May 14, 2023

Imagine Dragons Shows Reality in Ukraine


Imagine Dragons Shows Reality in Ukraine
A Ukrainian fourteen-year-old stands in a room wrecked by explosions. ImagineDragons, Youtube.

The American pop-rock band Imagine Dragons filmed the video clip for their song "Crushed" in Ukraine to help fundraise for United24, the official fundraising platform for Ukraine founded by President Volodymyr Zelenzky. The film follows the true story of Sasha, a fourteen-year-old from Mykolayiv Oblast, whose village was occupied by the Russian army for five months and barely survived.

The short film (embedded below) tells us Sasha's survival story as he walks through the rubble of what was once his hometown. Over a period of five months, his town endured constant shelling by Russian forces. Sasha survived by hiding underground in a bunker, but all his neighbors died. His family lost everything. The firmest structures left on the ground are encrusted missiles.

According to Rolling Stone, the director of the video, Ty Arnold, was delivering medical aid to people in Ukraine when he met the teenager. After hearing his story, Arthur partnered with Imagine Dragons, an ambassador for United24 since July 2022, to shoot the music video. The band wanted to show the reality and trauma that everyday Ukrainians experience due to the war.

All funds from the video will be directed toward rebuilding Ukraine. On their Twitter blog, Imagine Dragons strongly encouraged donating to the following link

You Might Also Like

Anything to Stop The Show
  • April 04, 2023

Anything to Stop The Show

Moscow police attempted to interrupt an anti-war pianist's concert, going so far as to call in a bomb threat.
Concert Confusion
  • March 29, 2023

Concert Confusion

A popular singer's concerts have been canceled after being blacklisted by Russia.
Flowers for Dnipro
  • January 22, 2023

Flowers for Dnipro

Russians across the country spontaneously mourned the victims of their country's January 14 missile attack on Dnipro, Ukraine, which crushed an apartment building.
What Is Born from Fire
  • December 12, 2022

What Is Born from Fire

Russian singer Monetochka released a music video on YouTube criticizing pro-government propaganda on television.
Like this post? Get a weekly email digest + member-only deals

Some of Our Books

Bears in the Caviar

Bears in the Caviar

Bears in the Caviar is a hilarious and insightful memoir by a diplomat who was “present at the creation” of US-Soviet relations. Charles Thayer headed off to Russia in 1933, calculating that if he could just learn Russian and be on the spot when the US and USSR established relations, he could make himself indispensable and start a career in the foreign service. Remarkably, he pulled it of.
Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

Davai! The Russians and Their Vodka

In this comprehensive, quixotic and addictive book, Edwin Trommelen explores all facets of the Russian obsession with vodka. Peering chiefly through the lenses of history and literature, Trommelen offers up an appropriately complex, rich and bittersweet portrait, based on great respect for Russian culture.
93 Untranslatable Russian Words

93 Untranslatable Russian Words

Every language has concepts, ideas, words and idioms that are nearly impossible to translate into another language. This book looks at nearly 100 such Russian words and offers paths to their understanding and translation by way of examples from literature and everyday life. Difficult to translate words and concepts are introduced with dictionary definitions, then elucidated with citations from literature, speech and prose, helping the student of Russian comprehend the word/concept in context.
Murder and the Muse

Murder and the Muse

KGB Chief Andropov has tapped Matyushkin to solve a brazen jewel heist from Picasso’s wife at the posh Metropole Hotel. But when the case bleeds over into murder, machinations, and international intrigue, not everyone is eager to see where the clues might lead.
Driving Down Russia's Spine

Driving Down Russia's Spine

The story of the epic Spine of Russia trip, intertwining fascinating subject profiles with digressions into historical and cultural themes relevant to understanding modern Russia. 
Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

Faith & Humor: Notes from Muscovy

A book that dares to explore the humanity of priests and pilgrims, saints and sinners, Faith & Humor has been both a runaway bestseller in Russia and the focus of heated controversy – as often happens when a thoughtful writer takes on sacred cows. The stories, aphorisms, anecdotes, dialogues and adventures in this volume comprise an encyclopedia of modern Russian Orthodoxy, and thereby of Russian life.
The Little Humpbacked Horse

The Little Humpbacked Horse

A beloved Russian classic about a resourceful Russian peasant, Vanya, and his miracle-working horse, who together undergo various trials, exploits and adventures at the whim of a laughable tsar, told in rich, narrative poetry.
Marooned in Moscow

Marooned in Moscow

This gripping autobiography plays out against the backdrop of Russia's bloody Civil War, and was one of the first Western eyewitness accounts of life in post-revolutionary Russia. Marooned in Moscow provides a fascinating account of one woman's entry into war-torn Russia in early 1920, first-person impressions of many in the top Soviet leadership, and accounts of the author's increasingly dangerous work as a journalist and spy, to say nothing of her work on behalf of prisoners, her two arrests, and her eventual ten-month-long imprisonment, including in the infamous Lubyanka prison. It is a veritable encyclopedia of life in Russia in the early 1920s.
The Little Golden Calf

The Little Golden Calf

Our edition of The Little Golden Calf, one of the greatest Russian satires ever, is the first new translation of this classic novel in nearly fifty years. It is also the first unabridged, uncensored English translation ever, and is 100% true to the original 1931 serial publication in the Russian journal 30 Dnei. Anne O. Fisher’s translation is copiously annotated, and includes an introduction by Alexandra Ilf, the daughter of one of the book’s two co-authors.
Russia Rules

Russia Rules

From the shores of the White Sea to Moscow and the Northern Caucasus, Russian Rules is a high-speed thriller based on actual events, terrifying possibilities, and some really stupid decisions.
The Moscow Eccentric

The Moscow Eccentric

Advance reviewers are calling this new translation "a coup" and "a remarkable achievement." This rediscovered gem of a novel by one of Russia's finest writers explores some of the thorniest issues of the early twentieth century.

About Us

Russian Life is a publication of a 30-year-young, award-winning publishing house that creates a bimonthly magazine, books, maps, and other products for Russophiles the world over.

Latest Posts

Our Contacts

Russian Life
PO Box 567
Montpelier VT 05601-0567

802-223-4955