Vladyslav Tsarenko - From Ukraine to Prague: Music as Cultural Currency

Send us a text

On this episode, we sit down with Vladyslav Tsarenko, CEO at All4band Design, an artwork and design studio for rock and metal bands, and guitarist with multiple musical projects, originally from Ukraine now living in Prague, Czech Republic. We talk about how music was his shared language and cultural currency that helped him navigate numerous moves from Kharkiv, Ukraine to Yevpatoria in Crimea and then another move to Prague, Czech Republic. Not only his interest in music, but his ability to play guitar served as his entry point to making new connections and forming tight relationships. During our conversation , we discuss Linkin Park, Metallica, Bullet for My Valentine, Architects, Snow Patrol, and Vlad’s instrumental project, Sad Saint.  

Check out All4Band Design: Website, Instagram, and Facebook 

Vlad’s Instrumental Project, Sad Saint on YouTube 

Vlad’s post-rock project, Diary of My Misanthropy on YouTube

Follow your hosts David, Raza, and Carolina every other week as they embark on an epic adventure to find the songs that are stuck to us like audible tattoos that tell the story of who we are and where we’ve been, to help us figure out where we’re going. It’s a life story told through 6 songs.

WHO WE ARE

DAVID: Creator & Host @ALifeinSixSongs

Facilitator & Educator | Music-Based Healing | Musician | Curiosity with Loving Kindness

CAROLINA: Co-Host @ALifeinSixSongs

Storyteller | Professional Facilitator

RAZA: Co-Host @ALifeinSixSongs

Lawyer | Producer | Solo Project: Solamente | @razaismyname

RESOURCES & LINKS

• Liked songs from this life story? Check out A Life in Six Songs playlist on Apple Music and Spotify
• Follow A Life in Six Songs on Instagram, LinkedIn, and YouTube
• Are you a veteran who is struggling? Call the Veterans Crisis Line: Dial 988, then press 1.
• Support our work!
• Subscribe to our YouTube channel 
• Don’t keep us all to yourself! Share our podcast with your people!
• Reach out to us at [e-mail]

Support the show

Copyright Disclaimer: Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976, allowance is made for "fair use" for purposes such as criticism, commentary, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit or educational use tips the balance in favor of fair use. The original work played in this video has been significantly transformed for the purpose of commentary, criticism, and education.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:02):
did you consciously go back to music you were
already listening to and kind ofre-look at those lyrics, like
Raza said, like the meaning insome of the older Metallica
songs and things like that?
Was that something you didconsciously?
Did it happen, or was it morefocused on the new music?

Speaker 2 (00:20):
you were finding.
I think that I revisited mostof the music that I listened to
earlier, but, to be honest, Iwas disappointed with many of
the songs I liked.

Speaker 1 (00:31):
So maybe like, let me not ruin it, Let me just keep
those songs as good songs andnot yeah.
That's funny, that's funny,that's good stuff.

Speaker 3 (00:45):
Thank you.

Speaker 1 (01:15):
Hey everybody, welcome to another episode of A
Life in Six Songs.
I am your host, david Reese,and I'm joined by my co-hosts
Carolina and Raza.

Speaker 4 (01:24):
Hey, hey, hey.

Speaker 1 (01:25):
Hello, for anybody new out there and this is your
first episode that you'rechecking out what we do on this
show is we go on a little tripwith our guests to find those
songs that get stuck to us, likethese audible tattoos that tell
the story of who we are andwhere we've been to help us
figure out where we're going.
It's a life story told throughsix songs.

(01:47):
We come to these conversationswith love, kindness and
curiosity to counter theprevalence of hate, anger and
judgment in the world.
Our guiding view, with a nod toTed Lasso, is be curious, not
judgmental.
We hope that by listening tothese songs and stories you can
bring more love, kindness andcuriosity into your own life.

(02:09):
With that, let's go have alisten together.
Our guest today is VladislavSarenko.
Vlad is a CEO at All4BandDesign, an artwork and design
studio for rock and metal bands.
He's also an independentmusician, playing guitar in
numerous bands throughout hispast.

(02:30):
Currently, he mostly makesinstrumental music under the
names Sad Saint and Diary of myMisanthropy.
Ukrainian by birth, vlad hasspent most of his life in Prague
, czech Republic, where hecurrently lives with his wife
and son.
Vlad.
Welcome to A Life in Six Songs.

Speaker 2 (02:50):
Hey guys, Thank you for having me on the podcast.

Speaker 1 (02:54):
Absolutely.
We're excited to chat with youand get into your songs.
To you know, just to kick usoff before we get into your
actual songs, we like to do justa little warm-up question.
So if you could just, you know,briefly tell us about what role
music plays in your life.
How do you see music fittinginto your life?

Speaker 2 (03:14):
Yeah, music has a huge role in my life, from my
career to my hobbies.
I basically, yeah, I live music.

Speaker 1 (03:24):
Yeah, absolutely yeah , and that's why we got you on
the show.
You know, yeah, it is.
It is related to your job andyour life.
So, yeah, well, let's get intoit with your, with your first
song.
So you know, those key momentsin life are those, those times
we first get exposed to a band'sart, a band's music or an

(03:45):
artist's music.
So, for this first song, what'sa memorable time when you were
first exposed to a band's music?
What was the song played?
Who played it for you?
How'd you come across it?

Speaker 2 (03:57):
So the song I wanted to mention is In the End, by
Linkin Park.

Speaker 1 (04:02):
Nice, nice, let's take a quick listen and then
we'll chat on the other side.

Speaker 6 (04:06):
I kept everything inside and, even though I tried
it, all fell apart.

Speaker 3 (04:10):
What it meant to be will eventually be a memory of a
time I tried so hard and got sofar, but in the end it doesn't
even matter.

Speaker 1 (04:22):
I had to fall to lose it all, but in the end it
doesn't even matter.
All right, so what's the storybehind the song?
Set it up for us.

Speaker 2 (04:38):
So I actually discovered this song in a very
peculiar way when I was, I think, 12 years old, me and my
friends, we were playing a videogame.
It was actually not even a fullgame, it was just some kind of
demo of the game that was namedCrimsonland.
It just had one level and threesongs as the soundtrack, and

(05:01):
two of them were songs byErasmus, In the Shadows and For
the Day of my Life, and thethird one was In the End by
Linkin Park, and basically justthree songs.
So we were playing this gamelike thousands of times and we
were listening to these threesongs over and over and it just

(05:23):
got me hooked.
And actually it was not justthe first song by Linkin Park or
the first alternative song thatI heard.
It was the first song that Iremember liking, because the
music I was listening to beforethat I didn't really like it.
I was listening to mostly rapmusic.

(05:45):
I was listening to it because Ihad a cousin who was three
years older than me and he wasinto all this, you know gangsta
culture.
He was listening to rap and Iwas looking up to him, so I was
listening to rap too.
You know to look tough to beamong cool guys.

(06:07):
So, yeah, I was listening torap.
I can't even remember one songI was listening to, so there
wasn't really something I liked.
So in the end, my Linkin Parkwas the very first song that I
really really liked, and once Iwas hooked to it, I went on the

(06:29):
internet.
I just started to look into theband.
I found Meteor and HebrewTheory.
I think it was just when theywere released, so I found some
pirated versions of the albumsand I started to listen to them

(06:49):
a lot.
Yeah, I was listening to LinkinPark all the time because I
didn't have any exposure toother music at the time.
So, it was the first band Ireally liked, and I started to
find more bands like this, andthis is how I basically got into

(07:09):
heavier music.
I started to listen to metaland I decided that I wanted to
learn guitar, playing guitar andthis is how my journey started.

Speaker 1 (07:23):
Nice, and so you said this was about 12 years old.
Where were you living at thetime?

Speaker 2 (07:28):
I was living in Kharkiv.
Kharkiv is a big city in theeastern part of Ukraine it's
actually the closest one toRussia right now and I moved
there with my mom and with mystepdad when I was seven.
Before that, I lived in a verysmall village, so we moved to

(07:51):
Kharkiv.
Life in Kharkiv was quite toughat the time because it was late
90s, the beginning of 2000s,and it was tough in Ukraine
because people were poor andmost of our parents, they spent
all their time trying to makemoney, and most of us kids, we

(08:13):
were just left to ourselves.
So we just, you know, we spenttime playing in the streets or
coming to our friends'apartments to the guys who had
computers or consoles, you know,stuff that we can entertain
ourselves with.
So we spent a lot of timeplaying video games.

