There have been episodes of creative stagnation in Andreyev’s life. On such days, Andreyev overused alcohol beyond all limits and spent long hours walking across forests of the Pskov region. In these solitary walks, he would sometimes even take a nap in the bushes. One of such walks could have ended as a tragedy for contemporary music.
A few locals went into the woods to hunt wild boars. Having heard the sound of something tossing and turning in the bushes, the best they could do was to shoot haphazardly, hoping to hit the unknown target by chance. Indeed, it was chance, or rather luck that saved our composer’s life, even though some damage was unavoidable. Nevertheless, Andreyev himself is usually ironic about this incident, always asserting that the jumping pellets which he is still able to feel in his seat nerve, gives him material for composing joyous tunes. This was the beginning of Andreyev’s brief period of fascination with country music.
The piece “Cowboy’s Nothing” written in this period is a bright illustration of both the author’s feelings, as well as Andreyev’s typically deep understanding of different musical genres. However, Andreyev puts in the center of the piece an extended quotation from Rabelais, emphasizing the carnivalesque nature of this work, and its profound connection with the popular culture of laughter, with its melody being derivative from the images of material-bodily “bottom.”