About Me
t.A.T.u. is a Russian pop music duo consisting of Lena Katina and Yulia Volkova.The group was formed in 1999 by Ivan Shapovalov, in Moscow. t.A.T.u. is the most successful international recording act from Russia, with a fan base stretching all over the world. Their debut album, 200 Po Vstrechnoy was the first from a Russian act to reach gold status internationally. With the release of their debut English album, 200 km/h in the Wrong Lane t.A.T.u. became the first act to receive an IFPI Platinum Europe Award for the same album in two languages.Much of their early success was based on the lesbian image portrayed by Katina and Volkova, and the controversy that surrounded it. However, in December 2003, it became apparent on their reality show Anatomy of t.A.T.u. that their sexuality was just part of the group’s image at the time, and that they were not actually lesbians. Then in 2004, the group took a hiatus after they split from their producer and Volkova had become pregnant. They were soon back in the studio, and in 2005, released Dangerous and Moving and Lyudi Invalidy. In the last year, the group has released a compilation album, negotiated out of their contract with Universal records, and announced the production of a third album, and a film."There is a love of friends between us. Our slogan is to love and it’s not important whom to love. We want to say that a boy can love a boy and a girl can love a girl. If all people would love each other, it would be easier to live in this world. If people are lead by hatred and evil, nothing good would happen from this."
"We don’t regret anything. In general, it is never necessary to regret anything, whatever happens. Whatever you plan, things turn out differently anyway. It is simply not necessary to make illusions for yourself. There was no image. We always behave the way we want to."Member of duet t.A.T.u. with Lena Katina.
Speaks Russian and semi-fluent English.
First child, Viktoria (Vika for short), with her (now ex) boyfriend, martial arts expert Pasha Sidorov, was born on September 23th, 2004.
Her parents are Oleg Viktorovich Volkov and Larissa Viktorovna Volkova.
She is an only child.This teenage dance pop duo became the biggest selling Russian act of the new millennium owing to a clever marketing strategy that played on the suggestive nature of the two singers barely legal lesbian love affair. The fact that Julia (b. Volkova Yulia Olegovna, 20 February 1985) and Lena (b. Katina Elena Sergeevna, 4 October 1984) both had boyfriends did not detract from the brilliance of the ploy. The project was the creation of Russian producer Ivan Shapovalov, who sifted through thousands of candidates for t.A.T.u. at open auditions before choosing Olegovna and Sergeevna. Enlisting various producers to help record the duo’s debut album, Shapovalov fashioned a suitably sleazy electro pop musical backdrop to complement the duo’s featherweight voices. Their debut single "Ya Soshla S Uma’ (I Lost My Mind) became a massive hit in the girls’ native Russia, owing in no small part to a video featuring titillating footage of Olegovna and Sergeevna acting out the song’s Sapphic storyline. The video became an instant hit on MTV Europe, encouraging Shapovalov to hire noted UK producer Trevor Horn to oversee the recording of t.A.T.u."s English language debut. Featuring reworked versions of songs from the duo’s Russian debut, the album was premiered by a new version of "Ya Soshla S Uma" retitled "All The Things She Said". The song duly topped the UK charts in February 2002 amid criticisms that Shapovalov was promoting "paedophiliac pop".