(08:36):
This is one of the reasons howI discovered this song and you
know it wasn't very safe in thestreets at the time so this is
the reason why we wanted youknow, to look tough, to be tough
.
This is why I was into thisgangster culture just to pretend

(08:56):
I'm tough because, to be honest, I wasn't and I was quite
scared when I was working in thestreets yeah, yeah it's wait.

Speaker 4 (09:13):
I let Carolina say that oh no, I was just saying.
Of course you're not tough.
You were a kid, you were littleand young and it can be hard if
your parents aren't aroundbecause they have to work,
because you have to survive.
But this is sometimes where,like magic happens.
You know, at your friend'shouses doing exploring, playing

(09:34):
stuff, pirating music, you knowit's super fun at the time.
But that's that can be wherelike some magic happens.

Speaker 2 (09:41):
So yeah, yeah, yeah, and some magic happens.
So yeah, yeah, yeah.
And you know, this is how wegot our independence as kids,
because we were by ourselves, wewere exploring all the time.
So we were exploring new music,new games, new stuff.
Because now you have a lot ofstuff, you know, grabbing your

(10:02):
attention music, video games,books, youtube, everything
Before, before internet becameso big you had to actually look
for stuff, you know.
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (10:19):
Right and you had to have patience, like the internet
wasn't automatic, it was slow,it didn't always work.
It you know, you had to committo finding that thing you wanted
to find exactly.
Yeah, rosa, what were you gonnasay?
I?

Speaker 5 (10:33):
was just gonna say yeah, um it.
To me it's really interestinghow, how you know how sort of
hip-hop culture and streetculture was was resonating with
you guys as kids.
You know it's, you know theidea of of appearing hard and
appearing, you know, tough andand street smart and and and and
things like that, um and uh,yeah and.

(10:57):
But I was going to kind ofbring it back to lincoln park
because in a way, from a musicalperspective right, I mean, I
know sort of heavier music ismuch more your thing now, but
Linkin Park seems like theperfect bridge between hip-hop
you know, toward.
You know more guitar heavy anddrum heavy.
You know sort of rock and metaland other styles of metal.

(11:20):
So from that side it reallymakes sense.

Speaker 2 (11:23):
I think Linkin Park gets mentioned in your show
quite a lot because, it's alwaysthe entry point into metal
music for many people yeah, Iwas.

Speaker 1 (11:34):
I was going to say that that lincoln park has
definitely been on the showbefore and we've had a few
artists, I think, come up morethan once.
But yeah, I think you're.
You're exactly right there,vlad, in the sense of you know,
lincoln park was, was a song orwas a group for a lot of people.
Right, it exposed them tosomething new in in both
directions.
Right, yeah, it could have beenpeople finding heavier music or

(11:57):
people from heavier musicgetting into maybe hip-hop or
something else, because it wasthis you know that time of the
early 2000s, the new metal, youknow this bridge between it
where all these genres were kindof coming together and do
things, and so you have thesecouple artists that were like
these gateways for people tocome in and then go find newer,
newer things.

Speaker 2 (12:14):
So because I don't think I would have got into
metal music if I started withsomething heavier, because
lincoln park was like theperfect music to start listening
to heavier music.

Speaker 1 (12:27):
Yeah, yeah, they had a little bit of everything right
, I mean.

Speaker 5 (12:31):
And then this song was one of I mean one of the
greatest choruses in all time.
But you know Chester's voiceand it's got like sort of like
the freestyle rap section aswell.

Speaker 2 (12:47):
Yeah, it's a great song all around.
This is still one of myfavorite songs ever and I even
made a post-rock cover of it.

Speaker 1 (12:55):
It still should be somewhere on youtube all right,
yeah, nice nice post, some linkswe got some things to search
for For sure.
Awesome, great first song,great first story, getting us
into your journey into heaviermusic and things like that.

(13:16):
You talked a little bit of howit's not that this song helped
you through the tough time, butit was part of a tough time.
Music can definitely be thatfor us, of a thing that helps us
through um a difficult time oris there with us while we're
going through it for that.
So for your next song, you knowwhat is a song that helped you

(13:37):
through um a difficult time andwhat was the situation.

Speaker 2 (13:41):
Uh, this is Metallica .

Speaker 3 (13:53):
Nothing else matters.
This is Metallica.
Nothing Else Matters, Nothingelse matters.
Trust I seek and I find in you.

Speaker 1 (14:11):
Great song.
What was the difficultsituation?
Tell us the story behind it.

Speaker 2 (14:18):
Yeah, this one brought a lot of memories.
So, yeah, the situation wasthat when I was 15 years old, I
was still living in Kharkiv.
I started to have problems inschool because my friend and I
we like the same girl and, yeah,he was the one who did the

(14:42):
first move, but it didn't workout.
So I did my move and weactually started dating with
that girl and my friend.
He didn't take it well, so hestarted to turn my friends
against me and they made theirbest to make my life miserable

(15:05):
in school.
And you know how it goes whenyou're 18, yeah, uh.
So, yeah, I was having a veryhard time in school and at that
time my parents they um,actually they were not around
because they bought a piece ofland in Crimea Crimea was still
part of Ukraine at the time andthey wanted to build a house

(15:29):
there and move there someday.
So most of the time I waseither alone or with my aunt.
So you know they were notaround to see what's going on in
my life Right right.
And at some point, theseproblems, they started to affect

(15:53):
my grades in the school.
So this was when my parentsnoticed that something went
wrong and they told me that theywant me to move with them to
Crimea.
And since I already broke upwith my girlfriend by this time,
so I didn't fight it, I justtold them that, okay, yeah,

(16:17):
let's move.
So we moved to Crimea, to asmaller city.
It's called Evpatoria.
It was about 100,000 people,quite big, not very small, but

(16:38):
much smaller than Kharkiv.

Speaker 1 (16:39):
Right right.

Speaker 2 (16:42):
I didn't know anyone.
So my parents made me to go toa mathematics school and it was
very hard there because I wasgood in school.
I was the best student inschool in Kharkiv, but I was
just in a normal school and theone in F Patoria.
It was mostly focused onmathematics and physics and they

(17:02):
had like 20 hours ofmathematics every week.
So I was behind.
Yeah, I was behind, and Ididn't know anybody.
I didn't have any friends.
So it was like a very toughmoment for me.
But there was a situation thatchanged things for me.
One day, when I came to school,I noticed that there were

(17:28):
acoustic guitars in the back ofthe class and some of the guys
from my class.
They brought guitars with themand it turned out that they play
music during the breaks, justsome street rock music, like we
call it.
Just, you know, simple musicthat you can play with four
shirts nothing complicated.

(17:50):
So they started to play and Icame to them and by that time I
actually I played acousticguitar quite well, because in
Kharkiv I was going to musicschool, I had three years of
music education and I actuallyplayed Spanish classic music,

(18:12):
but as a part of my exam Iplayed Metallica, nothing Else
Matters.
Actually, it wasn't even thesong that I listened to.
At the time I didn't know aboutit, but my teacher, she, was
into Metallica Nice.

Speaker 3 (18:33):
She was an older music.

Speaker 2 (18:35):
Funny enough, she was an older woman who enjoyed
Metallica.
So, yeah, he asked me to learnthis song and I really really
enjoyed it because, you know,it's amazing to play it.
It's very complex, it has a lotof going on there, so it's

(18:56):
really interesting to play andso I played it in my exam and I
knew this song very well.
So in this class, when I metthese guys, I told them that I
play guitar too and I asked toborrow their guitars just to
play something.
And I played Nothing ElseMatters and the guys were like

(19:18):
they were really surprisedbecause it's compared to the
street rock music that theyplayed it was like very, very
top-notch stuff.
Yeah, and after this we becamegood friends.
They asked me to play musicwith them.
We made a school rock band,started to play music on

(19:42):
different events in our schooland after a few months I helped
them learn this song with meNothing Else Matters and we
played it together on one of theschool events.
It was a really nice moment.

