenian guy, uh very, very, very dedicated and very honest, very good guy who always holds some amount of cash for me in rubles that I didn't want to leave in the hotel. And I said, Bring me the bag. And I took four interpreters whom I trusted, and I said, You take that bag, you go to the hotel, knock at every fucking door, whoever it is, if he's uh a member of parliament, minister, I don't give a shit. Just go there, knock at the door, give him 100 rubles, and tell him to get the fuck out of here. Uh he said, 100 rubles, you're crazy. Maybe 20. I said, give him 100 rubles. I want to be well at that time, 180 rubles was a monthly salary. Wow. So 180, 200 rubles was a monthly salary. So what I so what has happened then within three hours, I had my 100 rooms. They took the 100 rubles and they went to another hotel somewhere on the outskirts of Moscow, wherever, you know. But I had my 100 rooms, but I had another problem. They already used these bloody rooms, and there was not enough people to clean those rooms.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh gosh.

SPEAKER_03:

So and I here I was less generous. I gave okay, give those ladies 20 for each room to do it immediately. So they cleaned up the rooms, everybody, but I needed time, I needed time. So what I did, I went to the customs office in Sherabietyvo, and I said, guys, I give you 50 tickets, but we will do a customs bridge. Russell will load everything into the tracks, you seal it, goes to the venue, and you do the customs at the venue. 50 tickets? Yes, you have it. So we're doing this. Why I needed it? Very simple. Then I went to the band to uh what was his name? Robin, right? Robin, the the the tour manager, Robin, whom I knew from previous arrangements, and I said, Robin, your guys cannot go to the hotel because they have to be the customs officers request that everybody is with their equipment, which was bullshit. But I needed them in the hall, not in the hotel, because the hotel was not ready. So they were not very happy with this, but they stayed with the customs, and then each guy that was released by the customs went to the hotel where they had already a room. Gradually the rooms were adding up, and and in the morning they were all ready. It was hundred rooms, so you know that was missing. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

So that's the 4,000 hotel, huh? Sorry, the 4,000-room hotel that was that doesn't exist anymore.

SPEAKER_03:

Doesn't exist, yeah. But yeah, yeah, yeah. Thank god, they thank God they pulled it down and they built something else, but anyway, uh, you know, and we had lots of problems, and Brian came there as well, as you know. So I I I was looking for Brian to help me with something, and then you know, I woke him up at 11 o'clock in the morning, and he in his uh pyjama opened the door and says, What is it? What is it? Well, why are you walking? What why why do you? I said, Listen, we have a tour. You said it's you said it's important. Yeah, but you cover it. No, no, no, leave me alone.

SPEAKER_02:

That sounds like the Brian I know.

SPEAKER_00:

I've got I mean, it's amazing aspects to uh putting shows on the road there. I think you've got two middle names now, Mr. Innovation and Mr. Cultural Diplomacy uh connoisseurs. Incredible insights there. I'm just wondering, going back to the Pink Floyd and their massive show, you know, they had the flying pigs, they had planes crashing. Um political undertones were their performances. Was there any pressure on you to say with the band they can do this or they can't do that? That's got to be taking out any sort of uh censorship involved? Sorry, didn't I didn't hear you very quickly? Was there any sort of regarding Pink Floyd in the shows? I mean, the uh show huge production, so that's another story. But in terms of the music, the messaging they were put out, very political. Was there any um pressure on the band to censor what they were performing, what they could say? Nothing.

SPEAKER_03:

There was no pressure, there was nothing as I remember. Uh, I think the daughter of Gorbachev or Gorbachev himself came uh to the concert. The uh the critics were phenomenal. There was no pressure of what they were performing, what they were saying, what they were doing. Uh there was no uh no pressure whatsoever. Uh there was something else that if you remember, Russell, uh, there was a tragic incident, uh, accident in in Siberia. Uh was a chemical factory blew up, and uh there was a train coming with children from a holiday camp uh passing by that, and that train was affected by that explosion, and there was a national mourning in the country, and one day we couldn't play the concert. And uh David uh Gilmore and uh the band, I spoke to them and I said, guys, we can't play, we have a one day off because of this and that. Unfortunately, the tickets will have to be returned. And I said, No, I will talk to I will talk to Robin. Robin will talk to the uh to uh to the crew, and we will talk to crew to put it at the end, and that will shorten their packing days, uh, which time packing time that they have, but they will squeeze that and we'll make it in time for Helsinki because the next gig was in Helsinki. And uh and they did it so that one missing day that was a national mourning day, they put at the end of it as uh to replace that missing day to not disappoint people.

