Ukrainian hip hop

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Ukrainian hip hop, also known as Ukra-hop or Ukr-hop is a major part of the Ukrainian music scene.

Although some bands, like Tartak, Tanok na Maydani Kongo ("Dance on the Congo Square"), or Grafit rap in the Ukrainian language and mix hip hop with indigenous Ukrainian elements, many others do not, preferring instead to rap in Russian. Popular Russian-language hip hop acts from Ukraine include U.R.Asquad, Yuzhny Tsentral, Tuman, Schnell Sprechen and Don Drew.

Musically, Ukrainian hip hop is heavily influenced by Jamaican reggae, French hip hop and Ukrainian folk music, resulting a very tuneful and mellow sound, which makes it quite different from both Russian and American counterparts.

In 2005, Ukraine's entrant in the Eurovision Song Contest, GreenJolly's "Together We Are Many", was also the unofficial anthem of the recent Orange Revolution. Eurovision demanded the lyrics to be changed for the contest (because it did not correspond to contests rules due to political content). Also this song was remade by Polish hip hop artists.

Newer Ukrainophone artists emerging from Western Ukraine include, VovaZIL'Vova (Volodymyr Parfeniuk, host of a hip hop show on the TV channel M1), and Vkhid U Zminnomu Vzutti.

External links

• BBC: Eurovision shows political side