Speaker 1 (19:57):
That's awesome.
I love the story becausesometimes we have that song that
helps us through a difficulttime, cause it was like the song
we were listening to orsomething like that.
Like here, this song nothingelse matters by Metallica is
like it.
It is, it is the vehicle that'shelping you through it.

(20:18):
Like it is the thing, thatbrought you together with other
people, started to make friendsand and helped you make this
shift from this tough experiencein your old school and then
connect with people in your newschool, and that's so beautiful.

Speaker 2 (20:36):
Yes, exactly, we are still very good friends with
those guys.
We had a lot of great momentstogether.
That's amazing.

Speaker 4 (20:43):
And we had a lot of great moments together.
That's amazing.
Applause to your music teacherfor teaching you something just
different and like opening up awhole world for you.

Speaker 2 (20:54):
Yeah, yeah, I'm so grateful to her.
Yeah, I would like to see heragain, but since I haven't been
to Harkin for a really, reallylong time, yeah, I didn't have a
chance.

Speaker 5 (21:05):
Yeah, so obviously, you know we're talking about
Ukraine and we're talking aboutKharkiv and some of these cities
that are very, very relevanteven right now, especially right
now.
Yeah, I don't know if you'reokay to maybe give us a little
bit of a like taking a step backperspective and telling us

(21:28):
about maybe your friends or yourfamily and some of these people
that are in your story fromyour teenage years.
You know how are things, how iseveryone, if you look at it
from today's perspective.

Speaker 2 (21:40):
Yeah, my family actually still lives in Kharkiv.
My parents they moved to Crimeabut after it was occupied by
Russia they moved back toKharkiv and they still live
there and now it's actually avery hard time for them because

(22:00):
it's shelling, airstrikes, it'sgoing on every day.
But luckily my parents theylive in the southern part of
Kharkiv so it's a little bitcolder there.
Yeah, I hope my mom, sheactually can leave Ukraine.
My parents they have propertyin Prague and they can go there

(22:22):
and live there, but my father hecannot because he's not allowed
.
My mother is allowed, sosometimes she and my sister they
go to Prague to spend some timethere, but then they start to
miss my father and they go backto Kharkiv.
Yeah, because you know the warhas been going going on for

(22:45):
three years and people they justthey have to live their lives
somehow.
So first year a lot of peoplethey just went as refugees to
other countries, including mymom and my sister and my
grandmother as well.
But after a while they justcouldn't bear living in a

(23:06):
different country being refugees, so they all went back to
Ukraine.

Speaker 1 (23:14):
Yeah, yeah, thank you for sharing that.

Speaker 2 (23:18):
Yeah, yeah, and actually an interesting thing is
that I have a lot of friendsfrom Crimea and you know, a lot
of people think that people inCrimea actually supported what
was going on in Crimea, but thisis not true and, my friends,
they are good proof of that,because almost all of them moved

(23:43):
from Crimea either to Ukraineor to different countries
because they didn't want to stayin the occupied Crimea, and a
lot of new people came to Crimeaand this is how all this myth
about how people supported thiswas created because people who

(24:04):
didn't support it, they justmoved to ukraine right, right,
yeah, they just left and peoplewho supported they.
They left.
I mean they were living incrimea.

Speaker 1 (24:17):
So people saw that this is all the people who
supported it right, right, they,you know whoever it is talk to
talk to some people and they say, yeah, we support it, but those
aren't the people who supportedit.
Right right they.
You know whoever it is talk totalks to some people and they
say, yeah, we support it, butthose aren't the people that
yeah, were there originallythere, those people?
Are gone.
So you, you, you have, you know, a selective sample of people,
right?

Speaker 5 (24:37):
yeah, exactly in in the in the last song, and then
you know you mentioned that youwere around 12 or 13 years old.
If you look at or if you hearabout other stories of younger
teens kids now you know age 12,13, things like that who were
obviously much younger when thisinvasion began and when the war

(25:00):
began three years ago Can yougive us a sense of, or do you
know of, of you know how, howthe kids are doing, how how
their day-to-day live lives are?
Um, do they have access to, youknow, just a period of peace
and quiet where they could maybeplay a video game or two, or or

(25:22):
?
I mean, I'd love to hear whatyou know, what the adults,
especially the male adults, arerequired to be part of the
military and serve.
There's certain rules that I'lllet folks figure out what they
are, but could you give us asense of what daily lives for
kids are like these days?

Speaker 2 (25:40):
To be honest, I think that most kids, like most
parents who have kids, they moveto different countries Because
in Ukraine there is nopossibility of education right
now, because most schools, atleast in eastern part of Ukraine
, they are completely destroyedand, for example, the schools

(26:02):
that I was going to completelydestroyed like nothing left.
So everyone who has kids, theytry to move to a different
country to make at least somekind of normal life for their
kids.
And, for example, I have acouple of cousins who are in

(26:24):
teen age right now and now someof them live in Germany, some of
them live in Czech Republic.
They started to go to localschools but at the same time in
Ukraine we have like longdistance education, so most kids
study at the same timesimultaneously in local schools

(26:47):
and in Ukraine because theydon't know if they're going back
or not.
For example, my cousin, the onewho lives in Germany right now,
she actually finishes school ina year and she's thinking about
going back to Ukraine to go touniversity.
But I, to be honest, I I can'timagine how, how it's going to

(27:11):
work, because you know the waris still going on and most of
universities are closed, butshe's afraid to live in a
different country because herparents just cannot afford for
her to stay long term.
So she wants to stay, but she'snot sure if she can afford it.
It's a lot of uncertainty, yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:39):
Right, and that's how it is.
War just disrupts so manythings and, like you, shared you
know you Everyone tries to finda way to continue life and,
like you said, if you have kids,you're going to do what you can
to get them what they need.

(28:01):
Right and if they can't go toschool.
you're going to try and gosomewhere to find them school,
but it's like you said, it's notideal.
It's not what you would want,right?
You want to be going to schoolin your hometown, where you were
.
It's not what you would want,right?
You want to be going to schoolin your hometown, where you were
.
And so, yeah, thank you fortelling that story, because it
just shows how we're, you know,in the middle of it, right, as

(28:22):
people are still away and tryingto figure out what's next,
right, do I?
go back for university.
Do I move back?
Do we try?
And yeah, it's yeah.
So thank you for.
Thank you for just making thestory real for us and not just,
you know, a news headline.

Speaker 2 (28:42):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:45):
Anything else.

Speaker 4 (28:47):
Carolina Rasa.
No, I'm just processing all

Speaker 3 (28:50):
of that?
Yeah, no.

Speaker 5 (28:51):
I'm just processing all of that.
Obviously, yeah, we hearheadlines here, you know, but
the people that are actuallyaffected directly, that's been
their life for, you know, a fewyears now.

Speaker 2 (29:07):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (29:08):
And yeah, no, it's.
I mean, the one word that comesto mind is it sucks.
Yeah, it's, yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (29:28):
And I'm thinking of you and your moves and how music
has helped you, and I think myhope is that for young people
there's music that's helpingthem through this time also yeah
, yeah, I'm sure, I'm sure it isyeah, yeah, absolutely all
right.

Speaker 1 (29:42):
Well, let's move on to your next song, and so, um,
you know, music can be there, um, and help us through a
difficult time.
It can also be there when we'remaking transitions, right, I
think both of these songsalready have kind of, you know,
talked about that of atransition.
But for this next songspecifically, you know what is

(30:03):
the song that you associate witha weighty transition in your
life.

Speaker 2 (30:09):
So the song is Bullet for my Valentine, Suffocating
on the words of sorrow.

Speaker 1 (30:34):
Nice, let's take a listen.
What can I do to make you seeyour jealousy?
I'm suffocating, I'm tired.
Words of sorrow, words ofsorrow.
What was the transition and howdoes this song fit into it?

Speaker 2 (30:53):
Yeah, so, as you probably noticed, I moved a lot
in my life.
So when I finished my schooland I was 17 years old, I moved
to Prague, and it wasn'tactually my decision.
To be honest, my parents mademe move to Prague because they
wanted a better future for me.

