A wonderful song about underrated “geniuses” who keep trying every which way to prove their brilliance to the whole world — and the world just doesn’t appreciate them. I’d never heard of this Ukrainian band before, Spiv Brativ. Literally translated from Ukrainian, “spiv brativ” means “brothers’ singing,” since the band consists of four biological brothers. I have no idea how they divided up the roles within the group.
The song is in Ukrainian, which isn’t a problem for me — and for everyone else I’d recommend using YouTube’s new AI feature, which can now show captions with an automatic translation into your chosen language. There are small glitches here and there, but in English the meaning comes through perfectly.
I’ve had it on repeat for a month now — it’s a masterpiece.
I read this book by Henry Lion Oldie exactly one year ago, just a couple of months after their wartime diary, Invasion. This book is a collection of science fiction stories, but all of them revolve around one central theme — the war in Ukraine.
And today, it is impossible to separate them from real events, no matter how much you try to convince yourself that it’s “just fiction.” Because this “fantasy” feels far too real, and all the speculative elements are simply a backdrop for what’s going on in the minds of the authors — and in the minds of many people right now.
Normally, I try to write thoughtful and fairly in-depth reviews of books, but with this one, I couldn’t bring myself to write anything substantial for an entire year. It always felt like whatever clever ideas or interpretations I might come up with, any metaphors or hidden meanings I could find, would all crash into the wall of reality — a reality more fantastical and terrifying than fiction itself.
Even in their stories, the authors include fragments of autobiography. In The Small Circle, there are brief excerpts from their real diary.
And in the story Those Who Follow Me, they describe a magical wall that shuts the world away from the horrors of Mordor. A few years ago, I would have read that as quirky sci-fi. But now I realize — this is a dream many people share. They truly want an impenetrable wall to keep Mordor out. For many, many years to come.
I considered writing nothing about this book at all. But in the end, I decided to limit myself to a short note. Not all of the stories struck me as strong pieces of science fiction — and I did try to evaluate the book as a work of literature — so my overall rating is lower than for other story collections, whether by Oldie or other authors.
However, as a kind of mirror to our era and this war, the book deserves a much higher score. It is a must-read. At the very least, to get a glimpse of how this is being experienced, and how it finds expression in literature, by those who have now lived with this war for three years. Where people are dying who never wanted to fight — and every month brings news of children killed, children who should only have ever learned about war from history books.
P.S. I’m sorry I’m not able to write a proper review right now.
At one point, I was in charge of the audio design service department at Wargaming and even got to participate in a field recording of real tanks in Jordan. Officially, I was in charge of the entire trip, but in reality, I was mostly getting in everyone’s way 😉
A bit later, we decided to restructure the team, but I still maintained (and continue to maintain) good relationships with many of the guys. I remember when a new guy, Andrey, joined the Minsk team—now widely known as Andrius Klimka, the creator of many iconic tracks from the game World of Tanks as well as its promo videos.
Andrey truly crafted some legendary tracks, and a couple of them have found a permanent place in my playlist. Those are the ones I want to share today.
Since childhood, I’ve had a weakness for beautiful books. I might not even read them, but I’ll buy them just for their beauty (although lately, I’ve been buying more electronic ones).
That’s how Garik Korogodsky’s book first caught my attention — because of its design. I had no idea who this Korogodsky was, but the book sitting on my friends’ shelf simply demanded that I reach for it. And once I read the subtitle “and other stories of a Jewish boy,” its fate was sealed (I guess I have a genetic affinity for stories about Jewish boys). Interestingly, the book came to my friends from the previous owners of their apartments, and my friends hadn’t read it themselves.
First, a few words about the author. Garik Korogodsky, born Grigory Davidovich Korogodsky, has always been called Garik within his family. However, in the USSR, they didn’t want to put such a name on his birth certificate (I had a similar situation with my mom). Garik is a Ukrainian businessman and philanthropist, a dollar millionaire.
Originally, when planning his series on the history of the Russian state, Boris Akunin intended to stop at 1917, with the fall of the Romanov dynasty, as he believed that beyond this point, it was no longer the history of the Russian state but of an entirely different country.
However, some time after completing the series, he unexpectedly announced the release of the 10th volume covering the Lenin-Stalin era. Moreover, this volume became the first that was not published in Russia, as when the book was almost ready for print, Boris Akunin was declared a terrorist in Russia, closing off access to publishing in his homeland. So the book was printed abroad.
While the revolution and the last tsar always felt distant to me, despite having lived during the Soviet Union, the events of the Soviet state itself were always closer. I studied this history in school and believed that I lived in the best country in the world. Therefore, I was very eager to see how Boris Akunin would recount this period.
About a year and a half ago, I wrote about Pavel Filatyev’s book, which was essentially an account of the first days of Russia’s war against Ukraine seen through the eyes of a Russian contract soldier. Even then, I wanted to believe that all this horror would soon be over.
