The Long Way Home: When Soviet Rock Met the West

About this episode

The episode features a discussion with producer Steven Lawrence about the remastered documentary on Soviet rock legend Boris Grebenshchikov and his journey to the West during Glasnost.

In this episode of She's All Over the Place , I had the wonderful opportunity to sit and chat with the producer, Steven Lawrence , to explore The Long Way Home: Remastered and Expanded (2026) Michael Apted's long-lost documentary about Soviet underground rock legend Boris Grebenshchikov and his extraordinary 1988 journey from Leningrad to the West during the early days of Glasnost . Filmed at a moment of rare optimism inside the USSR, the documentary follows Grebenshchikov as he records an album with Dave Stewart (Eurythmics), alongside Annie Lennox, Chrissie Hynde, Ray Cooper, and Crosby, Stills & Nash, becoming one of the first Soviet musicians to collaborate openly with Western rock stars. Remastered in 4K with new 5.1 sound and expanded with a newly created epilogue, the film now brings Boris's story up to the present: his disillusionment with post-Soviet Russia, his outspoken opposition to Vladimir Putin's war in Ukraine , and his eventual exile from his homeland . We discuss the film's disappearance for more than three decades, its rediscovery through MoMA's Film Preservation Festival, and why The Long Way Home now feels less like a period piece and more like a warning, a…

People in this episode

Host: Chonacas

Guest: Steven Lawrence

Topics covered

• Soviet rock
• documentary
• music history
• Glasnost
• censorship
• exile
• cultural exchange

Keywords

• Soviet rock
• Boris Grebenshchikov
• documentary
• music
• Glasnost
• censorship
• exile
• MoMA
• collaboration
• Vladimir Putin

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: MoMA, Museum of Modern Art

Books & works: The Long Way Home: Remastered and Expanded, The Long Way Home, documentary

Places: Leningrad, Russia, Ukraine

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