CD Review | Inuktitut (Bonsound, 2023)

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Inuktitut
Elisapie
Bonsound, September 2023

Wish You Were Here by Pink Floyd, Going to California by Led Zeppelin, Wild Horses by the Rolling Stones, The Unforgiven by Metallica, I Want to Break Free by Queen, Heart of Glass by Blondie, Born to Be Alive by Patrick Hernandez. These are just some of the classics reinterpreted in Inuktitut by Quebec native artist Elisapie on her new album, produced by Joe Grass.

The 10 chosen hits, translated and adapted into Elisapie’s mother tongue, evoke emotionally-charged moments from her youth in her community of Salluit, Nunavik.

The result is a highly personalized artistic reappropriation of these popular hits from the 1960s to ’90s. Sometimes the original versions are barely recognizable, often imbued with an indie folk spirit and style that expresses the emotional intensity of this introspective and resolutely therapeutic work. This suits Elisapie’s artistic sensitivity perfectly: the album is a tribute to the friends and loved ones, and the sometimes painful memories they evoke. It’s also a tribute to inhabitants of the Far North, who demonstrate great resilience in the face of tragedy and trauma.

Listening to the tracks, paired with the short texts and video-clips that accompany each of the painful or joyous moments to which they make reference, listeners can hear the painstaking, meticulous, detailed work of both guitarist Joe Grass and Elisapie, as well as percussionist Robbie Kuster and keyboardist François Lafontaine.

This page is also available in / Cette page est également disponible en: Francais (French)