Since forming in 1999, Gogol Bordello have become synonymous with the term ‘gypsy punk’. Led by Eugene Hütz – who left Kyiv as a youth with his family, ending up in New York – the multinational collective became known for riotous good times set to Romani beats, riddled with sweat and boozy subversion.
Named after Nikolai Gogol, a writer of Ukrainian origin but widely claimed by history as Russian, Gogol Bordello hid their Ukrainian-ness in plain sight. Following Putin’s invasion, it’s come into the spotlight. “It was all the time a ‘fuck you’ to Moscow,” the wiry, generously
