A Las Barricadas

Seems like I’m in a bit of a musical mood today. I absolutely love this song and hearing it sung by loads of people like in the above video sends shivers up my spine. For those of you who don’t know A Las barricadas is a song that was written and sung by anarchists during the Spanish revolution whilst they were fighting the Fascist Falange on one front and eventually the counter revolutionary stalinists on the other.

The lyrics were written by Valeriano Orobón Fernández and it was sung to the tune of Warszawianka 1905. The lyrics in Spanish are:

Negras tormentas agitan los aires
nubes oscuras nos impiden ver
Aunque nos espere el dolor y la muerte
contra el enemigo nos llama el deber.

El bien más preciado
es la libertad
hay que defenderla
con fe y con valor.

Alza la bandera revolucionaria
que llevará al pueblo a la emancipación
En pie el pueblo obrero a la batalla
hay que derrocar a la reacción

¡A las Barricadas!
¡A las Barricadas!
por el triunfo
de la Confederación.

Which translate into English as:

Black storms shake the sky
Dark clouds blind us
Although death and pain await us
Against the enemy we must go

The most precious good
is freedom
And we have to defend it
With courage and faith

Raise the revolutionary flag
Which carries the people to emancipation
Working people march onwards to the battle
We have to smash the reaction (or “reactionaries”)

To the Barricades!
To the Barricades!
For the triumph
of the Confederation

Absolutely beautiful song. Here’s the original version from a recording made during the revolution itself followed by a slightly punkier version by Spanish band Los Muertos De Cristo.

Ach hell here’s a funky lounge version of the song as well.

No Pasaran!

La Lucha Continua!