Beyond the bristling sound of panpipes, the rhythms of Andean music are now so deeply embedded within popular culture that their influence can sometimes be easy to overlook. Rooted in the instruments and ceremonies of the pre-Colombian era, brusquely impacted by the push and pull of colonialism which entwined local traditions with African customs, European military bands and Italian opera then rippling through other Latin American forms, the combination of high-pitched sikus and antaras, quena or tarka and pinkillu flutes which respectively herald the dry and wet seasons, charango and other assorted string instruments plus wankara drums has influenced everything from ambient and new age to free jazz, or from the shrill tuin of baile funk to cumbia, whose Peruvian variant chicha might make use of wah-wah pedals and a stonking electric bass.
Starting in the sixties the Bolivian bands Los Jairas and Los Kjarkas brought renewed vigour to Andean folk music while the Chilean group Los Jaivas successfully fused psychedelic or progressive rock with traditional Andean instrumentation on the charango and flute. More recently there has been an upsurge in digital cumbia or psychedelic cumbia in the vein of the Colombian favourites Bomba EstƩreo, and the Peruvian label Buh Records continues to unleash new derivations while also mining the past.
An upcoming album by the musicians and researchers Dimitri Manga ChĆ”vez and Ricardo LĆ³pez Alcas as Pacha Wakay Munan promises to explore the sonic possibilities inhering within pre-Hispanic instruments including pututos, a type of ceremonial trumpet made from conch shells, ceramic antaras which were native to the Nazca culture and later ChimĆŗ whistling vessels. Meanwhile last year the Lima-based label issued a retrospective collection of pieces by Cergio Prudencio and his Orquesta Experimental de Instrumentos Nativos which showed the composer bending Aymara traditions in the direction of surprising avant-garde and contemporary music.
Since their earliest work as E+E and their studio debut American Drift under their previous monicker Elysia Crampton, the artist Chuquimamani-Condori has continued to hammer together in conscientious but coruscating fashion a diverse blend of themes and motifs. With precipitous Andean rhythms and staticky electronics providing the musical bedrock, they have explored queer identity, colonialism and Christianity while drawing upon the beats and textures of crunk and baile funk, metal and prog sometimes through the use of overt, even histrionic samples.
American Drift for instance – an album which ostensibly explored the landscapes and historical undercurrents of their Virginia surrounds – sampled cicadas, a litany of space sounds and the yelps of Lil Jon while Crampton’s collaborator Money Allah freely intoned a ‘transevangelistic prayer’ drawn from the religious writings of the French poet, dramatist and Catholic convert Paul Claudel, today perhaps overshadowed by his sister, the sculptor Camille, who Paul is accused of having confined to a mental asylum. The collaborative Elysia Crampton Presents: Demon City and the self-titled Elysia Crampton – dedicated in turn to the Aymara revolutionaries Bartolina Sisa and Ofelia or Carlos Espinosa – subtly expanded their sound, the odd cosmic melody and another profusion of warped, chugging rhythms now emboldened by metallic or industrial beats plus gongs and sirens on records which were strewn with demonic laughter.
‘Oscollo’ from Elysia Crampton sounded more plaintive and ‘Pachuyma’ was especially punishing with its crackling, ceaselessly pummelling beat while ‘Orion Song’ sailed celestial seas. The result on all of these records was a truly original and authentic type of folk music and at the same time a maximalist project in the vein of hyperpop or plunderphonics, as Crampton warped and weft sonic collages and transnational narratives which ultimately sounded quite unlike anything or anybody else.
DJ E their first album as Chuquimamani-Condori felt ebullient and bombastic in a way that was fondly nostalgic and even at times elegiac, as the artist utilised Tecla assistive technology, a Boss sampler of the type associated with J Dilla and Madlib, a CDJ and baby grand piano while their brother Joshua Chuquimia Crampton added crunchy bass and guitar licks and PK Crampton contributed extra decibels through the revving of a circular saw. From oversaturated video game beats to the whirring rivers and openhearted sentiments of the final three songs, the record seemed to find Chuquimamani-Condori in playful yet reflective mood which Joshua echoed on the guitar album Estrella Por Estrella the following year, by turns raucous and wistful.
Now the siblings have banded together for a self-titled debut as Los Thuthanaka, retaining much of the musical palette from their earlier works while homing in on Andean festivities.Ā In particular Los Thuthanaka emphasises the rhythms of huayno, a combination of rural folk and urban dance music which might variously feature quenas and sikus, saxophones and harps, charangos and more conventional string instruments like violins and guitars while bearing a signature pattern, a kind of poetic dactyl where one long or stressed beat is followed by two shorter beats.
On the self-professed huayno songs ‘Ipi Saxra’ and ‘Phuju’ and elsewhere across the album, the duo of Chuquimamani-Condori and Joshua Chuquimia Crampton might also play in the hocket, a facet of huayno whereby two performers or ‘voices’ share one melodic line, alternately dropping in and out of the mix to create a staggered and interlocking effect.Ā Chuquimamani-Condori once more makes use of Tecla assistive technology, sampler and CDJ plus the ronroco – a substantially larger bass-baritone member of the charango family – and Andean bombo drum while Joshua wields his guitar and bass, with the result an album of deep and ofttimes scuzzy grooves which relocate the heart of their sound even while their length harks back to the longform tracks on American Drift.
Liminal and transportive, affording constant shifts in perspective almost in the manner of a stereogram while these grooves stretch out through an indomitable show of will, as Los Thuthanaka their lurching, crunching beats and narcotic toplines suggest a whole smorgasbord of references from Suicide-like electronics to nineties boom bap, trance and the ecstatic organ repetitions of Charlemagne Palestine, all pitched through an Aymara frame.
‘Jallalla Ayllu Pahaza Marka Qalaqutu Pakaxa’ gallops forth, ‘Ipi Saxra’ builds a stacked atmosphere behind an insistent patter ofĀ sampled interjections and exhortations while ‘Phuju’ sounds more folksy with its wriggling melody and clopping percussion. ‘Apnaqkaya Titi’ with its guttural, even orgasmic groans draws from caporales the vigorous Bolivian folk dance before ‘Awila’ teases out one of the latent preoccupations in Chuquimamani-Condori’s work, old conflicts between Bolivia and Peru here related to ownership of the kullawada dance, whose whirligig motion carries rancour and menace while still seeming to set the scene for some kind of personal or cultural rapprochement if not quite a mutual display of goodwill.
The atmosphere on the penultimate track ‘Sariri Tunupa’ is especially ripe, a straining and reaching song which battles through the fog without ever cresting the summit. Described as a parrandita, the reference is to a kind of festive spree among friends which typically involves alcohol and has been compared to a secular form of Christmas carolling. Then the closer ‘Titi Ch’iri Siqititi’ cedes more to the the melody, a bouncy sendoff to Los Thuthanaka which still retains its share of crunch and bite.
A sense of reciprocity is embedded within this album. Chuquimamani-Condori has described it as an ‘ayni to the relatives and our queer guardian Chuqi Chinchay’, a water deity revered by the Inca who is often depicted as a dual-gendered, multicoloured jaguar or other wild cat. It is also a loud and rambunctious record, sonically unmastered and spiritually untamed, one of the most pounding and punishing of the year so far at the same time as the siblings encourage listeners to share in their grind and embrace their heedful but trenchant, generation-spanning dance.
