The Plastic People of the Universe
The Plastic People of the Universe (
PPU) was a
Prague (
Czech) rock band. It was the main representative of the
Prague underground culture (1968-1989). This avantgarde group went against the grain of the communist regime and due to its non-conformism often suffered serious problems such as arrests. Their song lyrics were very often poetic, at the beginning taken almost exclusively from
Egon Bondy's poetry and later also from other non-conformist poets.
Bassist Milan Hlavsa formed the band which was heavily influenced by
Frank Zappa and the
Velvet Underground in 1968. Czech art historian and cultural critic
Ivan Jirous became their manager/artistic director, fulfilling a similar role the one
Andy Warhol had with the
The Velvet Underground.
In 1968, under rule of
Communist Party leader
Alexander Dubček, Czechoslovakia was undergoing the
Prague Spring, a thawing of hard totalitarian control. In August,
Soviet and other
Warsaw Pact troops invaded Czechoslovakia to overthrow Dubček and reinstate hard-line communist rule, called
nomalization process. Less than a month after the invasion, Plastic People of the Universe was formed.
The consolidated Czech communist government revoked the band's musicians license in 1970. In 1974, thousands of students traveled from Prague to the town of
Ceske Budejovice to visit "the Plastics" performance. Stopped brutally by police, they were sent back to Prague in cattle cars, and several students were arrested. The band was forced underground until the
Velvet Revolution in 1989. Unable to perform openly, an entire underground cultural movement formed around the band during the 1970s.
In 1976 "the Plastics" were arrested and put on trial by the Communist government to make an example. They were convicted of "Organized Disturbance of the Peace" and sentenced to terms in prison ranging from 8 to 18 months. It was in protest of these arrests that led playwright
Václav Havel and others to write the
Charter 77.
Despite their clashes with the government, the musicians never considerated themselves activists and always claimed that they wanted only to play their music.