EP 'Red Threads'
Date: June 2026
“Red Threads” is a folktronica EP that merges my Russian and Tatar roots into contemporary electronic music. Across three tracks I blend traditional instruments: gusli, kurai, vargan, balalaika, rozhok with club structures, from 6/8 and 7/8 folk‑dance grooves to industrial four‑on‑the‑floor, to explore what it means to carry heritage onto a modern dancefloor.
The project is my final‑year work at the University of Sheffield and a personal act of reconnection: I write in Russian and Tatar, consult with the London Tatar diaspora on language and symbolism, and draw on family favourites and folk poetry while using tools like Logic Pro X and Vital to design the sound. “Red Threads” is about building a legacy, combining old ideas with new production, honouring cultural histories without exoticising them, and learning to be a producer, DJ and researcher who can speak to both my community and a wider, non‑specialist audience.
Track-list
1. Bolshoye Malenkoye Serdtse (Big Small Heart)
2. Minem Ilem (The Land of Mine)
3. Allaga Sheker (Thank God)
Bolshoye Malenkoye Serdtse
(Big Small Heart)
“Bolshoye Malenkoye Serdtse” is the opening track of Red Threads, where a Russian traditional chant collides with a danceable 6/8 electronic pulse.
The song traces the emotional duality of feeling both fragile and powerful at the same time: the heart is “malenkoye” (small) and “bolshoye” (big), echoing the tension between my private feelings and the larger ancestral voices that live inside Russian folk music.
This is the most personal song on the EP. Singing it feels both passionate and exposed, because it shows my weakest places rather than hiding them. It is performed entirely in Russian, which makes it very close to home for me.
Musically, I built the track around traditional Russian instruments: balalaika (a Russian plucked string instrument, similar to a guitar), gusli (a zither‑ or harp‑like string instrument), and barabanka (a traditional percussion instrument). I dug through Russian websites and YouTube archives to find recordings and playing techniques, then merged them into an electronic folk dance texture.
For the vocals, I taught myself to sing in a traditional Russian folk choir style, studying online tutorials and listening closely to village and ensemble recordings on Youtube. On the electronic side, I developed my understanding of electronic folk and folk dance (folktronica), drawing inspiration from contemporary Russian artists such as Zventa Sventana and Глум, who also blend folklore with modern production.
The result is a track where an old Russian heart song lives inside a modern club form.
A big, small heart beating between past and present.
Взгляни вниз,
А потом наверх.
Что ты там увидишь?
Вот я не увижу ничего.
А потом, всё перестанет, как назло.
Ну, возьми моё сердце
И унеси его подальше
Но не выкинь его
Возможно тебе понадобится оно.
Это мое сердце, но куда я его положу?
Не моё место в квартире, но можно я уже уйду?
Я не хотела узнать, что такое со мной
Взгляни на меня, и скажи, что ты видишь сейчас?
Мое маленькое сердце
Мое маленькое сердце
Мое маленькое сердце
Мое маленькое сердце
Когда ты у шел от меня
Я тебя хорошо запомнила
Голова раскалывается
На всех языках я расскажу, как я тебя люблю
Но меня всегда будет мало: мне говоришь “я уже не люблю тебя”.
И что тогда, тебе будет меня мало?
Тебе будет мало? Мало
Моего маленького сердца
Это мое сердце, но куда я его положу?
Не моё место в квартире, но можно я уже уйду?
Я не хотела узнать, что такое со мной
Взгляни на меня, и скажи, что ты видишь сейчас?
Мое большое маленькое сердце
Мое большое маленькое сердце
Мое большое маленькое сердце
Мое большое маленькое сердце
Look down,
and then look up.
What will you see there?
Me, I won’t see anything.
And then everything will just stop,out of spite.
Well, take my heart and carry it far away,
just don’t throw it out –you might need it someday.
This is my heart,but where am I supposed to put it?
This flat is not my place –so can I leave already?
I never wanted to find out what’s going on with me.
Look at me and tell me: what do you see now?
My little heart,
my little heart,
my little heart,
my little heart.
When you walked away from me,
I remembered you so clearly.
My head is splitting open.
In every language I will tell you how I love you,
but I’ll never be enough: you tell me, “I don’t love you anymore.”
And then what –will I still not be enough for you?
Will I not be enough? Not enough of my little heart?
This is my heart, but where am I supposed to put it?
This flat is not my place –so can I leave already?
I never wanted to find outwhat’s going on with me.
Look at me and tell me:what do you see now?
My big little heart,
my big little heart,
my big little heart,
my big little heart.
Minem Ilem
(The Land of Mine)
“Minem Ilem” is the Tatar heart of Red Threads: a Tatar napev (folk melody) carried by an irregular, club‑unlikely 7/8 groove. Instead of a typical four‑to‑the‑floor pattern, the beat rocks and shifts like walking against the wind, referencing both Tatar folk rhythm and modern breakbeat‑influenced electronic folk.
Traditional instruments that are used here - kuray (folk flute), gusli, and kubyz/ vargan are combined in the track, turning the sound into a nostalgic journey through “the land of winds and long wide roads,” where diaspora life meets the pull of home.
The lyrics are written almost entirely in Tatar (a minority language in Russia), which was my grandparents’ language and one I largely lost after moving from Russia to the UK. To write responsibly and authentically, I worked closely with the London‑based diaspora community “Tatars on the Island” via WhatsApp, checking translations, cultural nuances, and imagery at every stage of the process. The song became a shared act of remembering, my voice and their guidance rebuilt a language I had almost forgotten.
