Understanding Russian Popular Music

Johnson's Russia List tipped us off to this interesting post about Russian pop music from Russia Blog:

One of my co-workers asked me what a particularly sad song was about. And so I paid attention to the words, though I haven’t listened to it much since then. The song, Davai za Zhizn' (Let’s Drink to Life) by the very popular Russian band Lyube is about a soldier who is terribly wounded, and his comrades are promising him that everything will be ok, that they will all dance at his wedding, that he will hold his kids someday. However, the listener understands that they are just saying these things to comfort an 18 year old soldier who is bleeding to death. The chorus goes: “Let’s drink to us, let’s drink to the end, to the end of the war, to those who used to be with us.” The whole song has melancholy rock instrumentation. So, there’s some Russian rock’n’roll for you.