Pink Floyd was one of the biggest and most influential bands of the 1970s and 1980, so their legions of fans were devastated when they broke up in 1995. Now, however, the band is back together and releasing their first song in twenty-eight years!
They have recorded and released Hey Hey Rise Up, written to raise money to support the humanitarian efforts in Ukraine. Original band members David Gilmore and Nick Mason were joined by regular session members Nitin Sawhney on keyboards and bassist Guy Pratt. It’s a very powerful song both in the melody and the message.
To add an extra special flavour, vocals were performed by Andriy Khlyvnyuk, lead singer of the Ukrainian band Boombox. Gilmour met Boombox when performing at a show at Koko in London. The concert was put on to support the Belarus Free Theatre after their members were imprisoned. Boombox was also playing that night, but when Andriy could not attend due to visa problems, the band backed up Gilmour instead. They played Wish You Were Here in Andriy's honour.
Andriy later returned to Ukraine to defend his country. He did not give up on his music and recorded a beautiful video that inspired Gilmour to write a new song. He explains, "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."
The idea for Hey Hey Rise Up was born. It features a sample of Andriy singing a World War One protest song called The Red Viburnum In The Meadow. The band has also created a music video to accompany the song. They have released it on iTunes, Spotify and Amazon, and early signs suggest it will debut in the UK charts at number 5! They may not have made music for a while, but the band has lost none of their talent.
Gilmour and the band are keeping their fingers crossed that the song will do well and, in doing so, raise morale and raise funds for Ukraine. Talking about the song they said, "We want to express our support for Ukraine and, in that way, show that most of the world thinks that it is totally wrong for a superpower to invade the independent democratic country that Ukraine has become".