(31:14):
Yeah, they didn't reallybelieve I will grow to my full
potential in Ukraine.
So they told me to move toPrague.
And I didn't want, because Ihad a girlfriend at the time and
I had a lot of friends, I had aband, I had a lot of stuff
going on in my life.
So, yeah, I was excited.
I was excited to live inUkraine.

(31:38):
But, yeah, there wasn't a reasonto fight with my parents
because, you know, when you're17, you are not really in
control of your life yet.
So I moved to Prague and,luckily, I didn't have to do all
the paperwork because myparents they had a visa at the

(31:58):
time and I got a visa that wasjust attached to their visa, so
I didn't have to do anything.
They just gave me a keys totheir apartment because I think
a year before I moved to Prague,they moved to Prague.
They got a mortgage, bought aplace, because they wanted to

(32:20):
move to Prague someday, but Imoved there first.

Speaker 1 (32:24):
Do you think it was?
Maybe partly they had the ideaof sending you there.
So they're like we'll startthis now so that Vlad has a
place to stay.

Speaker 2 (32:32):
Yeah, exactly, exactly, yeah.
So they gave me a key, boughtme tickets and told me to come
to Prague and to, you know, togo to university and start start
my life in Prague.
And I went there withoutknowing the language, without
knowing anyone there, so theyjust came there.

(32:53):
I had an address of theapartment.
I came there without knowingthe language, without knowing
anyone there, so I just camethere.
I had an address of theapartment.
I came there, I was likecompletely on my own and it was
again very tough, even tougherthan to move to Crimea, because
in Crimea I didn't have to learnthe language at least.
Right, right In Prague, I wasin a completely strange land.

(33:15):
It was really a cultural shockbecause life in Prague was very
different from what I used to.
And so I started to go touniversity there and I didn't
understand anything, I didn'thave any friends.
I just I, just, you know.

(33:37):
I just came to my lessons, sitthere, pretend I understand
something, then went back homeand played video games most of
the time.
So, it was like a typicalcollege Sounds like a typical
college.
Yeah, that's what we all did,yeah, but you know it didn't

(33:58):
really work well for me.
I was a little depressed, yeah,so I didn't go out much, so I
didn't have any friends.
I didn't know where to makefriends because I couldn't speak
Czech at the time yet.

Speaker 1 (34:15):
Right, right, it's normally like, because you would
normally like people go off tocollege and you might not know
people there, right, you mayhave, like, gone to a school
where, like, your friends wentto a different school or
something like that that youknew from you know high school
or whatever but here you hadthis extra layer of not speaking
the language and not knowingthe culture as much.
So it's like the things thatmight've been going on where

(34:37):
other university students aremeeting people.
You weren't probably, you know,rushing out to go there, Cause
it was I don't even know what itis, or how to communicate.

Speaker 2 (34:47):
Yeah yeah, the language barrier is yeah, so
real quick.

Speaker 5 (34:52):
So, if so, if you don't speak czech or you know so
, the locals speak czech.
You're coming from ukraine.
Yeah, is it english?
That's the bridge language, oris it?
There wasn't?
There's no bridge?

Speaker 2 (35:07):
yeah, yeah, this is the problem.
So I was supposed to learnczech as soon as possible.
Oh wow, but it took time.
So you know, my first year wasreally tough for me, because,
even if you know something, youcannot really speak, you cannot
open to people.

Speaker 4 (35:23):
Right yeah, how are you managing assignments and
classes and projects?

Speaker 2 (35:32):
I didn't really my first year, yeah, my first year.
I didn't finish it, so the nextyear I had to start again, but
at the time I was a little bitbetter in Czech.
So after the second year it gota little easier for me, Okay,
but the first year my onlychoice was to find other

(35:53):
immigrants from Ukraine and tomake some friends with them.
So this is actually thebeginning of the story.
I just found an ad on theInternet from this guy, Yarek.
He was looking for people toplay music with.
He was also a guitarist and Ijust responded and wanted to try

(36:18):
to play with him.
So I asked him like which songI have to learn, which song we
are going to play, and he askedme if I knew a bullet for my
Valentine.
I honestly had no idea who theywere.
So, okay, he told me, like thisis the song we are going to

(36:41):
play, so learn it.
And I listened to it and Ireally liked the riff there.
It sounds amazing.
So I learned the song and I cameto Jarek.
He was living with his parentsbecause he moved together with
his parents at the time and hehad a room in the attic that was

(37:02):
just for himself and he hadlike a ton of guitar equipment
there, so we would just take asix pack of beers, come to the
attic and just took out ourguitars and start playing.
Just take a six-pack of beers,come to the attic, just took out
our guitars and start playingand wow, yeah, this was amazing.
We had a very similar tastewith Jarek and he showed me a

(37:25):
lot of very cool music and hewas actually much better than me
in playing guitar, so I learneda lot from him.
And this song Suffocating on theWords of Sorrow it was the
first song that we played and itwas the start of our friendship
and the start of our band,because after a while we started

(37:46):
to make our own music, found afew more guys, made a band and
you know, we had like a properband, my first proper band with
geeks, recordings and everythingnice nice, very cool.

Speaker 1 (38:04):
I love that because it's it's, you know, we we have
this story of you moving toprague and and not language,
right, so not being able toconnect.
But then you know, you found afellow Ukrainian who you could
obviously speak to, but you alsohad this other shared language
around music, right.
And so again, it was musicbringing you together in this

(38:27):
really like awesome way, whichis, I think, one of the things,
like you know, why we all lovemusic so much and why we have
this show is to hear thesestories, because it can do this,
right it.
You know what's the bridgelanguage?
Well, here's the bridgelanguage right Music.

Speaker 5 (38:42):
That's awesome.
Yeah, I was thinking when yousort of your sort of
introduction to the story waswhat was?
You had mentioned that that youknow your dad had a
conversation with you to tellyou that you know, son vlad, we
have an apartment for you in inthe czech republic, and I was

(39:03):
thinking back to you know whatif my dad had had offered me an
apartment in prague and and mystory would have been completely
different, though I went theromantic route, which is, you
know, like all cinematic andamazing food.

Speaker 2 (39:18):
Yeah, because it sounds amazing.
Yeah, In theory it soundsamazing In theory.

Speaker 5 (39:22):
Right In theory, yeah , yeah, why am I?
Just because I'm fasting andI'm just starving, right, but
yeah, no, but yeah, no.
Music as music, this theme ofmusic as language and music as I
think Carolina mentioned oncethe word social currency it's

(39:43):
what we use to relate to otherpeople and especially when we're
figuring out life and and andand dealing with life, you know,
changes, we always kind of relyon our musical language to, you
know, to survive really.

Speaker 4 (39:56):
Right, and it looks like it's been that for you in a
couple of these stories, right,it was nothing else matters,
was that social currency.
For you to find new friends,like this is what I bring.
And people were like OK, let'sbe friends.
Okay, let's be friends.
And now here, right, findingsomeone, something to just help

(40:17):
you adjust to a new country, newlanguage, new school, new, you
know new surroundings.
So that's pretty cool.
Love the story.

Speaker 2 (40:28):
It was a big transition, you know, from this
geeky guy who mostly play videogames and don't want to go out,
to a guy who played geeks, youknow had a lot of friends had a
lot of hobbies and stuff likethat.
So like, for me it was a reallybig transition yeah yeah right,
I.

Speaker 4 (40:46):
I also think it's important to note, um, that it
takes some bravery to reach outto an ad on the internet of a
stranger to meet and play musictogether at a young age, right,
17,?
18 is still really young.
Yeah, I just I think I want togive you a praise for for being

(41:09):
brave at a young age.
You know you could have juststayed playing video games, but
you were like no, I want, I want, I want more yeah.
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (41:18):
Yeah, it's that.
That's that sort of what wewere saying before, talking
about what people do whenthey're amidst war and and and
destruction, and you sort of youdo what you can and you find a
way.
This of you do what you can andyou find a way.
This is another story of that.
In that individual sense of you, you find a way, um, but not
everyone does, and so, yeah,what carolina's saying, like

(41:39):
that's that's awesome, good foryou.
Yeah, I was also just kind ofcurious about it not to bring it
back to this, as we're talkingabout music but did university
go better, like once you gotinto the band and stuff?
Was that like?
Did that give you a, a sense of, like a home that then made the
challenge of university and andthe new language get get better

(42:01):
, or how did that go?