SPEAKER_02:

So uh they were received very well, and uh I think I think that was uh I think that was an amazing gesture on behalf of absolutely.

SPEAKER_03:

I I think David never had chance later to speak to him, but it was his immediate reaction. He didn't have to think twice, you know. It was he's he was saying just yeah, he said Yatek, don't worry about it. What I have an idea what we do, we speak with Robin and we will do it uh at the end.

SPEAKER_02:

And talking about talking about um just while I think about it, Yatsek, about Robin and the crew. Um, as you know, I only had stuff to do at the beginning and at the end, and in the middle, I used to just come in to eat food. And in fact, I only ever saw the first half of the Pink Floyd show on the first night, and the last half on the last night. Fantastic show, and I love Pink Floyd, but I I only ever used to go to the venue to um have my have my lunch or whatever, and um I remember, I don't know if you remember this guy, he's a bit of a legend in sort of road crew um uh history, a guy called Andy Ledbetter. Now, Andy Ledbetter, I knew from because he was always on the big tours. And Andy Ledbetter was a guy who you called a boffin. He would he would sit at the side of the stage, he'd usually have a soldering iron in his hand, and you'd see him there at all these big, big concerts, and you know, that hi Andy, what are you doing? What are you mending now? Sort of thing. You know, you'd always be mending something. And uh I he told I remember in Moscow, because I was bored, I went over to the stage. I saw Andy, oh Andy, how are you doing? And he told me a story which I never forgot, which I thought was hilarious. He told me that uh I said, what are you mending? He said, Well, he said, um, he said, uh, I'm doing this and this. He said, but he said, I'll have to let you into a little secret. He said, it's not always like that on these tours. Now he was a guy in those days that used to used to command£2,000 a week, which was a lot of money in those days, um, because he was brilliant. He was he was a he was a mad professor. And he said, he said, yeah, he said, well, I've been on tours before where I've nothing to mend. I said, really? I said, but you that's all right. He said, well, he said, um, he said the the the most famous one was the last wings tour, which was in about 1981. Paul McCartney and Wings uh with um uh you know his his first wife and stuff. And he said they used to come in for sound check every day. And Paul used to say to me, he used to say to his wife, he'd say to Linda, oh look at look at that Andy, always mending something, he's there with his soldier iron, what a great guy, you know. And he said he was paying me two grand a week for it. He said he didn't realize that the whole tour, I didn't mend one thing, I was designing an alarm system for my house. And they all thought he was mending stuff for the band, but he wasn't, and he was getting paid. Yeah, yeah, he designed a new alarm system for his house. So good old Andy.

SPEAKER_03:

But anyway, yeah, so yeah, it was the other character, the other character on that tour was the guy who ran uh eat to the beat.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03:

The catering that was actually that that was a legend in in uh in uh the geordy guy. Sorry, was it the guy from Newcastle?

SPEAKER_02:

Yes, the Jordan guy, yeah. I'd done several tours with him as well. He's very fun.

SPEAKER_03:

You know, he he actually he actually trained our chefs, and uh and they were they were big fans of him because he said he he had a technology of actually preparing catering for bands that they are always happy, yeah. Yeah, yeah. And it did a bit, he he had 120 people to feed, plus guests and everybody else. So amazing.

SPEAKER_02:

Uh I I remember the I remember the loadout with all the trucks that we had to load quickly and get them off to Finland. I remember that, uh, but I also remember fondly, you were so busy, Yatik, but you were so gracious, you used to write I never seen the whole concert. No, I I used to come to your suite, you used to allow me to come to your suite, and it was chaos. You were ringing and shouting at people in Russian and and that, but the and and but you you'd put your hand over the receiver and say, help yourself to some Russian champagne. And I used to come and drink, and in those days, my palate wasn't so so sophisticated. That Russian champagne was amazing.

