Konstantin Evgenievich Kinchev (Panfilov) (russian: link=no, Константи́н Евге́ньевич Ки́нчев (Панфи́лов); born December 25, 1958) is a Russian rock singer, musician, frontman and the main songwriter for the Russian rock/

hard rock Hard rock or heavy rock is a loosely defined subgenre of rock music typified by aggressive vocals and distorted electric guitars. Hard rock began in the mid-1960s with the garage, psychedelic and blues rock movements. Some of the earliest hard ...

band

Alisa Alisa is a female given name, a version of Alice in used in Russia, Finland, Estonia and other countries. Notable people with the names Alisa and Alissa include: Alisa People *Alisa Agafonova (born 1991), Ukrainian former competitive ice dance ...

Biography

Born Konstantin Evgenievich Panfilov in Moscow, Soviet Union, he took his grandfather's surname for his stage name ''Kostya Kinchev''. When Kinchev was a 15-year-old, he heard heavy metal band

Black Sabbath Black Sabbath were an English rock music, rock band formed in Birmingham in 1968 by guitarist Tony Iommi, drummer Bill Ward (musician), Bill Ward, bassist Geezer Butler and vocalist Ozzy Osbourne. They are often cited as pioneers of heavy met ...

for the first time. After that he decided to collect musical albums of hard rock bands of that time. In the mid 1970s, before joining

he played in some local Moscow-based bands. In 1984 Kinchev made the decision to leave Moscow and move to

Leningrad Saint Petersburg ( rus, links=no, Санкт-Петербург, a=Ru-Sankt Peterburg Leningrad Petrograd Piter.ogg, r=Sankt-Peterburg, p=ˈsankt pʲɪtʲɪrˈburk), formerly known as Petrograd (1914–1924) and later Leningrad (1924–1991), i ...

, where he was offered to become Alisa's vocalist. The band's lineup was finally completed in December 1984, when new vocalist Kostya Kinchev and guitarist Petr Samoylov joined. Their debut album Energia was released by state publishing monopoly

Melodiya Melodiya ( rus, links=no, Мелодия, t=Melody) is a Russian (formerly Soviet) record label. It was the state-owned major record company of the Soviet Union. History Melodiya was established in 1964 as the "All-Union Gramophone Record Firm ...

and sold more than a million copies. In 1987, the newspaper Smena accused Alisa's leader Kinchev of

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

propaganda and worshipping

Hitler Adolf Hitler (; 20 April 188930 April 1945) was an Austrian-born German politician who was dictator of Germany from 1933 until his death in 1945. He rose to power as the leader of the Nazi Party, becoming the chancellor in 1933 and then ...

. Kinchev filed a suit for

calumny Defamation is the act of communicating to a third party false statements about a person, place or thing that results in damage to its reputation. It can be spoken (slander) or written (libel). It constitutes a tort or a crime. The legal defini ...

and moral loss compensation. After the year-long court process the magazine published a refutation. Alisa's next album was titled Article 206 part 2, a chapter ("Hooliganism") of the Soviet Union Procedural Code, alluding to this process. Kinchev was baptised in 1992 after a series of concerts in

Jerusalem Jerusalem (; he, יְרוּשָׁלַיִם ; ar, القُدس ) (combining the Biblical and common usage Arabic names); grc, Ἱερουσαλήμ/Ἰεροσόλυμα, Hierousalḗm/Hierosóluma; hy, Երուսաղեմ, Erusałēm. i ...

, and since then Christianity has been the main influence on his alignment and his lyrics. Since the late 1990s his lyrics mainly dealt with Christianity, Russian patriotism, and Slavic unity. Kinchev has good relations with the priests of the

Russian Orthodox Church , native_name_lang = ru , image = Moscow July 2011-7a.jpg , imagewidth = , alt = , caption = Cathedral of Christ the Saviour in Moscow, Russia , abbreviation = ROC , type ...

. Kinchev's fairly conservative religious-patriotic shift was viewed unfavourably by some old fans that liked Alisa for their original "rock" message. Still others are put off by his

antisemitism Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

– among other things, he has referred to the Protocols of the Elders of Zion as a credible source.Архив RS. Константин Кинчев: «Демократическая система голосования порочна по своей сути», 2005
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References

1958 births Living people Russian Orthodox Christians from Russia Russian-language poets Russian rock singers Russian male singer-songwriters Soviet songwriters Soviet male singers 20th-century Russian male singers 20th-century Russian singers {{Russia-musician-stub