Cover photo by Jerry Hsu. That’s a gypsy kid who tried to pick
Jerry’s pocket in Moscow. When Jerry caught him, the kid attacked.
 VICE MAIL
Letters - The Russia Issue
Long Live Krewson, Can Anorexics Eat Crow?, Fart Contest, the Colon's Broom, Support the Islanders, Kind of Missing the Point, It Never Fails..., Huh, What?, Know Your Enemy, Facial Hair Inquiry, Kentucky Fried Moron, Free to Be You and Me...READ MORE |
  BRIBING WITH BLUE JEANS
Bartering at the Velvet Rope
Just how valuable ARE a pair of old black Levi's 550s and a fresh roll of Kleenex-brand two-ply toilet paper to today's deprived Muscovites? I recently hit the fanciest nightclubs in town to see how far I could get on the real cultural currency of 1980s Russia...READ MORE |
 OVER THE COUNTER HABITS
A Brief History of Getting High in Russia
St. Petersburg's drug situation was always better than Moscow's. In fact most of the "fast" shit (ecstasy and meth) was produced in "Peter" and distributed to Moscow for double the price. St. Pete resisted cheap smack when it first hit about ten years ago, but...READ MORE |
 GROSS JAR
Being a hippie without relegating yourself to the dregs of utter dirtbagness is kind of a tricky area. If you're a guy in high school and completely surrounded by jocks and dogmatic straight-edgers, it's fine to take a year or two off to dabble in acid and not...READ MORE |
 RUSSIAN COCKTAILS
What Can't They Drink?
"In America, you drink vodka. But in Soviet Russia... vodka drinks you."
-Yakov Smirnoff, comic genius
Russians as a species are disappearing from this planet faster than Chilean sea bass. With a mortality rate comparable only to that of Afric...READ MORE |
 BORN TO RUN
Why Do Russians Always Leave Russia?
ARTIOM, 19, STOCKHOLM
Vice: So you left to avoid the Russian military?
Artiom: Did you hear about the guy who lost his legs and his dick? This is how Russian military service works: It's mandatory, and it's basically one year ...READ MORE |
 SKINEMA
By Chris Nieratko
RUSSIAN BRA BUSTERS
I never really grasped what they meant when doctors said people who lose a limb often feel a pain where their arm or leg once was. It didn’t make any sense to me. How is that possible? I always thought it was some sort of cry fo...READ MORE |
 TIDBITS
A Monthly Look At Things We Love - The Russia Issue
THE RUSSIAN ROAD RUNNER
You can learn a lot about a culture from its cartoons. This 1969 classic is the Russian version of the Road Runner. It's called Nu Pogodi ("Just You Wait"), but instead of the Wile E. Coyote character coming up with elaborat...READ MORE |
 FUCK KATRINA
DJ Chicken Does Dallas
Hurricane Katrina was a total disaster and everything but for some of the people of New Orleans' projects, who are used to dodging bullets while slanging yay and shocking out to jittery 808 beats and O.T.T. synth-driven hip-hop, Katrina was nothing. In fact, t...READ MORE |
 GAMES
Black & Marc Ecko's Getting Up: Contents Under Pressure
BLACK
This game expertly preys on the fantasies of all devoted gamers. No, we don’t specifically want to be black-ops guys with ninja clothes and guns from the future and shit. It isn’t about the equipment or the clothes, man. It’s about the lifest...READ MORE |
 LITERARY GULAG
A Writer's Retreat Behind Bars
Edward Limonov is the leader of the National-Bolsheviks Party, a radical left-wing movement that was outlawed by the Russian Supreme Court, but which has emerged as the leading opposition to President Putin. The NBP's membership numbers in the thousands (see t...READ MORE |
 BIBLE BASHERS
What's With The Maccabees?
Sometimes, you'll know a British band by how they make something poetic out of their experience of living in the UK. It could be Blur's Britain, or Pete Doherty's Albion, but you'll usually notice that their songs find some way to romanticise what is essential...READ MORE |
 THE VICE GUIDE TO RUSSIA
An A-Z of the World's Biggest Country
(A)-AZITHROMYCIN)
Russia is poisoned. It's poisoned from shitty old cars running on leaded 76-octane fuel and it's poisoned from decades of Soviet waste. Its capital is the largest city in Europe and the most polluted. The weather is usually raw, c...READ MORE |
 OUT THERE
Everybody likes to jaw on and on about indie rock and indie labels and indie magazines and indie rap (that's the worst indie), but what about indie distros? There are tons of them and they never get anybody saying, "Hey, I really like you guys. You guys are OK...READ MORE |
 RA-RA RASPUTIN
Is The Favourite Sons' Favourite Russian
The Favourite Sons are the reason Ken Griffith isn't currently mopping vomit off the floor of a Brooklyn drinking hole. After Irish noise-pop demi-gods Rollerskate Skinny split in 1997 he decided to have one last go with Kid Silver before opting to live out hi...READ MORE |
 VICE FASHION - MAIL-ORDER BRIDES
The real Russia is in provincial cities and towns like Tver, where we found these girls. They are all members of a local bridal agency (tverromance.com) and would like to marry you. There's no guarantee you'll hit it off but the bright side is, unlike American...READ MORE |
 GRIMEWATCH
With Roll Deep being kicked off Rinse FM, Essentials splitting up and my quest to become grime's own JT LeRoy moving as swiftly as Sharky Major's career, I was ready to file this month under "WASTE"....READ MORE |
 VICE PICTURES - JERRY HSU GOES TO RUSSIA
The Russia Issue
Photos by Jerry Hsu
"I flew into Moscow alone. After the 14-hour flight I got to stand in an immigration line for three hours while hundreds of Russians cut in front of me. They are the world's greatest cutters...READ MORE |
 FULL METAL TORTURE
Rape in the Red Army
Over the recent New Year's holidays, Private Andrei Sychyov's superiors tied him to a chair and beat him continuously for hours and hours, taking breaks only to sustain their drinking binge. When it was over, Sychyov was told not to say a peep. He didn't compl...READ MORE |
 RUSSIANS YAWN AT DEATH
Few countries can boast a death count as high as Russia's in the 20th century. Twenty million were killed by Hitler and Stalin each, and millions more were lost in the Civil War, WW1, and the Famine. During the 1990s, an estimated seven million Russians went t...READ MORE |
 RECORDS
Music Reviews - The Russia Issue
DJ ELEVEN AND SPITKICKER PRESENT THE BEST OF M.O.P.
