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The Guardian - UK
The Guardian - UK
Entertainment
Garth Cartwright

‘Playing in a war zone isn’t for most people’: the British band braving drone strikes and pneumonia to tour Ukraine

Hardwicke Circus
Combat rock … Hardwicke Circus (left to right) Plashka Andrii Khromchenko, Ben Wilde, Jonny Foster, Tom Foster, Conor Morrissey and Joe ‘King’ Carrasco. Composite: Veronika Zolotoverkha; AP; Getty Images; Reuters

It is late October and, 10 kilometres from the frontline in Donetsk, east Ukraine, the inhabitants of a reconditioned ambulance are completely lost. While opening your phone and logging on to a maps app might appear the obvious solution, this would be extremely unwise here: Russian drones are overhead and hunting for any signals.

Inside the van are a motley crew: an 81-year-old Irish music industry veteran; a 72-year-old Texas rocker; an Australian keyboardist; a Ukrainian saxophonist; and three twenty-something musicians from Carlisle, Cumbria. Their destination is a military base where they are to perform for Ukrainian troops.

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