Pink Floyd Releases First New Song in 28 Years

For the first time in 28 years, Pink Floyd has released a brand new song. “Hey Hey Rise Up” was recorded on March 30th as a means to raise money for Ukrainian humanitarian relief. It features original players David Gilmour and Nick Mason joined by longtime Pink Floyd bassist Guy Pratt and keyboardist Nitin Sawhney as well as guest vocals by Andriy Khlyvnyuk of the Ukrainian band Boombox.

“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,” guitarist Gilmour states. “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 Defense. 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.”

The sampled Instagram clip has Andriy singing “The Red Viburnum In The Meadow”, which is a Ukrainian protest song written during World War I. Pink Floyd also released a music video to accompany the track. Watch Pratt and Pink Floyd perform:

“I hope it will receive wide support and publicity,” Gilmour says of the song. “We want to raise funds for humanitarian charities and raise morale. 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”.

“Hey Hey Rise Up” is available now through digital distributors like iTunes, Amazon MP3, Spotify, and more.