SPEAKER_03:

It was pretty good, yes. It was pretty good, and then um, you know, I will I will never forget that uh once uh I had a I was in Russia on one of the tours, I can't remember what it was. Um I had a birthday, 10th of August, and on 10th of August, uh I I I like the caviar, the the the Russian caviar, and then they say you will stop liking it. We have a surprise for you. I couldn't why what will happen? And they brought a big ball, but I mean big ball, about five kilos or maybe more of caviar. I said, Well, that's for today. What about tomorrow? They started to laugh, but you know, the the the crew, the artist, everybody, and it was really gone that day. It was my birthday, you know. I I think the Russians, the Soviets, they really appreciated what what I've done that I managed to convince the the authorities and everybody else that they should allow a Western music and a Western style of concerts.

SPEAKER_00:

So, on that note, I'd like to ask you something. I mean, you've achieved so much in culture exchange between the West and uh Soviet Union. What do you think was your biggest achievement? And to go along with that, what is perhaps one of your fondest memories of all that hard work you put in?

SPEAKER_03:

Um, it's very I I'm thinking about it now. It's difficult to say. Obviously, Pink Floyd was from a professional point of view uh something that I will always prize as a big achievement. Yeah, but in terms of uh emotion, you know, at that time I was so busy as as Russell uh brilliantly uh uh described, and I was so much involved. I'm a perfectionist by nature, so everybody everything has to be done perfectly, you know, everyone, everything has to be neat and you know as it is. Um I think one of the biggest things was my my first tour ever uh that I was asked to do for for uh for Pagart in Poland was Prokol Harum and Gary Brucker, which I think at that time it was after uh 1968 Rolling Stones Concerts in Warsaw, which I was as a kid attending that uh paying uh uh a bribe to a guy who let me in from the back door and and I I went to see this. And then then it was in uh in the 80s, the first uh western band again allowed in Poland, and that was a very big uh very big achievement that I managed to to put the whole tour together and work it well, because again, it was like you know, Soviets were not prepared for that, Poland was not prepared for anything like Rapilharm. We did 15 concerts around Poland, and and then the second thing that the third thing would be probably the tour of uh Charles Alsnaver, uh, because he was uh he was such a great guy and uh a phenomenal person, and to make him happy and to make people understand what he is doing and seeing people appreciating that, it was brilliant. It was very good achievement, and then last but not least, I think it was uh Tina Turner's return into stage. Uh and we did a warm-up tour and the main uh main uh rehearsals in Warsaw in Torvar when she was coming back with Private Dancer tour before the release of the record yet. And uh uh we we sold almost like 90% of tickets only for those, but we managed to do two uh videos for the television, but also for the management of Tina to see what else they have to fix, what else they have to uh correct. Uh we did this in Warsaw, we did that in Katovice in Prague, and I think she went to Middle East as well, right? You you you had her. She did. Yeah, exactly. So so uh I think that was incredible because she came without even a backline, without PA system, without backline, nothing. Logistically, that was very difficult as well. Because we had to provide everything but she needed, but she was a phenomenal artist. I mean, phenomenal person to work with. She never complained. She never she she she would be saying, Yatzek, take it easy. I can work with this. Don't very good. I can do this, I can do that. You see, I need two hours more because the girls need to, the backing vocals need to rehearse. Please hold the people in the hall. You know, she was uh she was a human artist, if you know what I mean. Phenomenal artist. So I live Pink Floyd, Tina, Prokol Haram, and Charles Navu. This is my this these are my biggest achievements.

SPEAKER_00:

Fabulous insights. I know this podcast theme is back in the USSR, but let's stay with your home country at the moment, Poland, because very important time, a lot of changes. You alluded to a few there. Solidarity and your relationship at one stage with the first Polish president of solidarity, like well and say so you well, you became an advisor to him? Rock and roll or culture or what?

SPEAKER_03:

Yeah, I was um yeah, funny that you say that. Um, nobody remembers that. I hardly remember that. Yes, um, you know, I I was invited by his um minister for economic development uh to uh uh a group of advisors, and I was advising to the uh president's uh president uh for about six months to his office. I was serving to basically to to his office. Um and then I understood like few of us that were doing that that politics is not for me. I mean, I'm a straightforward person. I'm a I'm a perfectionist and I I like to do things where they are with work. What I do not only is appreciated, but it makes sense. In politics, it's not exactly that. So it wasn't for me. Uh, and among other people, uh, I also resigned after about six months.

