The Ukrainians

The Ukrainians

The Ukrainians are a Leeds-based group formed in 1991 by British musicians of Ukrainian descent. Their music brings Ukrainian folk material together with Western pop and rock, usually in a largely acoustic style that combines punk energy with folk instrumentation. The project grows out of a side project connected to The Wedding Present, a British indie band of the 1980s.

Origins and early recordings

The idea begins when The Wedding Present decide to make one of their BBC Radio 1 John Peel sessions a Ukrainian one. Guitarist Peter Solowka's friend Len Liggins, known as The Legendary Len, joins in because he sings, has studied Modern Slavonic languages at Leeds University, and plays a violin with an eastern European village sound. The session proves unexpectedly popular, leading to two further Ukrainian sessions for the same programme. After this, Peter Solowka and Len Liggins form The Ukrainians, with Roman Remeynes on mandolin.

Their first songs are written in Ukrainian, including Oi Divchino, which becomes their first single. They travel to Kyiv to film a video for it in the outdoor Museum of National Folk Architecture and Way of Life. The video is the first pop video made entirely in the east for a western band. The single is named NME Single of the Week and brings the band widespread attention in both specialist and mainstream press.

Albums, tours and wider recognition

Their first album, The Ukrainians, establishes them as a major example of a new blend of traditional Ukrainian folk and Western rock. The band quickly builds an audience across rock, punk, folk, roots and world music scenes and tours widely across Europe. Interest also grows in North America, and sportswear company NIKE commissions them to record music for a television advertisement using footage of Ukrainian pole vaulter Sergey Bubka, which is shown globally.

The EP Pisni Iz The Smiths contains Ukrainian-language versions of four songs by The Smiths and is voted No. 1 Single of the Year in Berlin. It also sets a pattern for later reinterpretations of Western songs in Ukrainian style. Other artists they Ukrainianise include The Sex Pistols, The Velvet Underground, T Rex, Prince, The Tornados, Plastic Bertrand and Kraftwerk.

The album Vorony expands their reach across much of Europe and leads to a 110-date tour from western Spain to eastern Ukraine. The band appears at festivals including Glastonbury and WOMAD, and at many world music, folk, indie, dance and rock events across western, central and eastern Europe. They also tour Ukraine as guests of the Ministry of Culture, ending with a performance in Kyiv’s Independence Square before a crowd of 75,000 at an internationally televised event marking Ukraine’s independence from the Soviet Union.

Later releases

The album Kultura draws heavily on the experiences from that Ukrainian tour and helps extend the band's profile in Poland, as well as among college radio listeners and Ukrainian émigré communities in the USA and Canada. Their fourth studio album, Respublika, consists mostly of traditional songs and is recorded quickly, giving it a post-punk urgency that recalls the early John Peel sessions by The Wedding Present. It receives heavy radio play across central and eastern Europe. In 2009, the band releases Diaspora, an album focused on migration, leaving home, and making a new life elsewhere.

Line-up

Members associated with the group include Roman Remeynes, The Legendary Len Liggins, Peter Solowka, Michael Linden West, James Booth-Howe, Paul 'Dino' Briggs, Steve "Mr Steff" Tymruk, Paul Weatherhead, Woody, Dave Lee, Stepan Pasicznyk and Oleksa Semenchenko.

Style

The Ukrainians’ work sits across folk, post-punk, pub rock, ska punk and swing revival, with a particular focus on Ukrainian folk material adapted into a high-energy rock format.