When Molchat Doma (literally “the houses are silent”) formed in 2017 in Minsk, Belarus, nothing indicated the band would go viral, find a home in California and embody the doom of the international social media generation – all while remaining unrecognized in its own country.
Their sound, described as cold, danceable post-punk built on drum machines, seems time- and place-specific – the Soviet ’80s in Eastern Europe. Yet it proves to be universal.
Vocalist Egor Shkutko, guitarist and drum-machine architect Roman Komogortsev and bassist Pavel Kozlov were catapulted to fame due to a 2019 YouTube “doomer music” compilation. Soon they were discovered by TikTok users. Their 2017 debut album S krysh nashikh domov (From the Roofs of Our Houses) was recorded on an old laptop before they had a studio or a label. Three years later, with their hit “Sudno,” they are no. 2 on Spotify’s Global Viral 50 and no. 1 on the U.S. chart.
Four albums on – including 2020’s Monument, recorded in Minsk under Covid lockdown – the band has relocated from Belarus to Los Angeles, a move reflected in the 2024 album Belaya Polosa, a considerably brighter turn toward ’90s synth-pop and Depeche Mode.
“We haven’t been in California for that long,” Kozlov says. “And honestly, the sunny, laid-back atmosphere here matches our inner state quite well.” The barrier one might expect of a Russian-language band in California, he insists, scarcely troubles them. “I don’t really think there is a language barrier,” Kozlov adds. “We speak English pretty well, we communicate with our fans, and we give interviews in English.”
The lyrics themselves, meanwhile, remain untranslated as a matter of principle. “Music is art, and language is simply our way and form of expressing it,” Kozlov says. “Anyone who is interested can easily use a translator and find out what our lyrics are about. At the same time, I think it’s always interesting to leave some mystery behind and give people some space for their own thoughts and interpretations. I think that’s also part of art.”
From a laptop to Coachella’s main stage, sharing stages with New Order and Tears for Fears, Molchat Doma has proven that silence carries.