Who wants a last-minute ballsy concert?
Following the cancellation of the Ragnard Rock Festival, some bands, mostly Slavic ones, decided to come to France anyway. It was the case of Znich who came straight from Belarus to see the world and quite simply have fun. Although it was absolutely not planned, it happened: Znich, with the help of ex-volunteers of the RRF 2017, played an acoustic concert in the one and only metal bar in Lyon, the Rock’n’Eat. I’m not fond of that word but “epic” might be the right term to describe this night.
Of course the band was not unfamiliar to me and I could not miss their exclusive coming to France. So I had followed their recent evolution and the first big surprise was Marina doing the singing, she seemed so quiet and shy on the pictures of electric sets. It really made me happy to hear a melodic accompaniment which had nothing “formatted” or “standardized” as is often the case with female voices. I really enjoyed her accent and her natural momentum to just do as she thinks best.
But what especially gripped me from the start was the vocal power this lassie could unfold, so well that Ales (the main singer) struggled to make himself heard. It didn’t prevent nice duets from happening like on “Belarus” and “Yak Pushtshu Stralu…”. Talking about twenty year old songs, I’d like to hail the brave choice of Ales for performing “Oy Dymna za Dvarom” which has a very unique and impressive singing style. You need to listen to it to understand. I especially liked it as it’s one of the songs with which I discovered Znich.
A short a cappella break preceded the most recent and successful “Dunayu“. Znich has a good contact with the audience thanks to Trollwald’s Andrei Apanovich, the traditional instrument player. Despite the language barrier, he did not hesitate to present songs before they were played and the most remarkable thing he did was motivate people to take part in traditional dances, still in this metal bar and while rocking both the demonstration and the duda playing! It wasn’t easy at first but awesome in the end!
Each musician put their heart and soul into what they did in their own way. I could make out each personality through their efforts and that’s what I like the most from a band in concert. Maybe this aspect would have been totally different in usual conditions. I’d like to thank the Rock’n’Eat a lot for having made all of this possible and in a total improvisation. A big thank you to Darya and Clément, as well as few pagan metalheads I saw wearing Ragnard Rock Festival merchandising. It was really touching to see this support.
Photos by Eduinaluca
