Taras Topolia, the leader of the band Antytila, is fluent in russian, but has never used it in his work. He hopes that in the future, Ukraine's attitude towards russian music and the russian-language cultural space will change. 

"This is a generational issue. Another generation just has to grow up. There is a whole generation that has been programmed this way. They were taught that this is normal, and it's not going to change right now. A new generation has to grow up that won't know how to write correctly in russian," Topolia said in an interview on the Priama Chervona YouTube channel .

The musician noted that although he was born in Kyiv, he knows russian well because it has been around him since childhood. "Did I choose it? Not at all. It was just my environment. There was only one guy at our school who spoke Ukrainian. And everyone looked at him like a black sheep," Topolia recalled.

Although the russian federation has been destroying the Ukrainian language for years, the musician cannot forgive them for anything else:

"For this, I have perhaps the greatest hatred for russians... For dividing families, for killing parents, and for trying to make our children uneducated," Topolia said.

It is worth noting that from the very beginning of Russia's invasion of Ukraine, the musician, along with his bandmates from Antytila, served in the 130th terrorist defense battalion. However, on the eve of the Independence Day celebrations, the Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, Valerii Zaluzhnyi, cancelled the order to return the soldiers from the front. Taras Topolia stressed that Antytila is proud of their service on the frontline for six months, as they managed to save the lives of many Ukrainian defenders. 

Taras Topolia is also considering returning to the war zone in Crimea, noting that he would like to take part in a counter-offensive.

"I dream of being involved in a counter-offensive in Crimea. I want there to be a children's camp on the shore of Cape Fiolent or a place where children whose parents died defending Ukraine could come and relax," he said.