Плач Єремії (Jeremiah's Lament)

The idea to form a band came suddenly in 1990 to its two members, Taras Chubay and Vsevolod Dyachyshyn. One day, they gathered at "Не Журись!" (Don't frown!) theater, where they performed their own songs. That's when they thought about merging and developing their own project.

After that, their classmate Oleksa Pakholkiv, who played the cello, joined the band. Later, Oleg Shevchenko, who had left another band, "Аптека" (Drugstore), which was already ending its activity, joined this band. At this time, the band began to actively perform in Lviv. Another addition was made to the lineup when Myroslav Kalytovsky, who plays the drums, decided to join the band as well.

Taras Chubay suggested the name "Плач Єремії" (or Jeremia's Cry. The correct translation would be Jeremiah's Lament, but this is how they called themselves in some releases). He took a biblical motif to give the band a "special sacred meaning". In addition, Taras Chubay took this idea from the poem of the same name by his father, Hryhorii Chubay, whose poetry inspired Taras Chubay to create music.

The band's first concert took place at the alternative festival “Вивих” (Sprain) in 1990. Chubay recalls the first concerts:

“..."Laments'" first performance was still within the framework of the concerts of the theater studio "Don't frown!" in February-March 1990. It was a pre-election program when Chornovil was still supported. The first concerts were at РОКС (ROKS, which is another name for Building of Science and Culture of the Lviv Railway Roads), then at the Lviv Philharmonic. That was our debut. At that time, we still played without drums, in a chamber-acoustic version, with a cello. Our first performance with drums took place at Viktor Neborak's poetry evening, and his birthday is on May 9. And at the end of May of the same year, we performed at “Sprain”. Back then, there were performances at the stadium. We brought a harp on stage. It almost burned down when there was a fire. In short, it was fun."

In 1991, at the «Червона рута» (Red Rue) festival in Zaporizhia, Jeremiah's Lament took second place in the rock music category.

In 1993, at the Maria international festival in Truskavets, the band won all possible awards — a special jury prize, a prize for the best song "О хто ти, о хто" (Oh, who are you, oh, who), and the audience award. In the same year, the guitarist changed again — Viktor Maisky was replaced by Oleksandr Morokko. In the end, Taras himself had to play the solo guitar, and in the fall of 1994, a new drummer, Oleksandr Kamenetsky, and trumpeter Yurko Duda joined the band. Taras Chubay spent August-September 1994 in United States, where he performed in local clubs and promoted the band.

The band seems to exist, but no new albums have been released.

In 2010, work was underway in the studio on a new album (it is unknown whether it was to be a Jeremiah's Lament album or a solo project), which was to include songs based on poems by Kost Moskalets, as well as poems by B.-I. Antonych and Hryhorii Chubay. The album was originally called “Золота Трава” (Golden Grass) but this was on the condition that all the songs would be based on poems by Kost Moskalets. The album was supposed to be recorded sometime in the fall of 2010 and released in the fall-winter of 2010, but for some reason, this album was never released.

In a 2018 interview, Chubay said:

“...I'm going to record a new album with Jeremiah's Lament. I've finished building my studio.”

In a 2019 interview, he was more in detail about his album:

"I finished the new album two years ago. But there was a legal problem with the co-authors. They signed contracts with other publishers, even though they had previously had agreements with me. Meanwhile, I've come up with some new ideas that I want to add to the finished material. The album will be the result of ten years of work. I played all the instruments on it myself.", “...I also want to reissue the old songs of Jeremiah's Lament, because the modern audience doesn't know them anymore. We recorded them in almost artisanal conditions, so they deserve a new sound.”


[1993] Двері, котрі насправді є (Doors that really exist)

This is band's debut album and I think it sounds pretty good, especially for a debut. Except that I didn't like half of the songs, but that's fine, it could have been worse. This album can be considered an example of how the band will continue to play music: rock with acoustic guitar and lyrics that are someone's poetry.

