We Will Never Die

This is Tuva’s one and only Albert Kuvezin’s first Yat-Kha studio album since 2010’s excellent Poets and Lighthouses. Right from the get go on ‘Kongurgai’, a Tuvan traditional song arranged by Kuvezin, you are confronted with his unique voice. Kuvezin’s kanzat style of throat singing ranges from rich velvet, rounded vowel-centred undertones to almost overstretched, near-cracked undertones when singing higher pitched words. Kuvezin plays acoustic guitar along with Sholban Mongush’s beautiful plaintive Tuvan igil (fiddle) accompaniment. Occasional khomuz (jaw harp), percussion and harmony vocals add to the folky sonic palette. The title cut uses the words of a shamanic ritual chant collected by the eminent 95-year-old writer and historian Mongush B Kenin-Lopsan. Kuvezin’s arrangement turns it into a throat singing torch song. ‘Shartylaam (My Locust)’ is more uptempo, also inspired by a Tuvan shamanic text. On that note, it would have been great to have had the lyrics available either in print or online. Throat singing renditions of Black Sabbath’s ‘Solitude’ and George Harrison’s ‘While My Guitar Gently Weeps’ echo Yat-Kha’s 2005 ReCovers. While ‘Ak-Oruk (The White Road)’, a multi-guitar instrumental, has a feeling of hope, resonating with the Tuvan greeting ‘White road to You,’ meaning a good open way to all. Wonderful sentiments.