Spitkicker
They used to be the dopest but they haven't put out a good song in a while. Signing with 50 is suspect. They look like bozos on that roster next to Ma$e. But we'll see...READ MORE |
 VICE FASHION - TRUE RIGGERS DON'T PLAY
The Russian Rap Fan's Life
Photo by Masha Bekish
And you thought wiggers bad. At least some of them have met a black guy before and could kind of identify with what it's like to be poor and shat on in America. But Riggers? They're worse than Japanese Rockabillys. What the fuck are ...READ MORE |
 DOOMS DAY METAL
Does it make any sense to even try to explain what has gone wrong with Death Metal? I see you scratching your bleached hair going "Huh!? Metal still rawks man!" Well, let me begin; Fuck you all. Fuck you all, and look deep into the face of Satan's Metal! Not t...READ MORE |
 WHORES ON WHEELS
Moscow's One-Stop Shopping
Moscow is awash in whores. They come to Russia's capital, the lone island of wealth in a Eurasian ocean of wretched poverty, from all over the former Soviet Union.
If you've got wheels, you can cruise the hundreds of outdoor whore markets, each of which b...READ MORE |
 ELECTRIC INDEPENDENCE
"Vodka for Russians is like a warming water. When it's cold you have to drink a glass of vodka to feel warm-I don't drink vodka to get drunk," says Alexey Orchensky, the 20-year-old Russian genius behind Amen Orchestra, whose breathtaking debut album, 17 Waves...READ MORE |
 LITERARY/I WANT MY DVDS
Book/Movie Reviews - The Russia Issue
Marzo, Rag, A Year in the Life of TheManWhoFellAsleep, Apples and Olives, Unknown White Male, The Devil & Daniel Johnston, Nick Broomfield: The Early Works...READ MORE |
 VICE FASHION - HOMESICK
In 2004 Chechens took siege of a Beslan school and killed and injured up to 1.000 people. There are about 1 million street kids in Moscow, infant death in Armenia is 36 to every 1.000 (in Scandinavia it's 4) and procreating close to Chernobyl is risky for the ...READ MORE |
 DRUNKY MONKEY
Freezing at the Zoo
In Russia, it isn't just prison inmates who go without heat. One million homeless kids get in on the freezing-their-fucking-balls-off action too. Christ, during the Russian winter, people who keep their cell phones pressed to their heads for too long find them...READ MORE |
 WUSSIAN WABBITS
Art With Floppy Ears And Fluffy Tails
Nathalia Edenmont is a 30-year-old Russian artist who has been bashed by literally everyone for the crime of making of art with dead bunnies. She gets hate mail from militant vegans, Nazis, and even regular people who say things like: "That's not art!" And all...READ MORE |
 PLAYSTATION PIRATES
Russian Home Entertainment
Russia is one of the world's largest pirate markets for electronic media. From music and DVDs to video games and software, Russia is ranked right up with world-leaders in piracy China and Indonesia. Fake shit is sold everywhere here, from underground walkway s...READ MORE |
 TB IN RUSSIA
Like Ticking Time-Bombs?
Tuberculosis is a contagious disease that spreads through the air just like the common cold. Someone with TB can cough or sneeze and infect others (10 to 15 people a year on average) with the bacteria known as bacilli. Getting the bacilli does not necessarily ...READ MORE |
 RUSSIANS IN LONDON
A Blight on Blighty?
Dasha is a 19-year-old Economics student and the only child of a media tycoon from Moscow. With a Hermès Birkin collection that would make Paris Hilton piss in her panties, Dasha loves to blow her family's cash. But she's not a fool about it: Dasha owns shares...READ MORE |
 DUBIINA BOX *
Tuning In Russia
Fuck, Russian TV is bad. It takes "so bad it's good" into entirely new realms. The best (worst) of Russian TV is so utterly abysmal that it's completely amazing. Here are the worst (best) shows that it has to offer. ...READ MORE |
| |