SPEAKER_02:

So so Yasek, um, I I have to share one thing with you. Uh, you probably don't remember telling me this, but I was quite impressed when you told me when I met you about 20 years ago, and you said, Oh yeah, I I was I was at one point I was an advisor to to uh uh Lech Ruenza, and I was like really impressed with this. And I said, Well, why do you give a job like that up? And you said, Well, I was advisor, but you never took my advice, and I found that really quite funny. And I that's what I said. No, that's what you told me. And and and I had the opportunity in Qatar of working with a minister, a lovely guy. Um, and uh on my business card, I had advisor. Uh, it was to do with events, and I was his advisor. It was for National Day. And uh one day I went into his office and I said, Oh, uh, I need to I need to get some new business cards. And he's like, What are you busy? What are you bothering me with? Just ask my secretary. What do you? I said, No, no, no. I want to change my my designation. And he said, What do you mean? I said uh he said, What do we call you now? I said, advisor. He said, Yeah, what's wrong with that? It's a good title. I said, Well, you never take my advice. And I got that from you, Yatsek. And and and he and he and he did a double take. He did a double take, and then he he burst out laughing. He said, Come on, he said, What do you want to be called? I said, Well, call me a consultant. I said, because you always consult me. Um, but I mean you give my advice. Exactly. So he said, he said, sure. He said, get out of my office. So it was it was that's from you, Yatsik. Bless you for that. That was a great one. Oh, nice. And um, I I'll just share one. Good that I good that the the the the that you took my advice. Yeah, I took your advice, yeah. Um, I must just share one thing which is totally uh off on a tangent, which we Phil will tell you we go off on tangents all the time, which you'll you never knew knew about. But um I was touring the Gulf and Brian, it came, it was coming up to Christmas, and uh Brian said, Do you go to Q8? I said, Yeah, we're gonna I'm going to Q8 next next week. Or um, I can't remember what what act it was with. And he said, he said, there's a Louis Vuitton shop there. He said, I want to buy a briefcase for Yatek. And I said, Really? He said, Yeah, he said, they're quite expensive. He said, just he said, just buy it out the float. And I said, Okay. So anyway, I I wander into the Louis Vuitton shop, never been in one before, just a farmer boy from the south of England. I don't know what a Louis Vuitton is. I was absolutely horrified that this briefcase is probably 5,000 or 6,000 pounds now, 10,000 even. It was a thousand pounds. I think it was 1100 pounds. I was like, wow, it was nearly all my float and a little bit more. So anyway, I bought this briefcase, I brought it back, and it was Christmas time. And I was going off for Christmas and I put it under my desk with a little uh and I told Brian, I said, uh, you know, the the briefcase under my desk. He said, Oh, well, I'm I'm not I'm not around. I'll I'll I'll pick it up. Anyway, over over Christmas, the office was broken in two. And and your and your briefcase was stolen. And and and and Brian made me pay for it because I hadn't officially given it to him.

SPEAKER_00:

Oh oh I had to wait.

SPEAKER_03:

I had to wait. I had to wait too much. This briefcase is um it's connected with Pink Floyd, funny enough. Is it yeah, because when when I was convincing or working on convincing Brian about the um doing the Pink Floyd and going into big acts like that and Stones and Floyd and thing, he says, When you if you do the Pink Floyd, you get a Louis Vuitton best briefcase from me as a gift. You're not gonna do it. He he risked that. Yeah, but I had to wait for the insurance. So when I did it, he had to find a way of buying it cheap.

SPEAKER_02:

No, but he I had to wait for the insurance to get my money back. Yeah, good old, good old amazing, amazing, amazing, amazing. Anyway, uh Yatsik, what a what an amazing thing. I mean, I got in touch with you a uh a a while back, a few weeks ago, whenever it was, and we had a good old Natter. And I did say to you, as you get older, you get a little bit nostalgic. And we've spoken on this podcast to a lot of uh people who say the same. I mean, Jake Duncan in the tour managers once was saying, you know, I look at my shelf and I see all over the last 55 years, all the tours I put together, and I've still got all the itineraries. And I think, was that me? Did how did I do that? Where did I get the energy from? And don't you think like that sometimes? It's it's crazy the things we used to do because it wasn't as easy as it is now, for sure.

