The band Lyapis Trubetskoy started as a “backyard thug” group, but over the years, they became more professional, powerful, and intense. The song Warriors of Light became something of an anthem for Ukraine’s Maidan (and, by the way, Viktor Tsoi appears in the music video).
In 2012, the band released a powerful interpretation of the poem Who Are You? by the great Belarusian poet Yanka Kupala, written in 1908, as part of the album Rabkor. The song Do Not Be Cattle feels like an anthem of the 1917 Revolution, and the video is filmed in a matching style.
A brilliant performance. Unfortunately, at the height of their success, the band suddenly fizzled out and fell apart. The successor bands Brutto and Trubetskoy have yet to reach the peaks of the original Lyapis.
Yanka Kupala Who Are You?
(literal, non-poetic translation into English):
Who are you?
— One of us, a local.
What do you want?
— A better fate.
What kind of fate?
— Bread, salt.
And what more?
— Land, freedom.
Where were you born?
— In my village.
Where were you baptized?
— By the roadside.
What are you consecrated with?
— Blood, sweat.
What do you want to be?
— Not to be cattle.