Speaker 2 (42:04):
the thing is it was getting better anyway.
So because I was learning, Iwas going to the university, it
was it was going better okayyeah but.
But the thing is that thistakes a long time.
So this helped me to spend thistime in a good way developing

(42:27):
my skills, developing my socialskills, finding new friends and
just enjoying my life, Becausewithout this, I'm sure, like I
would learn, I would havelearned Czech anyway.
But I would be a depressed kidwithout hobbies, without you
know, didn't enjoy my life, sothis helped me a lot For sure.

Speaker 1 (42:51):
Right, Because you can struggle in one area right,
being in a place learning a newlanguage.
But if you're struggling in allareas, like I don't have
friends.

Speaker 6 (43:00):
I don't have hobbies, I don't have like that becomes
really challenging.

Speaker 1 (43:04):
And so, hey, if this over here is good, I've got some
friends, I've got these hobbies, I'm doing this thing that I
enjoy and love.
It makes the challenge of theother thing over here, whether
it's a new language, a newcountry, a new job, a new school
, whatever, easier to make itthrough Not as miserable.
Yeah, yeah, bearable.

Speaker 4 (43:26):
Bearable, bearable.

Speaker 1 (43:28):
Yeah, basically Basically.

Speaker 5 (43:31):
All right.

Speaker 1 (43:32):
Thank you for that.

Speaker 5 (43:33):
Go ahead, reza, yeah, just one quick point, um, and
we might.
We might get to this, you know,in in the next couple of songs,
as we're talking more aboutyour, your life story.
But is art a factor so far aswell?
Or because it sounds likeyou're a good student, you know,
you've, you've got, you knowmath and physics, and then you

(43:54):
had kind of a trajectory thatyour parents were were thinking
about you.
You loved music and you foundthat you were able to play music
and you know, you, you, ifyou're playing metallica and and
you know bullet, you, you're,you're okay, you're doing okay.
Um, so is art a part of yourlife at this point as well, or
or is that something that comeslater on?

Speaker 2 (44:15):
Yeah, I think it's something that comes later on.
Yeah, it was a little bit later, when I had my second band,
because the reason why Ibasically got into art is that I
had a band and I basicallyneeded artwork for my band.
I had a band and I basicallyneeded artwork for my band and I
started to look into how thisis made and what options do we

(44:38):
have.
And this is how we met withPavel, who is co-founder of our
studio, and we were his clientsand this is how we met.
This is how I got into art.
Like I was so excited about theprocess, how you know how he

(45:02):
took our idea and brought itinto life.
So this is this is when Istarted to look into art as a
career at least you as a part ofmy career, because basically,
what I do in the studio I likeI'm the bridge between music,
art and business.
So, yeah, art is just a part ofmy hobbies.

(45:25):
I don't consider myself anartist, at least a graphic
artist, or a designer, becauseit wouldn't be fair.
Yeah, I'm more.
I'm a musician and a businessguy, but I'm not an artist.
But this is when this startedas a hobby for me nice love it I

(45:45):
appreciate that, yeah, verycool I'll have

Speaker 1 (45:48):
some follow-up questions, but later yeah all
right, let's move on to youryour next song.
And so, um, you know, we sortof talked here how how songs can
help us through transitions andand things like that.
But music can also open up newperspectives for us, expose us
to new things, give us new waysof thinking.
So what is a song that openedyou up to an entirely new

(46:12):
perspective?

Speaker 2 (46:13):
This is Architects.
These Colors Don't Run in thelife of the free.

Speaker 3 (46:21):
You know nothing jumps the free for free in
paradise.
I've been so sick of my deadrace.

Speaker 5 (46:45):
Life is a fight living in the.
It was the best part, yeahwhere it was coming up to.

Speaker 1 (46:52):
Yeah.
I'm telling you so hard it's sohard to pull out just a little
clip to listen to, because youwant to get different things,
and so you know I wanted to getsome of the lyrics in there, but
I also wanted the breakdowncoming.
So that's the clip we got.
I encourage everyone watchingand listening over these clips
oh, a lot of times, yeah I'll goto caroline and I'll be like,
hey, this part or this part orthis part, yeah, I spend a good

(47:14):
amount of time.
So for everyone watching andlistening, we encourage you.
We have a playlist.
This is a good time to dropthat.
Go to Apple Music, spotify.
There'll be links in the shownotes.
We have a running playlistgoing for all the songs we do on
our show so you can hear thewhole thing here.

Speaker 2 (47:39):
All right here, all right, um.
All right, vlad.
What's the uh, what's the newperspective?
What did this, what did this dofor you?
So, before this song, I didn'treally care about the lyrics so
because I didn't, didn't knowenglish very well, so I didn't
care.
to be honest, I, as a musician,I was more into melodies and
riffs and stuff like that.
So so, yeah, it was just musicfor me and vocals were just
another instrument in thisarrangement.

(47:59):
But after this song, I startedto pay attention to lyrics much
closer, because when I firstfound this song, it came with
music video which basically wasa mix of footage from different

(48:20):
events you know from, from, fromcartoons, from everything like
just a mix of footage with a lotof anti-capitalistic themes,
anti-corruption and stuff likethat.
And at that time, since I wasgrowing up, I was more into

(48:41):
politics, into what's going onin the world.
It just resonated with me.
So I started to look into themeaning of the song.
I started to look into meaningof the song and after this I
just started to listen to musicthat has more meaning, not just

(49:05):
music and reefs.

Speaker 1 (49:07):
Yeah yeah, yeah, thanks for that, and I think I
like how you say it too, of like, not knowing English as well,
you were less into the lyrics,but we've seen it a lot on this
show of how, like, for a lot ofus at times it's a question we
tend to ask, like, are you moreof a music person or a lyric
person?
Like what draws you in?

(49:27):
And I was someone who was for along time like, exactly like
you said, vlad of, I was drawnin by the music, right, I was a
drummer and stuff.
So what's the rhythm going on,what's this going on?
And, like the lyrics, I lovethe way you said it too, of
that's like the lyrics and thevocals are just another
instrument.
They give color and melody andthings like that.
But I'm not really listening towhat they're saying, I'm

(49:49):
listening to the sound and thefeel, and so I love the story of
how this is that song.
That changed it for you and saidoh, there is a lot going on
here with these lyrics.
I can pay attention to this andfind others that are doing it,
so thanks for the story.

Speaker 2 (50:06):
And now I'm a little bit allergic to music, you know,
when people just sing aboutgirls and booze and stuff.

Speaker 1 (50:15):
Right, right, right, the second it opens for you.
It's hard to go back.
Right you can't sell it in ayear?

Speaker 4 (50:21):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, no for sure.

Speaker 5 (50:24):
Well, you know, looking at your song list,
you've picked some of the mostyou know sort of epic
songwriters, like lyricists, Imean, I think Metallica.
So James Hetfield, at least tome as a, as a metal lyric writer
, some of the most profoundlyrics, even even now, you know,
and and they've, they've,they've made it a, they made it

(50:46):
a point to not sing about.
You know, just, you know girlsand cars and like stupid stuff,
like that.
It's or meaning, uh, things thatdon't really have meaning.
It's just like you know,admiration and more superficial.
Superficial yeah I mean, youknow they started, you know one,
nothing else matters.

(51:07):
You know, nightmare uh, entersandman being about nightmares
and those types of things, andeven the most recent album, 72
Seasons, you know, analyzingone's life, you know, as an
adult, and trying to think aboutand process things that
happened in people's childhood.
That's what, the 72 Seasons ofyour life.

(51:28):
So, but just all that meaninggetting super nerdy.
So, but just all that meaninggetting super nerdy, but yeah
lyrics.

Speaker 1 (51:34):
Raza found a way to make a Metallica section of the
show.
Yeah, see this.

Speaker 5 (51:41):
Right here, here you go.
But yeah, no, it's so cool tohear that you know that your
take is similar, that you knowlyrics are important and they it
is more than just an instrument.
It's you know it can actuallyhave profound meaning.
Yes, yes.

