Zamsha.nnov.ru was the official website of the Nizhny Novgorod music band "Zamsha" (Замша), which operated on the Nizhny Novgorod nnov.ru domain in the early 2000s. The site ran the band's news feed, posted songs and members' biographies, and its chronicle consists almost entirely of Nizhny Novgorod addresses: Minin Square, the Oktyabr cinema on Pokrovka, the Chkalov Stairs by the Geroy boat, the Comedia theatre[1]. The copyright notice on the home page credited the "Kamei Music" studio, with design and programming by "vr graphics"[1]. The earliest preserved snapshot of the home page is dated 23 September 2001, and the latest is dated 18 July 2003[1][2].
How the site was organized
The 2001-era home page took the form of a reverse-chronological feed: dated entries from 5 May to 20 September, ranging from a single line to several paragraphs of concert reportage[1]. These entries reveal how the rest of the site's sections were organized. In the "group" section, on 29 August 2001, as the home page announced, "life stories of the members of 'Zamsha'" appeared: Vadim's "autobiography," Alexander's biography written by his mother, and Tanya's account of her childhood[1]. In the "songs" section, a new track called "Tik-Tak" ("Tick-Tock") was posted on 17 August, and on 1 August it was reported that the band was just finishing work on it[1].
The top block of the home page carried an announcement dated 14 June 2001: the band ZAMSHA's music video was called there "the first Nizhny Novgorod video to break through onto Russian music television"[1]. The commercial part of the site amounted to a few lines: visitors were invited to vote for the video at vote.aport.ru and to order recordings at www.kapriz.online.ru "or 8 095 974-22-22, ext. KAPRIZ"[1].
The "18 Hours" video: filming and broadcasts
The recurring storyline of the 2001 site was work on the video for the song "18 Hours." Filming began on 5 May (a "studio" day), and on 10 and 11 May shooting took place in the courtyard of the Kamei Music studio, in the cafe of the Oktyabr cinema, and on the streets of the city[1]. The video was edited by 31 May[1]. From 4 June, according to the site's log, the video aired on the TV channels "NTR," "Volga," and "Dialog"; regarding a broadcast on "Seti-NN," the home page honestly noted "unconfirmed information"[1]. In early August the video, as the site reported, aired daily on MUZ-TV[1], and on 17 September it aired on MTV — the entry even records the broadcast time, 21:20[1]. Entries from 19 and 20 September reported that the video was airing daily and was in the channel's playlist[1].
Nizhny Novgorod chronicle in the site's entries
The news feed preserved the band's schedule for the summer of 2001. On 6 May "Zamsha" performed at a celebration held by the radio station "Russkoye Radio. Nizhny Novgorod" on Pokrovka[1]. On 12 June — at a concert marking the second anniversary of the radio station "RDV," where, as the home page reported, the Moscow guests Naik Borzov and Oleg Nesterov ("Megapolis") "showered 'Zamsha' with a heap of compliments"[1]. On 16 June the band played on Minin Square at the "Mig Lotto" concert, on 29 June it headlined the "Zamsha Party" at the nightclub of the Oktyabr cinema, organized by MUZ-TV and "Silver Rain," and on 6 July it performed at the SONY WALKMAN venue — the stage was the canopy of the same cinema[1].
The entry for 30 June noted that Alexander Ostrovsky was the "only Nizhny Novgorod musician on the jury" of the "Sprite — Thirst for Success" music marathon, which judged 11 Nizhny Novgorod rock bands[1]. On 1 July the site reported the founding of the band's fan club on the initiative of Yulia Yegorova, a presenter at the TV company "Dialog"[1]. The most detailed entry is a report on City Day, 9 September 2001: the band played by the Chkalov Stairs and on the square by the Oktyabr cinema, the full setlist is given, and the performance's finale was cut short when "a spotlight flared up" and the sound went out, after which the trio finished singing "Portuguese Women" without amplification[1]. The same entry noted an interview with the newspaper "Dosug v Nizhnem" (No. 32, 5 September 2001) and announced a performance at the "Miss Nizhny Novgorod — 2001" contest at the Comedia theatre[1].
Place in the Nizhny Novgorod internet and closure
Zamsha.nnov.ru belonged to the part of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet that existed around local music and media projects. In the surviving samples of the Counter.nn.ru counter, analyzed in the Archival study of the Nizhny Novgorod internet from the counter.nn.ru rating, the domain does not appear, and it is absent from the final voting table of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet Day in 2004[3] — by the time of that vote, the band's Nizhny Novgorod site was no longer being updated.
The last surviving snapshot, from 18 July 2003, caught the site after a redesign: the long feed was gone, leaving a short page with the note "Changes have taken place in the group" and a link, "The old site is here"[2]. The top news item was "Zamsha's" live broadcast on the radio station "Ekho Moskvy" on the night of 8-9 June 2003 — the program "Serebro" ("Silver"), hosted by Alexander Plyushchev, starting at 00:10[2]. The same page offered a new song, "Vozdukh" ("Air"), to listen to[2]. By this time the contact addresses already led outside the Nizhny Novgorod zone — sk@zamsha.ru and zamsha@mail.ru — and the copyright notice had been extended: "Kamei Music, 2001-2003"[2]. No later snapshots of the home page exist in the web archive; the domain zamsha.nnov.ru is no longer active[2].
Sources
- web.archive.org — Home page, 2001 (archive)
- web.archive.org — Home page, 2003 (archive)
- web.archive.org — Results of the Day of the Nizhny Novgorod Internet vote, 2004 (archive)