Musically, I deepened my understanding of modern folk breakbeat / folktronica, drawing on samples and references that are important to my family’s history. The track includes material inspired by my family’s favourite singer Ilham Shakirov and his song “Хаман яратам”, as well as a powerful line from the Tatar poem “Туган илем минем” by Enje Mominova, which speaks of homeland as something living inside the body. These references sit inside the 7/8 pulse as fragments of memory: voices from tapes, poems, and family stories, stitched into a contemporary electronic landscape.
“Minem Ilem” is ultimately a song about coming home in a language I'm still relearning, a track where rhythm stumbles on purpose, like feet finding old ground again.
Илем минем – җилләр иле,
Юллары ла – озын, киң.
Сагынып кайтып киләм,
Күңелемдә – нурлы көен.
Ямьле кичләр, яшел болын,
Туган йортта – нурлы ут.
Кайда булсам да, мин гел
Ватаным, син минем йөрәк.
Минем илем – родной край,
Там, где нас встретил май.
Где бы я ни была,
Всегда ты мне рада.
Минем ватаным, як минем.
Минем йортым, гаиләм минем.
Мин беләм, беркайчан да
Син мине ташламассың.
Җиреңә бассам, арта минем көчем,
Күгең күрсәм, иркен тын алам.
Туган илем, минем газиз җирем,
Мин сөекле синең бер балаң.
Шик туса кинәт, Һәм…
Шик туса кинәт, Һәм…
Минем илем – родной край,
Там, где нас встретил май.
Где бы я ни была,
Всегда ты мне рада.
Минем ватаным, як минем.
Минем йортым, гаиләм минем.
Мин беләм, беркайчан да
Син мине ташламассың.
The land of mine – the land of winds,
Its roads are long and wide.
I’m coming back with aching longing,
With your bright melody inside.
Soft evenings, endless green fields,
In my home – a gentle light.
Wherever I go, I’m always yours,
My homeland, my heart’s life.
The land of mine – my native ground,
Where May first welcomed us with sun.
Wherever I go in this world,
You’re always glad when I return.
My homeland, shelter close to me,
My house, my family, all mine.
And I know that there will never
Come a day you leave me behind.
When my feet touch down on your soil,
Something in me grows more strong.
When I lift my eyes to your sky,
I can finally breathe deep and long.
My homeland, my most precious earth,
I’m your child, your beloved one.
If suddenly a doubt appears, and…
If suddenly a doubt appears, and…
My land of mine – my native ground,
Where May first welcomed us with sun.
Wherever I go in this world,
You’re always glad when I return.
My homeland, shelter close to me,
My house, my family, all mine.
And I know that there will never
Come a day you leave me behind.
Allaga Sheker
(Thank God)
“Allaga Sheker” is the wild card of Red Threads, it's almost a joke and a provocation at the same time. Where the first two tracks lean into folk melody and nostalgia, this one comes straight out of my recent obsession with DJing and industrial‑leaning techno: a hard, four‑on‑the‑floor pattern, distorted sound design, and an attitude closer to Russian electro‑punk than to polite folktronica.
The track is heavily inspired by artists like Locked Club, a central figure in the Russian electro‑punk scene whose music fuses hard techno, acid, classic house, and distorted rhythmic experiments designed to knock the ground out from under a dancefloor. I’ve played their tracks in several of my own DJ sets, and “Allaga Sheker” is my answer back and my attempt to write something I could drop in the middle of a night and feel it stand next to those records.
Sonically, it’s the harshest piece on the EP: a 4/4 industrial techno framework with aggressive kicks, metallic textures, and noisy synths, built using a stack of plugins in Vital and other software instruments. In contrast to the more organic instrumentation of the other songs, here almost everything is synthetic and pushed into saturation, especially the vocals. That abrasive, machine‑like energy is important to me, because I want to keep building a career in DJing and production where I can play my own tracks in sets – and let my cultural references live inside genuinely club‑functional music, not only in “world music” contexts.
Lyrically and conceptually, “Allaga Sheker” plays with irony and sincerity, the phrase “Аллага шекер”, meaning “thank God / praise be to God” becomes a mantra shouted over a warehouse‑ready groove, somewhere between prayer and rave chant. That tension raises real questions for me: how to bring Russian‑Tatar cultural and spiritual references into a loud, industrial nightclub space without flattening them into exotic decoration or stereotype.
By leaning into humor and self‑awareness, I try to keep the track grounded in respect rather than shock value. “Allaga Sheker” closes Red Threads on a note that is confrontational but honest: a recognition that my heritage will also have to survive in distortion and mosh pits.
Я нажала PLAY PLAY
Самый лучший DAY DAY
Головы все YEAH YEAH
Делай это HERE HERE
(На русском акценте)
Is that a British song you got there?
But I thought you’re doing a song about Russian culture
Oh, Tatar, is it? Haha, very funny, yes.
Аллага шекер
Аллага шекер
Аллага шекер
Аллага шекер
I hit that PLAY PLAY
It’s the perfect DAY DAY
All the heads go YEAH YEAH
Do it right HERE HERE
(In an Russian accent)
Is that a British song you got there?
But I thought you’re doing a song about Russian culture
Oh, Tatar, is it? Haha, very funny, yes.
Allaga sheker (thank God)
Allaga sheker (thank God)
Allaga sheker (thank God)
Allaga sheker (thank God)
DEVELOPED BY DUMASTAR