Speaker 1 (52:03):
Carolina, oh, I couldn't, I couldn't tell or not
.
I was curious about that kindof point of of Raza bringing up
kind of a previous song you knowof Metallica that was earlier
in your life.
You had said once you kind ofcame across this song and kind

(52:25):
of the lyrics and the meaningand the political statements
that can be made and you sort ofnow are after this song or are
finding music that has that andyou're paying attention to it.
Did you, did you consciously goback to music you were already
listening to and kind of relookat those lyrics, like Raza said,

(52:46):
like the meaning in you know,some of the older Metallica
songs and things like that Wasthat something you, you, you did
consciously?
Did it happen, or was it morefocused on the new music?

Speaker 2 (52:56):
yeah, I think that I revisited most of the music that
I listened to earlier, but, tobe honest, I was disappointed
with many of the songs I likedyeah so maybe like let me not
ruin it, let me just keep thosesongs as good songs and not.

Speaker 1 (53:12):
Yeah, that's funny, that's funny, that's good stuff,
all right.
So we talked about kind of youknow how music and songs can
help you through difficult timesand with that previous song,
how it can open up you.
Open you up to a newperspective in that sense.
You know you know political umuh, speech and movements and
things like that.

(53:32):
But you know music can also beintensely personal and be there
at sort of perfect moments.
And so for this next song,what's a song that was there as
part of a just perfect moment inyour life?

Speaker 2 (53:45):
It was Chasing the Cars by Snow Patrol.

Speaker 1 (53:49):
Nice.

Speaker 3 (53:56):
Let's take a listen.
Forget what we're told Beforewe get too old.
Show me a garden that'sbursting into life.

Speaker 1 (54:28):
So what was the perfect moment and how does this
song fit in?

Speaker 2 (54:31):
So this was the song.
We had the first dance with mywife on our wedding too.
Oh yeah nice it was a funnystory how we chose this song
because, honestly, I didn't hearit before and I'm not really
into snow patrol, I don't evenknow if any of their other songs

(54:53):
.
I asked my wife to prepare alist of songs that she thinks
would be a good fit for thefirst dance, and I would just go
through them and choose the oneI liked the most.
And so she prepared a list ofsongs and she gave me the list
and I went through it and when Iwas listening to this song I

(55:16):
just remembered that in Prague,at the old town square, there is
this guy, italian guy, giovanni, who just play music at the old
town square, and he was playingthis song and it sounded
amazing.
He had a really great voice andI thought that it would be

(55:40):
awesome if we would be able tofind this guy and to ask him to
play at our wedding, and thiswould be the song we would dance
to.
So we started to try to findhim on the internet.
We went on YouTube and justgoogled a guy playing music on

(56:04):
Old Town Square in Prague and itactually wasn't difficult at
all.
He was on the first page.
He was a very popular guy, yeah, so there was another problem
to find a way to ask him to play, because we went to Old Town

(56:26):
Square a few times and we didn'tsee him there, so we started to
look on Facebook.
It took us a while, but wefound him, and it turned out
that the guy actually moved toSwitzerland.
He was no longer in Prague, butI still told him that I loved

(56:49):
him playing in Prague and thatwe have a wedding and we would
really like him to play at ourwedding.
And, surprisingly, the guy toldus that he would be willing to
come to Prague to play at ourwedding.
And this is what happened.
Yeah, he came to Prague for acouple of days just to play on

(57:14):
our wedding and to meet hisfriends.
He was amazing, yeah.
So he played this song and abunch of other songs and
everyone was everyone werereally excited.

Speaker 1 (57:26):
Wow, that's amazing.
That's like like the songitself could like if you just
said, oh, this was the song.
We did our first dance at thewedding, Right, Like that would
be an amazing, perfect momentand amazing story.
But the fact that there's thisextra layer of um you hearing a
street performer playing it andthen we're like we want to get

(57:49):
that person, and then trackingit down and then you're able to
make it work, that's that isawesome.
Yeah, it is.

Speaker 4 (57:59):
And so you don't just have the memory of like this
song, but the whole experienceof like finding him and getting
him to come.
And so it's your wedding andyou're about to have your first
dance, but you've gone throughall this effort to get him.
Did it make it like that muchmore special?

Speaker 2 (58:18):
yeah, yeah, of course it was amazing and you know the
fact that we found this guy, wehad this amazing story to tell
to people, like it is an extralayer, like you said yeah, like
we hunted for you, we were goingsquare to look for you.

Speaker 1 (58:35):
We were like yeah so when you by the way, I love the
way you pick this song too ofyour wife kind of picking a
couple songs and then you, youknow, choosing one, so it's like
you know that's a way to toagree on this is our song.
And when you heard this song asyou were going through the list
, you remembered hearing it, ofGiovanni playing it.

(58:57):
Like I remember that personplaying that song, that's how it
went.
It wasn't after the fact.
You were walking and then youheard this person playing it.
You remembered hearing itbefore.

Speaker 2 (59:06):
Yeah, exactly, wow it kind of adds that extra layer
of like.

Speaker 1 (59:11):
This is the song.

Speaker 4 (59:12):
Right.

Speaker 1 (59:12):
Because you didn't know the song.
But you did subconsciously kindof know the song.

Speaker 2 (59:17):
Because it's a very memorable song.

Speaker 4 (59:18):
You know, yeah yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (59:24):
I don't know what I love about this song.
Yeah, for real, for real,that's awesome.

Speaker 4 (59:29):
That's awesome.
Yeah, for real, for real,that's awesome.
That's awesome.
Yeah, this is one of thosesongs that gives me like
goosebumps.
There's just something about itI don't know if it's the piano,
or like the lyrics or the like,the cadence of it, you know.

Speaker 2 (59:41):
Yeah, I love the voice.
Yeah, he just has an amazingvoice.

Speaker 4 (59:46):
Yeah.

Speaker 5 (59:47):
Yeah, for sure.
Complete like counterpoint toarchitects what we just heard.

Speaker 1 (59:52):
Yes, yeah, a definite , definite different side and
like I mean, I think, havingthem together in that way too,
of like that previous song, thearchitect song, is about like
big picture things, right, war,capitalism, corruption, like
these big things.
And then this song is so smalland intimate, it's just singing

(01:00:15):
from one person to another,right, like you know, just be
here with me, right, and thenlike there's other lines in it
of like you know, I've I've saidI love you those three words,
and it just never captures itand I want to find another way.
And so it's so like justillustrates how music can do
such wide varying things of likebring up these big world issues

(01:00:39):
, but also just that intimate,one person to another, that that
feeling so and it was amazingbecause you know weddings, they
are very stressful and youusually don't have a moment to
you know, to breathe.

Speaker 2 (01:00:52):
So this was the moment when, like we took a
break and we didn't notice anypeople around us.
We just dance, listen to themusic and enjoy it all the
moment together.
Yeah, I love it.

Speaker 4 (01:01:13):
Love it All right yeah enjoy it all a moment
together.
Yeah, I love it, love it all,right?
Yeah, just like the song says,like, like, be with me, like lay
with me, and let's forget theworld, right, let's forget
everything else going on, thestress, the people, the all of
it yeah yeah, it's a perfectsong yeah all right.

Speaker 1 (01:01:26):
Well, let's move it along.
We're at your last song, songsix.
Here we are, um and so, for youknow, for this song, music is,
is something that can mark atime and a place for us.
And so for this song, what is?
A song that, when you hear it,you're instantly transported to
a specific time or place.

Speaker 2 (01:01:47):
This one is actually mine.
Yeah, this is a song that Inamed love eternal, and this is
by my lo-fi project.
All right.

Speaker 1 (01:02:00):
Let's take a listen.
We're the story, so where doesthis song take you?

Speaker 2 (01:02:30):
I wrote this song to be released specifically the day
my son, leo, was born.
I wrote it just two weeksbefore his birth date because my
wife had a planned C-section.
We knew exactly when he wasgoing to be born.
So two weeks before that I justhad all these feelings, you

(01:02:52):
know, overflowing in my head.
You know there's excitement,doubts if I'm going to be a good
father.
You know, I guess everyone hasthese kind of thoughts and I
wanted to put everything insomething.
You know, I guess everyone hasthis kind of thoughts and I
wanted to put everything insomething, you know, to find
some kind of media for all thesefeelings.