  1. Єхидна (Echidna)
  2. Відшукування причетного (Search of involved)
  3. Клітка (Cage)
  4. Плач Єремії (Jeremiah's Lament)
  5. Сніг (Snow)

[1995] Най буде все як є (Let All Be As It Is)

This album includes the most known song of the band, called “Вона” (She), written by Kost Moskalets (although some mistakenly credit the song to Taras Chubay), but this is not the version that most Ukrainians have heard; here its slower and more acoustic. The ballad was written by Kost in 1989, when the poet was 26 years old. The story of how the song came to be performed by the band was told by Taras in one of the interviews, which I found kinda funny:

“At first, I didn't like the song. It seemed that there were already enough ballad snots like this in the repertoire of ”Jeremiah's Lament". So other musicians started singing “She”. One interpretation was worse than the other. I couldn't take it anymore and sang the song the way I wanted to. In the end, it was included in the album "Let All Be As It Is".

The song “She” is to the story with Kost Moskalets what the Mona Lisa is to Leonardo da Vinci. That is, in a sense, it is a self-portrait. Kostya may not realize it, but that's how I feel. So he can say whatever he wants about who he dedicated this song to. In 1990, he said he dedicated it to one girl, then to another, but that's not true."

Thanks to this album, in the summer of 1996, Jeremiah's Lament received the "Золота жар-птиця" (Golden Firebird) award at "Таврійські ігри" (The Tavrian Games) in the category “Best Rock Band of Ukraine.”

In my opinion, it's a pretty good album, probably my favorite, but it has one problem — the lack of a CD release with remastered songs (as with the previous album), because the album was only released on cassette. Another problem related to this is the poor and unprofessional digitization of songs by enthusiasts, which can be found on the Internet. I myself could barely find a good digitization of the album where the songs are not too slow, with a low tone and crazy echo.

  1. Грифон (Griffon)
  2. Літо (Summer)
  3. Вона (She)
  4. Каламутна Вода (Cloudy Water)
  5. Коридор (Corridor)
  6. Я Тебе Забув (I've Forgotten You)
  7. Дощ (Rain)

[1997] Хата Моя (My House)

Not bad. Sorry, thats all I can say about this album, I'm not a fancy critic and there's not much info about the album either (not even a funny trivia), other than tracklist, band name and year of release.

  1. Жінка (Woman)
  2. Хата Моя (My House)
  3. Ой, хмариться (Oh, it's clouding over)
  4. Королева Де... (Queen of Re...)
  5. Морзе (Morse)
  6. Якби Ти Була (If You Were)
  7. Ти Бачиш (You See)

[1998] Добре (Fine)

This album is an exception to the rule because, despite being a compilation of various songs by the band and their remasters (even remasters of songs from Let All Be As It Is”), there are several songs here that were re-recorded or songs that were later included in the mini-albums "Я піду в далекі гори" (I Will Go to the Distant Mountains) and "Як я спала на сені" (How I Slept on the Hay). So instead of making a list of songs that I liked, I'll just name the songs that were recorded separately for the album (and I happened to like them, hehe). By the way, there is a version of the song "Вона" here, which most Ukrainians are familiar with.

  1. Коли До Губ Твоїх (When To Your lips)
  2. Плач Єремії (Jeremiah's Lament)
  3. Єхидна (Echidna)
  4. Світло і Сповідь (III ч.) (Light and Confession (pt. III))
  5. Вона (She)
  6. Срібне Поле (Silver Field)

[1999] Я піду в далекі гори (I Will Go to the Distant Mountains)

Starting with this EP, I began to like the band's next work less and less. If we don't take into account the songs that were already included in “Fine”, then there are no songs here that I like.


[2000] Як я спала на сені (How I Slept on the Hay)

Same as with “I Will Go to the Distant Mountains” EP, which I don't like (except for a few songs that were on "Fine". I consider this EP to be Jeremiah's Lament's last album. Everything that came after that is more of the work of Taras Chubay himself, rather than band's music.