Bil Sabab Power Hour: Partisan Forest - Лента за лентою

You know sometimes you need to go back to the roots and listen to some oldies...

"Round by round" (Lenta za Lentoyu) is an old song from the glory days of Ukrainian Rebel Army (UPA). It is about relentless and seemingly endless struggle, love and war and all the things Ernest Hemingway would appreciate. It is unabashedly upbeat to the point of ridiculousness. It's an inciting contemplative war cry filled with little details that flesh out the characters and setting of the song to the point that you can actually relate to it in a very bizarre but honest way.



I wouldn't dare to translate this song but i can retell it. There's a fierce skirmish between Ukrainians and Soviets. It's early evening and the heat is intense. Machine-gun covers the scene and keeps the bastards down. Then the gunner got shot and the medic came around. They look at each other - right in the eyes - and it seems like they know each other. But the gunner is critically wounded and enemies are coming closer. So the girl takes the machine-gun and resumes the shooting. Because the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few.

The version is recorded by the little-known ska folk rock band from Yalta called Partisan Forest. Unlike other modern interpretation that go overboard with militant theme or romantic feel - this interpretation is balancing between both before raving up in the end.

The story of the song is utterly fascinating. In the summer of 1944 after a succesful skirmish member of Security Forces (SB) of Organisation of Ukrainian Nationalist (OUN) Mykola Sorokalit AKA  "Lyutiy" (Angry or Mad as Hell) wrote a poem which started with words "The evening's coming down...". A bit later his brother-in-arms Vasyl Zastavniy AKA "Shershen'" (Hornet) composed a melody to it. One of the first documented performances of the song was somewhen in April of 1945 when UPA troops were surrounded by the soviets and attempted a breakthrough near Radvantsi village. At some point of the battle Antin Sharko AKA "Girka" (The Hill) and Volodymyr Bashko "Zimbryna" started to chant the song. The words went through the troops and it substantially imrpoved morale and they broke through the surrounding. Later this episode was mentioned when Sharko was awarded with Silver Cross.

In 1959 the song was transcribed by Roman Levytskiy for his his anthology of rebel songs. You can see the scans below and i dare you to perform it: