Few Russians know who Ilya Prusikin is. No wonder. Music lovers know him by his creative pseudonym “Ilyich”. The singer is the founder and lead singer of the musical group “Little Big”, working in the direction of punk-pop rave.
To characterize Prusikin simply as a musician would be incomplete. He is an actor, screenwriter, director, video blogger, producer and, in addition, a psychology teacher. Here the most complete biography of Ilya Prusikin will be presented, and it will also be explained why he is divorcing his wife.
Childhood and education
Ilya Pruskin was born on April 8, 1985 in the small village of Ust-Borzya in Transbaikalia, near the border with China. Later the family moved to the city of Sosnovy Bor near Leningrad, and then to St. Petersburg itself.
Ilya grew up as a sporty boy. He attended the football section and the exotic baseball section, occupying the position of an outfielder on the team. The child had other interests besides sports. The boy went to a group for modeling aircraft structures.
The parents correctly identified the child’s ear for music and sent him to an art school to study piano. Ilya attended his lessons with joy. In secondary school, he was fond of KVN and was a member of the team.
Note: In 2001, Ilya received the title of champion of the school league of the “Merry and Resourceful Club” of Sosnovy Bor.
Nothing foreshadowed Prusikin's brilliant musical career. Having received a matriculation certificate, the young man entered the Institute of Culture in St. Petersburg, from which he graduated with a diploma in psychology and teacher.
Ilya Prusikin in his youth (photo from Instagram)
Beginning of a musical career
In 2002, Ilya Prusikin, who had just graduated from school, joined the nu metal band Tenkorr. With the appearance of a new musician with the pseudonym “Ilyich,” the band quickly became famous. Soon the group released their debut mini-album of three compositions, “It Will Be Late.”
Video for the track “K.V.N. (How It All Began)” received the Grand Prix at the Leningrad Region music festival in 2004. The culmination of Tenkorr's creativity was their 10-song long play, Sex Police, released in 2008. Then Ilya Prusikin began to move away from the emocore style and lean towards alternative rock.
Fron managed to work with other groups:
- "Constructor"
- "St. Bastards",
- "Like A Virgin"
Note: The musician became most famous for his participation in the rave group “Little Big”. This group was formed in 2013, and in 2021 it was nominated from Russia to Eurovision.
Ilya Prusikin – lead singer of the band “Little Big”
Career development
Ilya Vladimirovich Prusikin is a versatile personality who makes progress not only in the musical field, but also in the humorous genre. With his support, more than 10 different projects were created for the YouTube platform. And this is not counting the personal blogs of Ilya Prusikin and Irina Smelaya, in which humor occupies an important place.
Important ! His friends play an active part in Ilya’s creative development: Andrei Stary, Eldar Dzharakhov, Ruslan Usachev, Yura Muzychenko and other members of the Klik-Klak collective.
Music career
The leader of the popular group Little Big, Ilya Prusikin, organized his first musical group in 2002. And it was called “Tenkorr”. Under this name, Ilya released his first mini-album, “It Will Be Late.” It consisted of only three songs. Well, in 2004, the Tenkorr group presented to the public their first concert video, entitled: “How it all began.” It was this film that deserved the Grand Prix at the Leningrad Regional Festival.
Unique news Dima Gordey: biography and how much a blogger earns per month in 2021
Until 2008, Ilya Prusikin's population growth as a musician was rapidly increasing. In three years under his leadership, the Tenkorr group released two more albums and several individual tracks. All of them were presented to the public during tours in more than 10 cities of Russia.
Working in advertising
Taking advantage of his popularity, Ilya Prusikin decided to sign a contract with. The guy actively advertised his partners in videos, which brought him good income. And a year later, Ilya concluded a similar contract with Vladimir Besedeny, the creator of the show “Gaffy Gaff”.
Important ! In 2012, Svyaznoy turned its attention to Ilya Prusikin. He offered the musician a creative position in his company. Ilya was interested in this proposal. Moreover, he was so carried away by his new work that he even took part in the filming of the advertisement.
Participation in other projects
In 2012, the leader of the Little Big group, Ilya Prusikin, became one of the directors of the Internet project “Police Everyday Life”. In the same film, the musician himself appeared several times, playing the role of Sergeant Kotov. And Prusikin’s colleagues on this project were his colleagues from “Thank you, Eva!”, where Ilyich had been working for more than a year.
