Yenisei Punk

The Central Asian country of Tuva and its music aren't quite so obscure since the high-profile release of the Genghis Blues film documentary and CD. A precursor to that project, Yenisei-Punk is the groundbreaking 1995 debut from Yat-Kha (pronounced Yat-ha). Remastered and reissued with two extra tracks, Yenisei-Punk takes otherworldly Tuvan throat singing and fuses it with rock and blues, embellishing several tracks here with guitar. While leader Albert Kuvezin claims to be influenced by Black Sabbath, Deep Purple, and Sonic Youth, tracks like "Kaa-Khem" actually sound closer to the Velvet Underground with its simple but insistent percussion, rock guitar chord progressions, and morinhoor (a bowed Tuvan instrument). It's also interesting to note that Kuvezin, in classic punk fashion, remakes such Soviet propaganda songs as "Solun Chaagai Sovet Churtum" (i.e., "Beautiful Soviet Country"), adding a cynical edge in much the same way that the Sex Pistols did with "God Save the Queen." Definitely one of the more interesting musical hybrids one is likely to come across. --Tad Hendrickson