Just announced: Pink Floyd are releasing new music in support of the people of Ukraine entitled 'Hey Hey Rise Up', which will be available digitally from midnight tonight, with all proceeds going to Ukrainian Humanitarian Relief.
The track (recorded last Wednesday, March 30th) sees David Gilmour and Nick Mason joined by long time Pink Floyd bassist Guy Pratt and Nitin Sawhney on keyboards, and features an extraordinary vocal performance by Andriy Khlyvnyuk of Ukrainian band Boombox. Andriy's vocals are taken from his Instagram post of him singing in Kyiv's Sofiyskaya Square. The song itself, 'Oh, The Red Viburnum In The Meadow' is a rousing Ukrainian folk protest song written during the first world war which has been taken up across the world over the past month in protest of the invasion of Ukraine. The title of the Pink Floyd track is taken from the last line of the song which translates as 'Hey, hey, rise up and rejoice'.
In the press release, Gilmour, who has a Ukrainian daughter-in-law and grandchildren said: "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 explained how he came to know Andriy and his band Boombox. "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 Defence. 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."
While writing the music for the track, David managed to speak with Andriy from his hospital bed in Kyiv where he was recovering from a mortar shrapnel injury. "I played him a little bit of the song down the phone line and he gave me his blessing. I hope that we do something together in person at some point in the future." Gilmour wanted "to show 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."
The video for 'Hey Hey Rise Up' was filmed by acclaimed director Mat Whitecross and shot on the same day as the track was recorded. Gilmour: "We recorded the track and video in our barn where we did all our Von Trapped Family live streams during the lockdown. It's the same room that we did the 'Barn Jams' with Rick Wright back in 2007. Janina Pedan made the set in a day and we had Andriy singing on the screen while we played, so the four of us had a vocalist, albeit not one who was physically present with us."
The artwork for the track features a painting of the national flower of Ukraine, the sunflower, by the Cuban artist, Yosan Leon. The cover of the single is a direct reference to the woman who was seen around the world giving sunflower seeds to Russian soldiers and telling them to carry them in their pockets so that when they die, sunflowers will grow.
You can hear/buy the new song via PinkFloyd.lnk.to/HeyHeyRiseUp from midnight tonight (12am on Friday, April 8th) in your location.
11 March 2012 would have been the author Douglas Adams' 60th Birthday. To celebrate this event, Douglas's family and friends decided to hold a "virtual birthday party" in London, at the Hammersmith Apollo (formerly Odeon) which turned out to be a stunning, star-studded event with chat, comedy and music filling the evening. Our review of the evening can be found here. The event was staged in aid of Save The Rhino International.
For the musical part of the evening, there was quite the house band. Robbie McIntosh on guitar and vocals, Gary Brooker on keyboards and vocals, Jodi Linscott on percussion, Wix Wickens on keyboards, Margo Buchanan on vocals and guitar, backed by Dave Bronze on bass, and Paul Beavis on drums. Joining them later in the set was David Gilmour, who sang Wish You Were Here, which he played an acoustic guitar on, followed by Chuck Berry's Too Much Monkey Business with the Black Strat fired up, which he also used on the finale of A Whiter Shade Of Pale.
The show was filmed, but never released. However, one decade on, and to coincide with what would have been Douglas's 70th birthday, permission has been granted to release that stunning finale, which you can see here:
With uncertainty over surges of Coronavirus cases, the January/February 2022 tour dates for Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets in the US and Canada were postponed.
Rearranging existing tour dates (particularly at the moment with the heavily increased demand from all artists affected) must be incredibly difficult, as the available venues must be the right size for the act, and in a vaguely logical geographical location so bands and crews aren't zig-zagging their way across a country in an unsustainable way. However, after what we suspect has been a huge amount of work behind the scenes, the revised US and Canadian tour has now been announced.
The difficulties in sorting a revised schedule are evident in that, sadly, six gigs have had to be cancelled. These are: Cincinnati which was originally on February 1st, St Louis on February 8th, Memphis on February 9th, Kansas on February 10th, Sacramento on February 23rd and Spokane on February 27th. For all of you holding tickets for these shows, the point of sale should be in touch with a refund.
The better news is that these six cancelled gigs, have been replaced by eight new shows (in different locations). There are also three of the existing shows that have moved venues, within the same cities - Washington DC, Phoenix AZ, and Vancouver BC. For rescheduled shows that will be taking place at the same venue, all previously purchased tickets will be valid for the new date. For all shows being moved to new venues, customers will be automatically refunded for their purchase and offered an exclusive presale opportunity for the new venue and date. Further information will be sent directly to the original ticket holders by email shortly, and for any additional ticketing inquiries, fans should reach out to their point of purchase.
The sale of tickets for the new shows starts on FRIDAY, MARCH 25th 2022 at 10am (local time), via Ticketmaster for most of the venues, and other normal agents. Using our direct links (included on the show pages below) also helps toward the ongoing running costs of this site, and is really appreciated!
Here is the new schedule in full, with the newly added shows in bold:
In more tour news this morning, Roger Waters has expanded his 2022 This Is Not A Drill tour by adding three dates to the schedule in new locations, albeit two of the venues are ones he performed in for his 2017 Us And Them tour, so will be familiar to him and his band. The other venue (in Austin, Texas) is currently under construction.
The tour was originally due to take place in 2020, until the pandemic put a stop to those plans. The show is a new production and is going to be an "in the round" performance, with the staging in the middle of the venue, and the audience sat on all sides of the stage. It is going to be fascinating to see how Roger approaches this format, and how the show will be staged, as there is no traditional front, back or sides of the stage/performance area normally.
As it stands, the tour is only taking place in the US, Canada, and Mexico. Whilst there are an awful lot of fans worldwide who are hoping that Roger adds their location to what could well be his final tour, at this stage there is no hint that this will happen. We will keep you posted in case that situation changes.
Tickets for the three new shows go on sale next Friday, March 25th, at 10am local time, although check the direct links below as some of them have presale information too:
With the cancellation of the two Russian shows from the 2022 Echoes tour that Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets are about to start in around a month's time, a small gap has opened in the schedule - which has turned out to be excellent news for our friends in Lithuania!
The band will be playing at the Compensa Concert Hall in Vilnius, Lithuania, on May 27th 2022, and tickets have just gone on general sale:
It's great to see Nick and the gang bring the music of Pink Floyd to locations which have been starved of the band's music - the only other member of the band to have played Lithuania was Roger Waters in 2018.
If you are thinking of going to the show, we suggest you don't hang around when tickets go on sale on Monday, as we expect them to sell quickly for this 3,000 seater venue.
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Just announced: Pink Floyd are releasing new music in support of the people of Ukraine entitled 'Hey Hey Rise Up', which will be available digitally from midnight tonight, with all proceeds going to Ukrainian Humanitarian Relief.
With uncertainty over surges of Coronavirus cases, the January/February 2022 tour dates for Nick Mason's Saucerful Of Secrets in the US and Canada were postponed.
In more tour news this morning, 
With the cancellation of the two Russian shows from the 
