In the early days of the Soviet Union, some people went to extraordinary lengths to get hold of Western pop, even pressing records into discarded x-rays and trading them secretly, as the Guardian reported. But in the 70s and 80s, things were easier thanks to the BBC World Service. Seva Novgorodsev was one of the BBC's main DJs for the Soviet Union and his shows - a mix of pop hits and light-hearted jokes - apparently had 25 million listeners every week, with Russians searching up and down radio dials until they found a signal that the authorities hadn't blocked.

In fact, he was so well known that when he went back to Russia in 1990, 800 people met him at the airport chanting, "Se-va, Se-va!" Some said his show was so influential he caused the demise of the Soviet Union. "Of course, it's kind of an exaggeration or hyperbole, but the thing is that there is some truth in it," Andrei Ostalski, who was one of Seva’s bosses, told the BBC. "He was a symbol of this curiosity and the way it caused this great penetration of certain Western values into Soviet society, which was sort of deadly for the regime."

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