Tanya Tagaq makes 10-4-08

TANYA TAGAQ GILLIS
AUK/ BLOOD
JERICHO BEACH

Sound: verb: babble, bang, bark, blare, blow, boom, burst, buzz, cackle, chatter, clack, clang, clank, clap, clatter, clink, crash, creak, detonate, echo, emit, explode, hum, jabber, jangle, jar, moan, murmur, patter, play, rattle, reflect, resonate, resound, reverberate, ring, roar, rumble, shout, shriek, shrill, sing, slam, smash, snort, squawk, thud, thump, thunder, toot, trumpet, vibrate, whine, whisper 

Its the creation through Innuit throat singing of a world of distance, flecks of sound, barely discernible, an Acrtic mirage, quick glimpses so sure and yet questioned...was it really real... the darkness and the lightness of being.... covering tracks with guttural invocations, rumbles and murmurs, whispers and low shrieks.... what began as a contest between women, an amusement during the hunt has been taking as an art by Tanya Tagaq. She is a solo artist but the echo in throat singing involves another. It is not a cry in the wilderness but communication. It needs the other to exist. And in being so strengthens its connection to its geography and thus to Canada. Its the art of Survival writ large. Here Tagaq collaborates with Buck 65 and Mike Patton of Faith No More among others in an attempt to further explore the genre's possibilities. While this could be classed as World Music Tagaq's honesty roots her work in something not so exotic or quaint. Compared to her art its her collaborators who come across as below par. Their machinations and creative flights of fantasy whose aim I imagine is to compete in the tradition of throat singing fail terribly. Tagaq takes gold each time. The others' attempts actually detract from the power of the record. But left alone with just sound and voice this is easily the best thing I have heard in sometime. It is authentic, unique and completely itself.