After 28 years, David Gilmour has surprisingly revived Pink Floyd. He recorded “Hey Hey Rise Up” with drummer Nick Mason and Ukrainian singer Andriy Khlyvnyuk. The song is based on the Ukrainian folk song which translates to “The Red Viburnum in the Meadow”. In an interview with the US American ROLLING STONE he explained why action was called for for the band: “We want to spread this message of peace and raise the morale of the people who are defending their homeland.”
Singer Andriy Khlyvnyuk, who wanted to tour abroad with a band Boombox and whom David Gilmour met personally, returned to his home country shortly after the start of the war to defend Kyiv as a soldier. In an Instagram video showing him singing the folk song, he is wearing a uniform and holding a submachine gun. Pink Floyd’s David Gilmour admired the musician for this impressive clip: “My daughter-in-law, who is actually Ukrainian, sent it to me and I was like: Wow, that’s fantastic. I just realized that we are here, with our name [Pink Floyd] and this platform, and that we could use it more. That piece of vocals immediately gave me the idea to make something out of it.”
It’s just very moving when you see Andriy standing on the square in Kyiv, in the midst of all this riots, raising his voice just for fun and singing this rousing Ukrainian song for nobody and for nothing.
Nick Mason immediately agreed
This was followed by “Hey Hey Rise Up” – after a call to drummer Nick Mason, the Pink Floyd comeback was a done deal. The song was recorded together with bassist Guy Pratt and keyboardist Nitin Sawhney – Khlyvnyuk’s clip also ran in the studio. “I hope the song does something good. I hope we can achieve something with this.”
Russian soldiers, stop killing your brothers. There will be no winners in this war.
My daughter-in-law is Ukrainian and my grand-daughters want to visit and know their beautiful country. Stop this before it is all destroyed.
Putin must go pic.twitter.com/VE4oMsUIRf
— David Gilmour (@davidgilmour) March 1, 2022
David Gilmour supports the tough sanctions and condemnation of the atrocities committed by Russia 100 percent. “Much of the world is responding in the right way. They’re angry and they’re frustrated. You can see and hear the frustration in the leaders of other countries around the world.” Something like that shouldn’t be allowed to happen, the musician continued. “You shouldn’t allow that. But we live in a world where, a fifth of the 21st century, this obscene situation can still occur. It’s unbelievable. It is incomprehensible to me.”
Will we be hearing more from Pink Floyd soon?
When asked if there was more new music to come, David Gilmour replied: “This is a one-time thing for Pink Floyd. I keep working on the side all the time. I hope to eventually finish an album, but right now I’m just concentrating on this.”