(01:03:15):
And this is why I decided towrite this track.
So I wanted it to be a reminderof the day when Leo was born.
So I didn't show the song to mywife before the day it was
released, and the first time shelistened to it was actually

(01:03:39):
just after he was born, just acouple of hours after that.
And now we all have thisbeautiful reminder of this day
and I also gave my wife anecklace with the name of the
song as a reminder.
So, yeah, it will be a nicereminder for her, for me and for

(01:04:05):
our son.

Speaker 1 (01:04:08):
Absolutely, that's beautiful.
That's beautiful, that'sawesome, that is so sweet.

Speaker 4 (01:04:14):
Thank you, that is just so sweet.
I just love the idea of makingtimeless things out of our
feelings, our emotions, likeputting them into something that
we get to look back on.
So like I say that because asyour son gets older, he'll be

(01:04:37):
able to listen to this and youknow you'll tell him the story
and you know he'll havesomething that he can keep you
know forever.
But I did want to ask becauseyou wrote it as you were feeling
very overwhelmed and nervousabout becoming a first time
parent Was the process ofwriting and recording helpful
for you to process thoseemotions?

Speaker 2 (01:04:58):
Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure.
Like you can hear in the song,it's like it's difficult to say
what kind of mood it has.
Like it's a little bit to saywhat kind of mood it has.
Like it's a little bit it'shappy but it's sad, it's a
little bit melancholic.
But you know, you hear hope,you hear a lot of stuff there
and once I wrote it I just ithelped me to figure out

(01:05:21):
everything I was feeling and,you know, to make sense of it.

Speaker 4 (01:05:26):
Yeah, I think that's an important lesson for our
listeners and viewers, ascurrent times might feel scary
and secure.
You know, the world seems kindof a scary place right now.
How much creativity can help usmove through those times and

(01:05:47):
process all that we're feeling.

Speaker 2 (01:05:49):
Right.

Speaker 4 (01:05:50):
Some of us will just sit in front of the TV and watch
what's happening or sit on ourphones, but there's something
about creating that allows thesethings to move through us.

Speaker 2 (01:06:01):
Yeah, this is true.

Speaker 1 (01:06:03):
Yeah, yeah, and I, I, I love what you said about it
and kind of like hearing thestory behind it of not just like
, oh, I wrote it for my son, butI wrote it for him in this way
of like the excitement for it it.
It is a very simple song and Idon't mean that in the way of

(01:06:32):
like it was easy to write oranything like that.
But it's just there's.
There's not like a ton of stuffgoing on, but you so do feel
all of those different emotionsin it and, uh, it just really
kind of captures like hearing.
You know you hear music and youhave your own interpretation of
it, but then hearing the personwho made it, what they're, you

(01:06:53):
know what's going on for themand what's in it, like I can
just I see all of it in thereand it just like comes to life
in this very beautiful butsimple way.
So, yeah, thank you for that.

Speaker 2 (01:07:07):
The most important for me was to try to convey the
feeling of unconditional love,Because unconditional love is
something that you can only feeltowards your kids.
Towards your children becauseyou know people like when your

(01:07:31):
husband and wife something mayhappen, you won't love each
other anymore.
Things change, but you cannotstop loving your children.

Speaker 4 (01:07:40):
So this feeling was completely, completely new for
me and this is why I wanted totry to convey this feeling,
because this is was somethingnew for me, and this is why I
wanted to try to convey thisfeeling, because this is was
something new for me yeah, yeahright, um, because we all, we
tend to think of love as just ajoyous feeling, but as a parent,

(01:08:03):
it comes with it's terrifying,it's, it's makes you nervous and
you know there's all of thesefeelings and I feel it, it's,
it's almost it's it's makes younervous, it you know there's all
of these feelings and I feelit's, it's almost like you were
feeling them already, before hewas even here.
You were feeling that love of aparent, um, trying to process,
because it's not just the joy oflike oh, there's my baby, but
it's always like I want to makesure you're safe and I want to

(01:08:24):
make sure you're happy and Iwant to make sure I can give you
everything you need and um, soyou are feeling those things,
like you know, early yeah,exactly

Speaker 5 (01:08:35):
it's cool because it's the song is like, almost
like a gift to your, to yourchild, something that that um,
that you can listen to later onand and and can go with with um
can basically go through life,um, but it's also the beginning
of it is, is it?

(01:08:55):
it's your expression of how youwere feeling yeah um, and then
it'll be a constant reminder toyou also.
And, by the way, you're in goodcompany, because we're all
parents here on this, on this,looking at the screens right now
and I think, yeah, in, in, in,in, the really um, in some ways,
you know, we've all sort of hadthose, those feelings and uh,

(01:09:18):
and the idea of unconditionallove.
I think you said it perfectlywell, that's that, that, that,
that that's so spot on.

Speaker 2 (01:09:25):
It's still.
It's still all new to me, to behonest, Like after the first
year.
I still haven't figured thisout.

Speaker 4 (01:09:35):
And as soon as you think you do they change,
something else comes up.
It's true.

Speaker 2 (01:09:42):
Small children, small problems.
Bigger children, biggerproblems.

Speaker 4 (01:09:45):
Yeah, Still problems.
They just look, just look theyjust change um, how did your
wife react to the song?

Speaker 2 (01:09:54):
yeah, she laughed it, she laughed it and, uh, she
always told me that she, like,why wouldn't you write a song
for me?
And it was I don't know.
It was just like it was quitedifficult for me to write a song
dedicated specifically to her.
So this was this moment when Ifinally had all these feelings

(01:10:17):
that I wanted to put into a song.
But now she told, now she says,like, this is not a song for me
, this is a song for your son.
So you cheated here.
Yeah, oh, my goodness.
Well, now you know, this issome quote for your son.
So your teacher is here yeah,oh my goodness.

Speaker 4 (01:10:32):
Well, now you know you have work to do.

Speaker 2 (01:10:34):
Yeah, there you go.
Another song, one more.
Yeah, that's right.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):
That's right, and I'm so glad you shared this song as
well, too, because we've hadother musicians on the show who
have a song that's theirs thatthey wrote that might have been
there.
Most of the time, people arereluctant to want to share their
own song, and I'm always like,no, I want to.
That's something we want tohear, right, because it's it's

(01:11:00):
there, and so I'm just so gladyou you chose to share this song
and didn't say, well, let menot share my song, let me pick a
different one, or somethinglike that, cause I love getting
getting our guest music on theshow.
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 5 (01:11:16):
It's such a treat to actually hear from the creator,
you know, it's really good.

Speaker 4 (01:11:20):
Right.
Well, that's, that's your sixsongs, vlad.
How well.
First of all, thank you so muchfor sharing them with us and
sharing the stories behind yourmusic with us.
How does it feel to hear yourlife reflected in these six
songs?

Speaker 2 (01:11:38):
Yeah, it's really interesting because usually when
you're busy with all the stuffin your life, it's hard to find
time to reflect on all your life, on your journey from, you know
, from your childhood throughyour teen years and to your
adult years.
It was exciting, you know.

(01:11:59):
I found myself with a lot ofnew feelings, a lot of nostalgic
feelings, a lot of people thatI wanted to contact after that
to find out how are they.
How are they?
My friends from the past.

(01:12:20):
Yeah, actually, there is onefriend from Yevpatoria who I
contacted a few weeks ago justafter I finished the
questionnaire.
So I wrote him a message justasking how he is, and one thing
led to another and he will comevisit in a few weeks here.

(01:12:42):
Wow.

Speaker 4 (01:12:44):
That's amazing, that's awesome.

Speaker 1 (01:12:47):
I love that.
I love that.

Speaker 4 (01:12:49):
That makes me so happy.
Yeah, for real.