In 2013, fate connected Ilya with the famous St. Petersburg blogger Eldar Dzharakhov. Together with him, Ilyich created a now popular humorous project called “KliKlakBand”. Its essence was to complete trash tasks. The audience really liked this format, which became noticeable from the number of autographs given by Ilya Prusikin.
Blogger
Ilyich began to master video blogging in 2011. The young man began working for the creative association “Thank you, Eva”, and together with Vladimir Besedin launched the “Guffy Gafa Show”. The project imitated musical educational programs for children, but the sock puppets sang songs that were not children's songs, raising acute social problems and exposing the vices of society.
The second satirical project, “The Great Rap Battle,” became equally popular, where “famous personalities” met in rap battles. Half of them were played by Ilya Pruskin himself. From 2012 to 2015, Ilyich was an actor and at the same time a producer of the Internet sitcom “Police Everyday Life.”
After the project was closed, he and Eldar Dzharakhov created the “Klikklak” association on YouTube. In different shows, the blogger showed stupid but funny tricks, such as wallowing in a pool with Vaseline or giving each other bream. On the VKontakte platform, friends also launched the program “Klikklak in Prison.”
Videos of the group “Little big” gain millions of views
Ilya Prusikin and “Little Big”
During the same period, he created the rave group Little Big, which was called a super virus in the press. Listeners often compared her with the shocking South African band Die Antwoord, whose opening act the musicians rocked at the St. Petersburg club “A2” on July 2, 2013.
Ilya Prusikin created his own group “Little Big”
The band's frontman was even accused of completely copying his image from the lead singer of Die Antwoord, but the attacks did not last long. Little Big have proven their originality and great potential on the world stage: the St. Petersburgers have won the hearts of listeners in Germany, France, Belgium, Spain, Argentina, the USA and Brazil.
Ilyich (Little Big) and Ninja (Die Antwoord)
The pearl of the group were the dwarf soloists Olympia Ivleva and Anna Karst (later left the group).
The very first video of this shocking group, entitled “Everyday I'm Drinking,” instantly spread across the Internet. The clip ridiculed “cranberry” stereotypes about Russia and delighted the eye with stunning camera work: a bear snorting cocaine along with a naked purple-haired girl, predatory grinning clowns against the backdrop of a shabby front door, Soviet interiors and a lot of vodka.
Ilya Prusikin and Little Big - Everyday I'm drinking The bar was set high, but each new Little Big video was not inferior to the first in terms of quality and extravagance of approach: “Life in Da Trash”, popularly nicknamed “clip with maggots”, “Give Me Your” Money”, “Big Dick” (winner of the Berlin Music Video Festival in the category “Best Trash Video”), “With Russia From Love”, “Public Enemy”, “Hateful Love”, in which model Elena Sheidlina starred. In 2015, the group’s second album, “Funeral Rave,” was released. The album included 11 songs, only one of which (Polyushko Polye) was recorded in Russian. The album debuted on the iTunes chart at number nine.
In the spring of 2017, during a tour of the Russian Federation, which started in September of the previous year, the Little Big frontman published the video “Rave On” on the Internet, which collected more than a million views in a day. Viewers had access to a track with an additional song “For Hatters”. At the same time, on the social network VKontakte, together with Dzharakhov, he launched the show “KlikKlak in Prison.”
Ilya Prusikin in the show “KlikKlak Behind Bars: Interrogation” The group also released a video “U Can Take” together with Ilyich’s wife Irina, where the lyrics of the composition are heard in Tatar and English. In the first day of publication on YouTube, it received more than two million views.
In the summer of the same year, the musicians became participants in the project “Concerts without a roof. Red Summer”, performing in Moscow. Later, together with the equally hooligan group Eskimo Callboy from Germany, they presented a new track “Nightlife”.
At the festival of science fiction, science and cinema "Starkon" and the vlogger presented a joint project with Eldar Dzharakhov - a space, somewhat absurd web sitcom "Team E", in the filming of which famous video makers and show business stars took part, including Sergei Shnurov, the leader of the group "Leningrad".
LITTLE BIG - LollyBomb In 2021, Little Big's third studio album, Antipositive, was released.
Personal life
Very little is known about Prusikin’s first novel, although it lasted about 10 years. Ilya’s girlfriend worked as a kindergarten teacher and actually supported the aspiring musician. The first entry in the musician’s work book appeared on August 15, 2021, when he got a probationary job as an art director of the Svyaznoy chain of stores.
