Thrilled that my article “Songs of War – The Russian war on Ukraine, popular music and social media” which looks at songs released after the first phase of Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine and social media was just published in IASPM Journal. In it I discuss how the songs comment on the war by drawing on events and memes. Through changes in the last 40 years in the music industry and technology not only the production process, but also the reception process has changed. Today this has enabled a quick production process drawing on footage from the battlefields and commenting on the war. While the songs span different types (e.g. novelty songs, answer songs and covers) they also lay claims to territory – both Ukrainian and Russian. Thus they bring the conflict to social media and function as tools to influence public opinion outside Ukraine. The article can be found at the IASPM Journal website (together with the other interesting articles on post-Soviet popular music published in this special issue):

https://iaspmjournal.net/index.php/IASPM_Journal/article/view/1509

Wickström, David-Emil: “Songs of War: The Russian war on Ukraine, popular music and social media”, IASPM Journal 14 (2) 2024, p. 52-74 – https://doi.org/10.5429/2079-3871(2024)v14i2.4en

The article also caps three workshops on post-Soviet popular music. The first was hosted online in 2021 and the two others were hybrid (at Södertörn University and at Popakademie Baden-Württemberg in Mannheim) in 2022 as well as a panel at BASEES in Glasgow in 2023. These very stimulating exchanges were all organized by Ann Werner who also guest edited this special issue of IASPM Journal and funded by Östersjöstiftelsen. Big thanks to Ann for that!!!