Bone Music

Bone Music: Soviet X-Ray Audio Stories of the secret underground Cold War-era Soviet music subculture that distributed forbidden music on used hospital x-rays are revealed in this book. During the Cold War era, the songs that Soviet citizens could listen to were ruthlessly controlled by the state. A secret underground subculture of music lovers and bootleggers defied the censors, building recording machines and making their own records of forbidden jazz, rock 'n' roll, and Russian music, cut onto used hospital x-ray film. Foregrounding interviews and oral testimonies gathered over five years bring to life the stories of the original bone bootleggers, their customers, musicians, record collectors, and commentators. The book delves deeper into a forgotten era when being a music fan could mean a lengthy prison sentence, or worse. Richly illustrated with dozens of new images of Soviet x-ray discs and sound letters, Bone Music details how the bootleggers worked, outlining the technical precedents of their techniques. The true rebel music was that of forbidden Russian emigres, gypsy romances, and criminal tunes: the soul songs of a society brutally cut off from its culture. This book presents a spirited resistance to a repressive culture of prohibition and punishment, revealing a wealth of compelling new detail about this fascinating era in Soviet history.