SPEAKER_03:

Look, absolutely, absolutely, I do, but I uh know i morphed into it somehow because what happened when when we finished touring when when when soviet union turned into russia and when the different um groups of interest started to be interested in culture that we actually developed in the concept uh life and venues they we we developed they were coming to to speak to me and to brian you know we will look after you you give us 10 and and we basically escaped we left it because we didn't want to get involved with uh local uh uh mafia or however you want to call that uh groups of interest um i i turned my interest into poland and and i built uh uh a first record company in private record company in poland then i turned into digital recording for classical music and uh it gave me a lot of pressure in terms of uh um meeting deadlines and and you know producing music i i produced over 100 records and it was it was a great time in in the meantime i also did the j walter thompson in central europe and i i was uh i was running that uh as well so uh i had a lot of things to do and you know when i finished something it i close the book it's a red book it's the book that i have already read but i feel nostalgic about concerts especially now when my my uh my daughter had married uh uh uh a guy that is he's uh camille my my son-in-law is a very good and gifted musician uh and he does concerts and he die recordings and uh i support him as much as i can if you need me if you need me obviously but you know all artists they have their egos and they are fragile so i i i try not to step in too much but uh but this is uh but it it it also gives me that vibe that i had you know a recording studio a concert that he's doing great guy great music that he does uh and uh i'm still in touch plus uh at the back you don't see this but i've i've got 5000 cds and and about a thousand black records i i still listen to the music i'm i'm still up to the speed on getting old if you're asking me russell if i'm getting old i'm not no no no i'm just getting old but not old on on that note of being in touch and a final question from me before we wrap things up i would really like to thank you so much for spending your time with us and all those insights have been fascinating and brilliant brilliant but as russell said things are a lot easier now when it comes to touring putting on big shows and even though you're sort of perhaps removed from it but still in touch I mean you're removed because you're so busy doing other things and you said you closed the book has there been anything over the 10 last 10-15 years a show production which is really impressive which you felt oh I would love to have been involved with that yes yes uh I've seen phenomenal phenomenal concerts of you two in Stockholm I was invited by the uh promoter uh um uh in Live Nation who actually they stepped into uh Central Europe um uh and Todd who is a great guy he's doing phenomenal work uh and he uh he put up shows he's from time to time he's inviting me to the concert because he knows he appreciates the fact that he actually took over my my crew even uh so uh um I got invited to Stockholm for their concert and uh it was such a phenomenal such a complicated show where they had two stages uh fantastic and that was and this is this was something that I said oh I wish to be a part of that yes and I and and and always uh and always when I uh have a chance to go to the Rolling Stones concert uh I I love stones that's my favorite band uh I always uh very uh uh always think why didn't we do the stones why didn't we do the stones I like I I like that very much energy on stage on the stones phenomenal I've seen them a few times so anyway once again for me thank you very much indeed for joining us on this podcast to uh say as well and a nostalgic and there was a pleasure talking to you guys thank you very much a really nostalgic trip back what over 30 years yeah yeah to you mate yeah thank you yet i i i don't want to embarrass you um but i'll say this for our listeners uh benefit phil's benefit um i've known you a long time and we're obviously periodically bumping into each other again and stuff but what I would say through all your achievements and they are absolutely incredible I mean CEO of J Walter Thompson in itself is amazing you know advisor to the prime the president of Poland the you know pink Floyd and all the other things we've spoken about but you've never lost that nice approachable touch and that's something I'm on a human level I'm really appreciative of um I feel if I turn up on your doorstep uh you'll always offer me a cup of tea and we'll have a chat and we'll pick up where we left off and don't lose that don't lose that because you're a great thank you very much thank you very much but I think I got it from my ancestors and our history of our family going uh back from the time that we've been crushed it in 1435 oh dear dear don't don't don't give me a history lesson you'll lose me but uh appreciate it so much and we'll we'll keep in touch huh take it easy please stay in touch bye bye thank you very much radio production Google and all the podcast and also on YouTube