Old friend and former fellow DJHistory.com forum devotee, Pavel Plastikk, has made available an ambitious mix, designed with two very specific aims. The first is to raise funds for his war-torn homeland, Ukraine. The second is promote the music of the nation’s artists. Over close to 90 minutes, Pavel`s carefully constructed collage segues across countless tracks, genres, and 3 decades. Rolling romantically from solo piano pieces – where keys shower as if spring rain – to epics of stadium rock guitar strumming. Along the way taking in ethereal pop, whose passionate pleading is captured in cavernous echo, and machined, tribal, Salon des Amateur-esque slo-mo grooves. Reeds bleed in to beatless prog-y flights, strings sing mournfully, and Durutti Column-like dexterity dances to bionic breaks. Saxophone skronk fidgets and shakes to broken rhythms, while free flute and trumpet are juxtaposed in a jaunty, angular, future jazz jig. There are clusters of calming crystalline chimes, and oases of buzzing, psychedelic drones. Virtual rivers of kankyo ongaku ripples. Fragile electro-acoustic folk, Bjork-like pagan poetry, finds it place next to playful Plaid-like post-techno drum patterns, and summery, swinging, syncopated crooners rub shoulders with flickering sequenced ambient house. Pavel describes this extremely eclectic aural experience as “a tiny sketch of a broader musical landscape, out there, yet to be discovered.”

Ukrainska Epika is available exclusively on Bandcamp. Mastered by Rune Lindbaek, all proceeds will go the charities Am I Jazz?, K41 Community, and Musicians Defend Ukraine.