Zhenya Belousov

Yevgeny Viktorovich Belousov (Евге́ний Ви́кторович Белоу́сов; September 10, 1964, Zhikhar — June 2, 1997, Moscow), better known as Zhenya Belousov (Женя Белоусов) was a Soviet and Russian pop singer, popular in the late 1980s – early 1990s.

His best-known hits include My Blue-Eyed Girl, Night Taxi, Alyoshka, Devchonka-Devchonochka, Evening-Evening, Hair Cloud, Golden Domes, Short Summer, Dunya-Dunyasha, In the Evening on a Bench.

Yevgeny Viktorovich Belousov was born on September 10, 1964, in the village of Zhikhar, Kharkiv Oblast.

He graduated from vocational school No 1 as mechanic-repairman and later studied at the Kursk Music College, learning bass guitar.

He was not conscripted to the army due to heavy concussion he suffered in a car crash as a schoolboy.

In the mid-1980s Bari Alibasov saw Belousov playing in a Kursk restaurant and invited him to join his band Integral as a singing bassist.

In 1987 he started a solo career and enjoyed success with a series of hits, collected in three studio albums, My Blue-Eyed Girl (1988), Night Taxi (1990) and Devchonka-Devchonochka (1993).

Starting with 1993, Belousov's health started to deteriorate and his popularity nose-dived.

His stint as a distillery businessman in Ryazan proved to be a failure and he was accused of tax evasion.

In March 1997, he was taken to the Sklifosovsky Institute with acute pancreatitis.

A month later he suffered a stroke (earlier head injuries and alcohol abuse cited as possible causes) and underwent a brain surgery.

On 2 June 1997 Belousov died at the Sklifosovsky hospital, and was interred in the Kuntsevo Cemetery.