Speaker 1 (01:12:51):
For real.
That's a first so far on theshow for something like that a
reunion of sorts that we know ofright that we've heard of, so
that's awesome he is the guy Iwas playing Metallica National
Smetters with.
Oh nice, nice Reunion show.
Maybe, yeah, maybe the guy Iwas playing metallic and snl
smithers with oh oh nice, nicereunion show.
Maybe, if he still plays guitar, yeah, yeah, yeah, oh, that's

(01:13:17):
good stuff, though.
Thank you for that.
All right, well, normally rightnow we'd go over to raza for
our lightning round, but Iwanted to do something just in
between because, um, youanswered another question on our
questionnaire that not everyonedoes, and so, for all the
listeners and viewers out there,right, we, for our guests, we

(01:13:38):
send them a questionnaire, theygo through, they fill it out and
then we kind of, you know,choose the songs.
That's why you hear differentquestions in each episode, cause
not everyone's going to answerthe same questions, or the same
ones are going to this, and Ialways.
I have a question at the endthat says hey, if there's a song
that didn't come up somewhereon the questionnaire but you
want to share with us for somereason, please give it here.
And you did that, and I justwant to give it a moment to just

(01:14:01):
share that, and so I'm going toplay a clip of the song and
then you can share what you wantto share about it.
Okay, Okay.

(01:14:34):
So who was the?

Speaker 2 (01:14:34):
artist in the song and what made you want to share
that song with us?
Yeah, so the artist's name isPalindrom.
He is an independent artistfrom Ukraine.
He considers himself a rapper,but I see a lot of you know
different influences in hismusic and I really love this
song.
It's called Last Dance, if Itranslated correctly.

Speaker 1 (01:14:59):
That's the translation I got when I did
Google Translate.
So, Last Dance, yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:15:04):
And what I love about Palindrom is that he speaks
about stuff that's very close toall Ukrainians About war, about
corruption, about hope, abouthow people unite together to get
through what's going on inUkraine.
He writes really amazing lyrics.

(01:15:27):
He writes really amazing lyricsLike.
This is the guy.
I love him just for the lyrics,because you know, musically
maybe sometimes it's not mything because I'm going to
heavier music, but the lyrics iswhat got my attention.
I just think that what he writesit's amazing, like it's so much

(01:15:49):
metaphors, so much of hiddenmeaning in every phrase that
every time I listen to his songI can find something new for
myself.
And you know, considering thatI found him just a couple of
years ago, so all his music Ican consider it in the context

(01:16:13):
of the war and of everythingthat's happening in Ukraine
right now, and I think that alot of people hear things that
they want to hear in his songsright now, in this particular
moment.
Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16:33):
No, thank you for that and thank you for, like I
said, sharing that song with uswhen you were originally, you
know, putting your songstogether and that's why I wanted
to get it on here, cause youknow, just it, it it what you
just said about it is isimportant and, like we said, we
hear headlines about things andand we can learn so much from

(01:16:54):
the artists that are telling usabout what's going on, and so,
uh, I wanted to just get thatsong on there and hear your view
and perspective on it, and sowe can share with our listeners
of hey, here's an, here'sanother artist to to check out.
So, thank you so much for that.

Speaker 4 (01:17:10):
Yeah, well, obviously we'll share links and um.
I would encourage folks outsideof of Ukraine, our listeners
and viewers, to you know,translate those lyrics and hear
the messages that creatives andartists are sharing out of
Ukraine.
I think um today more than ever.

Speaker 1 (01:17:28):
All right Lightning round, kick it over more than
ever.
All right lightning round, kickit over to Raza Raza go with
our lightning round.

Speaker 5 (01:17:34):
All right, we're going to do this quickly today,
guys.
So, vlad, just to end thingswith us.
Thank you so much, first of all.
But our lightning round issimple.
What is your first, your mostrecent and your favorite concert
experience?
Take it over.

Speaker 2 (01:17:48):
So my first concert was Sonic Syndicate.
I think it was 2012 in Prague.
It was my first metal gig and Iwasn't really into Sonic
Syndicate.
They were a little bit tooalternative for my taste.
I was into metalcore.
But I really enjoyed the show,like the energy.

(01:18:11):
It was amazing and it was thefirst time I was.
I went into mosh and circlebeat and all this stuff you know
.
So, yeah, it was, it wasamazing.
Still remember it.
The most recent show was SayArt Is Murder in Prague.
It's one of my wife's favoritebands my wife into really proper

(01:18:39):
heavy stuff, even heavier thanI yeah.
So yeah, also, it was an amazingshow, the guys.
Yeah, the music is amazing andthey also had a really nice show
with projectors and stuff.
I enjoyed it very much.
But my favorite show ever wasthe first show architects did in

(01:19:08):
Prague.
At least the first show that Iknow of was after their album
Daybreaker.
They were pretty young backthen.
It was a very small gig forlike 200 people or so you cannot
compare it with the shows theydo now.
It was very small, local gigwith a few support bands.

(01:19:34):
Actually my friends were asupport band with them and it
was amazing.
It was the first time I heardthese scholars don't run live
and it was amazing.

Speaker 1 (01:19:46):
Nice, nice, love it Awesome.

Speaker 4 (01:19:49):
Nice.

Speaker 1 (01:19:50):
Love it Awesome, Very cool.

Speaker 4 (01:19:51):
Thank you Well as we get ready to to end the show and
sign off in in the last minuteor so we have left, um, tell us
you know this is this is yourmoment to share with our viewers
and listeners anything you havegoing on or anything you'd like
for them to know.
I know you run graphics.
You know album design.
Whatever you want to share,this is your moment.

Speaker 2 (01:20:11):
So if there are any metal heads listening to this
and you guys have a band whowant to make music, like me and
Raza, feel free to reach out tous.
Just you know, Google All4BandDesign.
We are a big team of artists.
We make all kinds of stuff fromlogo design to cover art and

(01:20:32):
merch design, like whatever anyband needs, so we would be happy
to help you.
Also, if you like post-rockmusic, you can check out my band
Diary of my Misanthropy out myband Diary of my Misanthropy.
And if you just need some chilllo-fi music to play in the

(01:20:52):
background when you work, studyor do whatever you like to do,
you can look me up Sad Saint onSpotify or YouTube.
I also make chill instrumentalmusic you can check out.

Speaker 1 (01:21:07):
Awesome.
Thank you so much and for allthe listeners and viewers, we'll
have links to all of that inthe show notes so you can go
right into there.
Whether you're watching onYouTube or listening on any of
the channels, you can find those, those notes there.
Vlad, thank you so much fortaking the time with us, for
being so thoughtful with your,your songs and your stories, and
and just with your, your songsand your stories and and just

(01:21:29):
sharing your, your, your lifestory with us.
Uh, thank you for you know umuh making current events uh come
to life in in a real person forus and telling those heartfelt
stories as well.
Um so, thank you so much for umspending this time with us.

Speaker 2 (01:21:45):
Thank you for having me.

Speaker 1 (01:21:49):
It was a pleasure.
Yeah, all right, everybody, youknow what to do, like subscribe
, follow whatever channel you'reon so you don't miss any new
episodes.
Just like we said here, go findthose artists, find those songs
that are out there.
Connect with stories out there,find out what's going on on the
ground in places.
Don't just follow the bigheadlines.
Hear stories from people thatare there, and we can do that

(01:22:11):
through artists.
We will share all those linksand with that, this has been a
life in six songs.
We will see you next time.
Thanks for watching.

Speaker 5 (01:22:21):
It was just dying issue.

Speaker 2 (01:22:22):
Yeah, yeah, this stuff is complicated.

Speaker 4 (01:22:31):
We also only have two songs left, so not as long do
you guys?
Know how I know Vlad.

Speaker 5 (01:22:37):
By the way, vlad, should I tell them the story?

Speaker 2 (01:22:39):
yeah, sure you have time.
I think I need a moment to youknow my cat and yeah, yeah,

(01:22:59):
let's.

Speaker 1 (01:22:59):
uh, I could use a restroom break too, so let's all
take two minutes and then.
I'm sure.

Speaker 2 (01:23:05):
I'm sure people love cats on YouTube.
But yeah, I'm sure people lovecats on YouTube, but this is
enough.

Speaker 4 (01:23:11):
Go ahead.

Speaker 2 (01:23:11):
Yeah, see you.

Speaker 5 (01:23:20):
Look at that face.

Speaker 3 (01:23:24):
Oh, my God.