Recorded live

Scaly Whale
Photo by Olya Runyova

Scaly Whale is a title-paradox which Pavel Doronin uses for thinking out, recording and performing his rhythmical full-of-melodies music.

“Long ago, when I was about 19 years old, I was pondering about pseudonym for myself. I had thought about something that could make people ‘stumble’ and accidentally remembered the phrase from Pyotr Yershov’s fairytale ‘The Little Humpbacked Horse’ (‘Konyok-Gorbunok’) about ‘Marvel Fish-Whale’. As we were told in school at biology lessons, a whale is a mammal but not fish — so he can’t have any type of scale by definition. I decided to leave my whale with the scale because exactly such a kind of pseudonym can make people ‘stumbling’ and saying: ‘Nothing of the sort! A whale can’t have scale because he’s not a fish!’. And I would answer to this: ‘But my whale can have it!’.

MS-DOS tracker which I used for making music at the very beginning wasn’t able to support Cyrillic symbols — so I translated my pseudonym into English and was astonished: it looks and sounds like a wave: ‘scaly whale’, ‘~~’.”

Pavel’s desire to be oriented on live performances has come into being when he bought used synthesizer ‘Polyvox’ via a free-private-advertisement newspaper and became stronger with a buying of a groove box. Sound control without intermediation of keyboard and computer mouse turned to be fantastic experience which have shaped destiny of Scaly Whale as a music project.

While performing live, Pavel forgets about his other professions (journalist, translator, and teacher) and operates with a setup of electronic music devices. At the same time video art is showed on a screen (or on a wall which replacing it). In such a way an audience gets not only the interesting music but also rather interesting spectacle.

“Live actions allow me to get feedback immediately and to see right away: yes, my music has the influence, it makes people more joyful and happy. The best of possible conditions is when you — in a sweat, just have done your best on a stage — come out on a dancefloor and be saluted by those who enjoy your tunes, appreciates your work and thanks you for a great concert. I suppose, that is my reason to continue playing music.”

Listen to some music by Scaly Whale:

Scaly Whale - I Was a Spy and I Forgot to Tell You Scaly Whale - Ghettornado the Boxer in a Ring Scaly Whale - Planet Döner With Onion Rings Scaly Whale - Binary Cowboy Scaly Whale - Centfuchser Scaly Whale - Polar Ice Scaly Whale - Hektik Scaly Whale - Evening Streets in Downtown Scaly Whale - Asphalt Mushrooms Scaly Whale - Raketa

Released on 56 Stuff
Ghettornado (2018)
One Man Show (2013)
Igra (2011)

Ideas for Pop Producers to Steal (2020)
Halfway Bitter (2019)
Music for Eukaryotes (2018)
The Discreet Charm of Consumerism (2015)
Marginal Stuff for Genuine Dorks (2014)
Foldout (2013)
Uncategorized (2012)
Not So Easy. Less Quiet. (2011)
Easy. Slow. Quiet. (2010)
7×8. 56 Stuff Remixes Itself (2010)

Recorded live: Live at MTA Novgorod