Пилигрим

The band PILIGRIM was first formed in 1975 by students of The Moscow Automobile and Highway Institute (MADI), as a Deep Purple cover band. That early line-up included Andrey Kovalev on bass guitar, and lasted less than a year. In the beginning of 2005, Andrey Kovalev reorganized PILIGRIM. The new line-up included Andrey Kovalev, Alexey Iovchev, Alexander Noskov, Dmitryi Sosov, Andrey Pristavka, Iraklyi Choladze and Alexander Losev. All music and lyrics were written by Andrey Kovalev. The band’s first concert was in May 2005, when PILIGRIM played at the opening of “The Bike-Show” in Pushkino near Moscow. The bikers’ crowd was very appreciative of Kovalev – known on the biker scene as “Arkadich” – and his breakthrough performance. During the next two years, PILIGRIM played several shows in Moscow, took part in major local rock-festivals – “Nashestvie-2005”, “Emmaus-2006”, “Emmaus-2007” – and travelled to the Czech Republic for the international “BASINFIREFEST-2007”. PILIGRIM also became a staple of the “SLAVA ROSSII” (Hail to Russia) festival held in Moscow, Oryol and Nizhny Novgorod, with their song “Slava Rossii” becoming the unofficial festival anthem, commonly performed with the audience singing along. In September 2006 PILIGRIM released their debut music video for the song “Piligrim”. The video was directed by famed clip-maker Alexander Solokha, and was followed by videos for the songs “Na linii ognya” (On The Line Of Fire) with the band Master, “Slava Rossii” (Hail to Russia), “Ne Demon, Ne Angel” (Not a Demon, Not An Angel), “Khischniki” (Predators), “Moy nerozhdennyi syn” (My Unborn Child). 2007 saw the release of the band’s first studio album “Slava Rossii” (Hail to Russia). In January 2008 PILIGRIM launched an extensive tour of Russia, during which the band will play in 100 Russian cities. That year also brought new musicians to the band, forming the current line-up: Andrey Kovalev – vocals Alexey Strike – guitar Alexander Karpukhin – drums Igor «Bach» Moravskiy – bass-guitar Pavel Vetrov – guitar Yuri Plekhanov – keyboards The band’s sound is now much heavier, keeping up with current trends. PILIGRIM is now on tour with a new concert program, while also working on their second album, scheduled for release in September 2008.