April 3rd, 2020
t.A.T.u.’s official VK page posted a 32 second teaser video that showed Lena Katina’s reflection inside of a car who could also be heard singing “I’m sorry” in the paired instrumental track. The post had no context except for “soon” written in the body of the post and “Believe In Goodbyes” written across the video, which, was presumed to be the name of the featured teaser track. View post →
April 6th, 2020
t.A.T.u.’s official VK page posted the premiere of “Believe In Goodbyes” with the following note:
“In these difficult days it is important to feel something that can brighten up everyday life self-isolation. That is why today Sergio Galoyan is sharing this recording with all of us and wishes us to not be lonely, to be healthy and to take care of yourself! The track was created by Sergio Galoyan, Lena Katina, Sasho Kuzmanovich, Sven Martin and Igor Koring. You can download the track here: www.promodj.com/tatu/groups/651994/Demo” [link no longer active].
That same day, Lena Katina went on Instagram live where she talked about the released demo and her dismay with it:
“There was a situation just today with Sergio Galoyan, who, for some reason, decided that he has a right to release a song without my permission…demo version of the song, without my permission or the permission of other co-writers. It’s very not cool and I think it’s a very wrong thing to do. So, I would ask you to understand the situation and do not consider this song as an official release. I’m pissed off, to be honest.”
Lena went on to translate what she said for the Russian viewers, adding the following:
“I want to tell you about a situation which occurred today. A song was released by Sergio Galoyan, who, for some reason, decided that he has the right to control my voice, my author’s rights, and the author’s rights of other people who wrote this demo, and just to take the song and release it. I will not say the name of it. Dear Sergio, you have my phone number, you have my email. You should not do things like this, people don’t do this. This is just really screwed up. This is a very bad move from your side. So, if I was you I would just take it down and the sooner the better. No one has the right to use my voice without my permission…and my author’s rights…I am getting overlooked and then I have no idea what is going on. Then I go online and see that a demo was released that was written a hundred years ago in America, which we did not even finish. The words aren’t even all there, it’s called ‘blah, blah’ lyrics. I am very unhappy with what Sergio Galoyan did, it is just rude and foolish.”
After Lena’s livestream, t.A.T.u.’s official VK page took down the post featuring the premiere of the demo and the Promo DJ link where fans could download the song was also removed. Instead, a new post went up with a Lena Katina/Julia Volkova mashup by Maks Divine with “We don’t believe in goodbyes ✨🌙” in the body of the post. View post →
Sergio Galoyan posted the following 2 screenshot to his Insta story:
– Sergio, did you hear what Lena said about the release of your song?
– No, what did she say?
– She said that you do not have the right to publish the track without her permission.
And that you should have called her or wrote to her.
She was very angry.
They removed the song from the VK page.
– I agree with her, I was foolish.
But, on the other hand
You would have never heard it.
So, either Lena is the only angry one (who I love and respect a lot) or there are thousands of happy fans of our music during these difficult times.
March 2nd, 2020
In an interview about t.A.T.u., Sergio Galoyan had talked about “Believe In Goodbyes” for the first time:
“There was an idea to reunite them. I even wrote a song with Lena about reuniting, which no one has heard still. It exists. But for some reason something happened between the two of them that was sacred and they could no longer do anything together.”
t.A.T.u.’s reunion discussion starts at 27:50