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'This is a crazy, unjust attack': Pink Floyd re-form to support Ukraine - NEW MUSIC ADDED
Editing to add the music video at the top of this OP:
Tweet from the Guardian, minutes ago, then an excerpt from the article:
Link to tweet
https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/apr/07/pink-floyd-reform-to-support-ukraine
A couple of weeks ago, Pink Floyd’s guitarist and singer David Gilmour was asked if he’d seen the Instagram feed of Andriy Khlyvnyuk, frontman of Ukrainian rock band BoomBox. Gilmour had performed live with BoomBox in 2015, at a London benefit gig for the Belarus Free Theatre – they played a brief, endearingly raw set of Pink Floyd songs and Gilmour solo tracks – but events had moved on dramatically since then: at the end of Feburary, Khlyvnyuk had abandoned BoomBox’s US tour in order to fight against the Russian invasion.
On his Instagram, Gilmour found a video of the singer in military fatigues, a rifle slung over his shoulder, standing outside Kyiv’s St Sofia Cathedral, belting out an unaccompanied version of Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow, a 1914 protest song written in honour of the Sich Riflemen who fought both in the first world war and the Ukrainian war of independence. “I thought: that is pretty magical and maybe I can do something with this,” says Gilmour. “I’ve got a big platform that [Pink Floyd] have worked on for all these years. It’s a really difficult and frustrating thing to see this extraordinarily crazy, unjust attack by a major power on an independent, peaceful, democratic nation. The frustration of seeing that and thinking ‘what the fuck can I do?’ is sort of unbearable.”
The result is Hey Hey, Rise Up!, a new single by Pink Floyd that samples Khlyvnyuk’s performance, to be released at midnight on Friday with proceeds going to Ukrainian humanitarian relief.
-snip-
Prior to the band’s unexpected reconvening, Pink Floyd’s post-1987 output – and the solo work of their late founder, Syd Barrett – was removed from streaming services in Russia and Belarus as part of a cultural boycott. Their most famous work, from the 1960s and 70s, was not removed, leading to rumours that moves to do so had been blocked by former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters, whose relations with his former bandmates are legendarily strained. A week before Russia invaded Ukraine, Waters told an interviewer on Russia Today that talk of a Russian invasion was “bullshit ... anybody with an IQ above room temperature knows [an invasion] is nonsense”; he has subsequently condemned the invasion calling it “the act of a gangster”, while also condemning “propaganda to demonise Russia”. It’s a subject on which Gilmour won’t be drawn. “Let’s just say I was disappointed and let’s move on. Read into that what you will.”
-snip-
On his Instagram, Gilmour found a video of the singer in military fatigues, a rifle slung over his shoulder, standing outside Kyiv’s St Sofia Cathedral, belting out an unaccompanied version of Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow, a 1914 protest song written in honour of the Sich Riflemen who fought both in the first world war and the Ukrainian war of independence. “I thought: that is pretty magical and maybe I can do something with this,” says Gilmour. “I’ve got a big platform that [Pink Floyd] have worked on for all these years. It’s a really difficult and frustrating thing to see this extraordinarily crazy, unjust attack by a major power on an independent, peaceful, democratic nation. The frustration of seeing that and thinking ‘what the fuck can I do?’ is sort of unbearable.”
The result is Hey Hey, Rise Up!, a new single by Pink Floyd that samples Khlyvnyuk’s performance, to be released at midnight on Friday with proceeds going to Ukrainian humanitarian relief.
-snip-
Prior to the band’s unexpected reconvening, Pink Floyd’s post-1987 output – and the solo work of their late founder, Syd Barrett – was removed from streaming services in Russia and Belarus as part of a cultural boycott. Their most famous work, from the 1960s and 70s, was not removed, leading to rumours that moves to do so had been blocked by former Pink Floyd member Roger Waters, whose relations with his former bandmates are legendarily strained. A week before Russia invaded Ukraine, Waters told an interviewer on Russia Today that talk of a Russian invasion was “bullshit ... anybody with an IQ above room temperature knows [an invasion] is nonsense”; he has subsequently condemned the invasion calling it “the act of a gangster”, while also condemning “propaganda to demonise Russia”. It’s a subject on which Gilmour won’t be drawn. “Let’s just say I was disappointed and let’s move on. Read into that what you will.”
-snip-
The new song was recorded by Gilmour, drummer Nick Mason, bassist Guy Pratt and keyboardist Nitin Sawhney, with their voices layered with Khlyvnyuk’s sampled voice. They also did a video, with the drums decorated with a Ukrainian artist's painting.
Re Waters -- I listened to something he recorded after the invasion started, and I was very disappointed, actually disgusted, that he also criticized Zelensky. I couldn't listen to all of it, though I'd hoped it might be something worth posting here, (Editing after I looked at the letter again, listening to the video Waters had posted on Twitter. He did condemn the invasion as "the act of a gangster" but immediately afterward condemned Western countries for "fueling the fire" -- especially the "gangster hawks in Washington" -- and he said he "hoped" Zelensky wasn't a gangster, too. He called Obama, the Clintons, Bush and Blair gangsters. He also told the Ukrainian girl whose letter he was responding to that there are neo-Nazis in her country (which of course is irrelevant to the government of that country). He urged diplomacy. He mentioned his father and grandfather dying in wars against Germany. He apparently has absolutely no understanding of the necessity for some military action, especially after invasions, when diplomacy does not work.
44 replies
= new reply since forum marked as read
= new reply since forum marked as read
It all sounds like the exact opposite of the artist I thought I knew!
that doesn't mean anything.
There's no "both sides" here.. there's Evil and there's Good.
💙💛
they were Reuniting!
💙💛
💙💛
Link to tweet
Nitin Sawhney
@thenitinsawhney
Me as a kid: “Well, if I keep practising maybe one day I could join my favourite band…”
Mate: “Yeah and pigs might fly.”
#Ukraine @pinkfloyd #PinkFloyd
@thenitinsawhney
Me as a kid: “Well, if I keep practising maybe one day I could join my favourite band…”
Mate: “Yeah and pigs might fly.”
#Ukraine @pinkfloyd #PinkFloyd