‘It was like a toxic relationship’: the exiled Russian musicians starting again abroad

‘We used to rehearse together’ … Lucidvox, who are releasing a new record despite living between Germany, Serbia and Israel. Photograph: Kostya Kondrukhov

‘We can say what we feel,” says Nadya Samodurova, “but we needed to move to another country to do so.” Half of the acclaimed Russian psych-rock band Lucidvox are speaking to me, via video link, from a modest room in the Serbian capital Belgrade. It’s where Samodurova and Anna Moskvitina, the group’s drummer and bassist, have moved to since the war against Ukraine began because, as Samodurova puts it: “It’s really dangerous to speak out in Russia.”

“I felt like I needed to move,” adds Moskvitina, “because I don’t want to pretend that I’m someone else.”