by Gio Pika
“Buyno golova” (“Wild Head”) is a song by Gio Pika, the stage name of Gio Dzhioev, a rapper born in Tbilisi in 1978 who began making music after moving to the Komi Republic in Russia. His style blends rap with Russian chanson, and crime and prison life are his central themes; this song is one of his best-known tracks. Many listeners abroad found it through short videos and know it by the phonetic spelling “Boyna Galava”. In our translation a wild head boils over, with white foam spraying and a white haze. Then come the rights read out, a crowd in blue uniforms, iron shackles, a court and a train, and bread crumbs, tea and halva. A refrain keeps telling the wild head to endure. Near the end the whole prison roars, a line names Magadan and calls prison home, and the Wild Head is the one in charge.
Koinei's own English translation. The original Russian lyrics are not shown on this page: open the reader to follow them word by word with the audio.
From one head, all the gray hair,
All the gray hair all the chaos from one rib, and one devil, but there's a white haze, and white foam sprays
the wild head boils.
My pit is deeper by two,
Two cuts with three stitches each
They'll read out the rights,
Here in blue uniforms, a crowd.
And iron shackles
Sleeves on the hands,
Endure, wild head
Endure, wild head.
The carrot is a stick, and a mace
Court, train, grouse,
Bread crumbs, tea, halva,
Endure, wild head,
If you've broken the wood,
Wild, wild head,
Cooked up a mess with butter
The cops slurped it up.
Two bullets, three feathers,
Three claps, two corpses the key to the drill, the owners kicked out, here rules the Wild
Head, wild head, here the main one is
Wild yes, wild, wild head.
When the Wild
Head boiled over in a flash.
and the smoke streamed through the pipes,
The whole prison roared,
Three bars and two stakes,
Luck knocks on the bells,
Magadan, your home is prison
Endure, wild head, yes, yes, yes.
Wild head, wild head, here the main one is Wild
Head, wild head, and the wild head drags, wild head, wild, wild head, wild, wild head,
| Word | Say it | Meaning | Type | In the song |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| голова | golova | head | noun | головы: genitive, singular, feminine |
| белый | bely | white | adjective | бела: singular, feminine |
| кипеть | kipet | to boil | verb | кипит: present, 3rd person, imperfective; here “boils” |
| буйный | buyny | wild | adjective | буйна: singular, feminine |
| глубокий | glubokiy | deep | adverb | глубже; here “deeper” |
| терпеть | terpet | to endure | verb | терпи: imperfective |
| суд | sud | court | noun | суд: nominative, singular, masculine |
| буйно | buyno | wildly | adverb | буйно |
| заварить | zavarit | to brew | verb | заварила: past, feminine, perfective; here “cooked” |
| расхлебать | raskhlebat | to slurp | verb | расхлебали: past, plural, perfective; here “sorted” |
| главный | glavny | main | adjective | главный: nominative, singular, masculine |
| тюрьма | tyurma | prison | noun | тюрьма: nominative, singular, feminine |
«буйна голова» (buyna golova) “wild head”
Буйна is a short form of буйный (wild, unruly). In everyday Russian a short adjective stands after the noun as a predicate, so голова буйна would mean “the head is wild”. Folk songs, though, often use short forms as plain descriptions before the noun, as in красна девица (a fair maiden). Standard prose would say буйная голова. In the title, буйно does not agree with feminine голова; the song uses it like a nickname.
«два надреза» (dva nadreza) “two cuts”
After два (two), три (three) and четыре (four), a noun goes into the genitive singular: надрез (cut) becomes надреза, and the same happens to the cartridges and the feathers of the next lines. Watch шов (stitch): its genitive is шва, because the о drops out, a so-called fleeting vowel, just as рот (mouth) becomes рта in the opening verse. From пять (five) upward the genitive plural takes over: пять надрезов.
«терпи» (terpi) “endure”
Терпи is the singular imperative of терпеть (to endure): take the present stem терп- (терплю, терпишь) and add -и. The plural or polite form adds -те: терпите. The person being addressed stays in the nominative, here голова. Once the song switches to терпит, the third-person present: literally, the head endures, a statement rather than an order.
«Заварила каши» (Zavarila kashi) “cooked up a mess”
Заварить кашу, literally “to brew porridge”, is an idiom for stirring up trouble, and расхлебать, “to slurp it all up”, means dealing with the consequences; the song hands that job to the police, called мусора in slang. Both verbs are perfective, made with a prefix on a simple verb: за- on варить, рас- on хлебать. The past tense ends in -ла because its subject, голова, is feminine.
Translation, word notes and commentary by Koinei. Rights holders: see Copyright and takedown requests.