Pink Floyd have shared ‘Hey, Hey, Rise Up!’, their first original music in 28 years. The song, which is being released to air the relief effort in Ukraine, features guitarist David Gilmour and drummer Nick Mason joined by longtime Pink Floyd bass player Guy Pratt and Nitin Sawhney on keyboards. It includes a sample of Andriy Khlyvnyuk, singer for the Ukrainian band BoomBox, singing the protest song ‘Oh, the Red Viburnum in the Meadow’ outside St. Sofia Cathedral in Kyiv. The title of the Pink Floyd track is taken from the final line of the song, which translates in English as “Hey, hey, rise up and rejoice!” Listen to it below.
“We, like so many, have been feeling the fury and the frustration of this vile act of an independent, peaceful democratic country being invaded and having its people murdered by one of the world’s major powers,” Gilmour said in a statement. He continued:
In 2015, I played a show at Koko in London in support of the Belarus Free Theatre, whose members have been imprisoned. Pussy Riot and the Ukrainian band, Boombox, were also on the bill. They were supposed to do their own set, but their singer Andriy had visa problems, so the rest of the band backed me for my set – we played Wish You Were Here for Andriy that night.
Recently I read that Andriy had left his American tour with Boombox, had gone back to Ukraine, and joined up with the Territorial Defense. Then I saw this incredible video on Instagram, where he stands in a square in Kyiv with this beautiful gold-domed church and sings in the silence of a city with no traffic or background noise because of the war. It was a powerful moment that made me want to put it to music.
All proceeds from ‘Hey, Hey Rise Up!’ will go to Ukraine Humanitarian Relief.