After 4 months, Ilyich quit this job. He left behind a uniform he invented for the network’s salespeople and a commercial for “Messenger Swipe,” in which he himself starred. In 2014, Ilya met blogger Irina Smela, who is called “Tatarka” in Internet circles.
The girl was famous before meeting the musician. She hosted the “Tatar Everyday Life” vlogs, the “M/F” and “Fashion Trashon” programs. Irina is a cloud rapper. Soon, Ilyich’s fans suspected that the relationship between the musician and Tatarka, who works at Klikklak, went beyond a partnership.
Prusikin was the inspirer and developer of the Tatarka project, where Smelaya plays a key role. The couple hid the connection for a long time, until on July 6, 2021, Ilya posted a minute-long video for fans of the wedding, to which only relatives and close friends were invited.
Ilya Prusikin and Ira Smelaya decided to divorce in 2021
In November of the following year, the couple became parents. They named their son with the exotic name Dobrynya. At the same time, Prusikin wanted the boy to be recorded in the documents under his wife’s last name. After all, then the child’s full name will sound like in ancient Russian epics - Dobrynya Ilyich the Bold.
Parents' Instagram accounts are filled with photos and videos of Dobrynya. However, fans are confused by the fact that the two-year-old sometimes uses obscene language. Ilya assures that the audience only heard the swearing in childish babble. At first, the blogger and musician said that frequent travel and the busy work schedule of both spouses do not harm love. But after 4 years, the marriage could not stand the test of long separation.
In August 2021, a video with the intriguing title “We want to tell you something” appeared on Irina’s YouTube account. At first, Ilya Prusikin and his wife said with a smile that they were expecting a second child, but they immediately admitted: it was just a joke. In fact, they decided to break up.
The news of the divorce stunned fans of the singer's work. But Ilya and Irina dotted the i's and explained why they were breaking up. They say that long and frequent separations have led to alienation, and there are no former feelings between them. However, the ex-spouses emphasized, they maintained their friendship. Although Ilyich is divorced, he plans to continue to actively raise his son.
The flamboyant musician did not remain alone for long. Soon, insiders started talking about Ilyich’s new hobby – the singer’s colleague in the Little Big group, Sonya Tayurskaya. So far, the musicians have not commented on these rumors.
Ilyich and Dobrynya spend all their free time together
Personal life of Ilya Prusikin
The popular vlogger and musician is married. His chosen one was singer and blogger originally from Naberezhnye Chelny Irina Smelaya (known on YouTube as Tatarka), born in 1992. Her debut video “Altyn,” directed by Dzharakhov, immediately became a YouTube trend.
Ilya Prusikin and Ira SmelayaThe young people got married in July 2021, and a year later it became known that Ira was expecting a child. The baby, who was born on November 26, 2021, was named Dobrynya.
Friends nicknamed the blogger “pussy.” It turns out that he is afraid of rats, mice, snakes and even insects.
Ilya Prusikin with his wife Irina Ilyich devotes all his free time to Little Big, calling creativity his hobby since he was 15 years old.
Frequently asked questions about Ilya Prusikin
- Russians are interested in who the musician is by nationality. Prusikin himself said in an interview that this does not matter to him in the slightest, but admitted that Polish and Jewish blood flows in his veins.
- Will Prusikin go to Eurovision? Due to the pandemic, the music competition was cancelled. We can only hope that the Little Big group will represent Russia in 2021.
Many people call Prusikin an eccentric madman. They say his videos should not be shown to children. But you can’t deny a musician’s ability to work. All the groups he performed with immediately became popular. We hope he doesn’t have to sacrifice his relationship with his new girlfriend on the altar of work.
Biography of Ilya Prusikin (Ilyich)
Ilya Prusikin (Ilyich) is an old-timer of the Russian YouTube scene, co-founder of the creative association “KlikKlak”, one of the authors of the idea for the web series “Police Everyday Life”, the Constructorr project, the social show “In the Order of Things” and many other rating videos. Blogger, director, video producer, judge of rap duels Versus Battle, leader of the musical rave group Little Big, with the help of which Ilyich fulfills his long-standing dream - to become a phenomenon of world musical culture and “pump up the whole world.”
Video blogger and musician Ilya Prusikin
