I was cleaning up my email box, and I noticed an email from my sister with a link about the death of Eduard Khil – better known as “Mr. Trololo” thanks to his unearthed (and somewhat freaky) YouTube video of his rendition of “I am Glad, ’cause I’m Finally Returning Back Home.”

The video was forwarded to me by many because it reminded them of my love for singing like this (and general mimicking of eccentric singing styles). I watched it a few times and moved on.

But when I was reading the death notice, I was struck by these two paragraphs:

“A popular but fading Soviet singing star, Khil rocketed to global stardom in 2010 when a Cold War-era video of his performance of Arkady Ostrovsky’s 1966 “I Am Glad, ‘Cause I’m Finally Returning Back Home”—with Khil singing “trololo” instead of censored lyrics—became an Internet sensation.

The original lyrics—about an American cowboy riding across a prairie—didn’t sit well with Soviet censors, so Khil changed them in the quirky, vocalized version.”

How many of those who watched that video knew that? Without the common censorship of Soviet communism/socialism, we would never know the miracle of “Mr. Trololo.”

I guess that ideology is good for something after all.

– My name is Jon Friesch, and I’m fascinated by the things people know and don’t know.