But two years have already passed since Russia attacked Ukraine, and there’s still no end in sight. As a child, reading about the Great Patriotic War, I used to think that four years of that war was a whole lifetime. By that measure, Ukraine has already been at war for half a lifetime.
The initial shock has long since faded, and any hope of a quick ending is gone for good. And then a book came out by the remarkable Ukrainian authors Dmitry Gromov and Oleg Ladyzhensky, whom all fans of sci-fi know under the pen name Henry Lion Oldie.
Both authors are from Kharkiv — a city where, before the war, Russian was heard far more often than Ukrainian, even though its residents considered themselves Ukrainian. Before the war, Oldie were seen as purely Russian-language authors. They wrote in Russian, a language they command better than most Russians do.
But on February 24, 2022, war came to their home; Russian missiles and bombs began to fall on their city. And both of them, Dmitry and Oleg, started keeping a diary.
This time I won’t write anything of my own. I’ll just quote the text for this video from Nogu Svelo! themselves:
Today is a terrible date for each of us—the anniversary of the start of Russia’s military invasion of Ukraine. It is still hard to believe; it is very hard to accept. We see daily reports of new destruction and new victims. Hundreds of thousands of people have been killed or wounded; millions have lost their homes and were forced to leave their native country without knowing when they will be able to return. It is a grief that cannot be measured in numbers. On this day we want to say: “We stand with you—in spirit and in deed.” We have already held more than one charity concert, supporting and helping to raise funds for Ukrainian hospitals and refugees. And we will continue to help for as long as it takes. Until the missiles stop flying, until people return to their homes, until peace comes.
Our new release is dedicated not only to every Ukrainian, but to everyone who stands against the darkness closing in around us. Maksim doesn’t speak Ukrainian, but he specifically learned and performed a few lines at the end. You’ve already heard this song—it’s “Ukraine.” But on this day we perform it in a new way—in a church, with an organ. Many thanks to director Alexey Musin, who filmed the original music video and has now taken on this new work. Thanks to the whole team. Thank you for your support and sincerity.
It’s been a long time since I last wrote about good songs. Now it’s time to talk about one that my younger children have come to love — and which we’ve already listened to dozens of times.
The song was made very popular by the TV series Vikings, although in fact it is more than a thousand years old. In English it is known by its opening words, “My mother told me”, while in Old Norse (Common Scandinavian) it sounded as “Þat mælti mín móðir.”
In the series, the song is performed by two brothers who, upon hearing each other’s voices, realize that both are still alive after the battle. But, as I said, after the series the song began to be heard in many places; it was even added to various videos on Viking themes (for example, over the trailer for Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla video game). In many versions, performers limit themselves to just about a single verse, which is repeated several times:
My mother told me
Someday I would buy
Galleys with good oars
Sail to distant shores
The song is dated to around the 9th century AD. And in this text, historians say, is reflected the time when the Vikings no longer had enough land of their own and resolved not only to go on distant raids but even began to contemplate settling in other lands — in particular, England and Ireland. On the subject of the full text of the song, there is an interesting article by archaeologist Martine Kaspersen: http://www.scandinavianarchaeology.com/my_mother_told_me/.
I’m going to say something that might sound sacrilegious to some: I was never a fan of Yegor Letov or his band Grazhdanskaya Oborona (Civil Defense). Even though I’ve listened to pretty much all of their albums. Sure, I know some of the songs very well—but I never felt the urge to go back and listen again.
And then, a few months ago, I stumbled upon a music video by Noize MC. The song had the same title as one of Letov’s most famous tracks—“Vsyo kak u lyudey” (“Everything Like the Others”). And that’s no coincidence. This track was written for a Yegor Letov tribute album as a kind of homage. But Noize MC didn’t just cover the original—he wrote a completely new, original song. The only part preserved from Letov’s version is the chorus, sung by Letov himself between Noize’s verses.
And this version really hit me. Maybe because it feels so much closer to the present moment, while fully preserving the spirit of Letov’s original message.
Interestingly, the video came out in 2019—but if you look at Noize’s outfit, you’d think it was filmed during the madness of the current war. The colors of his jumpsuit are very fitting.
Many media outlets wrote about Pavel Filatyev’s book, as it offered a view of the war in Ukraine through the eyes of a professional Russian soldier who found himself there from the very first days.
Pavel Filatyev is a junior sergeant in the Russian Airborne Forces and comes from a military family. His father was also a paratrooper, and Pavel essentially grew up on a military base—where he would later return to serve. A real military lineage, much like in the Soviet film Officers, where they serve because “there is such a profession — to defend the Motherland.”
Moreover, both his father and Pavel himself were not just stationed idly at their units—they had real combat experience. Pavel fought in Chechnya. However, over time, the army became increasingly irrelevant, and he left for civilian life, where he spent nearly 10 years doing work unrelated to the military. But after a failed business venture and financial difficulties, he began considering a return to the army under a contract. He specifically wanted to join the same unit he’d known since childhood—though by then, it had already been restructured and relocated from his hometown to Feodosia, in Crimea, which had by that point been annexed.
