Tanya Tagaq: Saputjiji
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Out Now
Saputjiji is the seventh album from Tanya Tagaq; singer, composer, actor, author, activist. Adam Brady, a long-time fan, reviews the latest from one of the moral compasses of the world.
Nostradamus would not have seen this coming. Six Shooter could not have planned this better even if they had tried. Nobody could have guessed or wagered that in the week leading up to the release of Saputjiji, the seventh album from ostensibly Canadian but definitively Inuk multi-disciplinary artist Tanya Tagaq, that Donald Trump and Benjamin Netenyahu would illegally bomb Iran. For someone who has advocated for indigenous rights and against colonialism and violence, the stars could be said to have aligned.
Saputjiji opens with Fuck War. Its message stark and without ambiguity, it hits you over the head with the force of a MOP (a bomb used in July 2025 against Iran, which has the rather sterile designation of GBU-57 MOP; MOP being a Massive Ordnance Penetrator, aka a ‘bunker buster’)Its electronic soundscape is as disorienting as that which the song rails against, with distorted guitar crashes (provided by Patrick O’Reilly) adding bite. Combined with Tagaq’s unique solo take on traditional Inuit throat singing it is a heavy way to start the album.
If a song could be said to have a sibling, then Fuck War’s sister would be Foxtrot. Joined by Damian Abraham of Fucked Up, the repeated refrain of Foxtrot Uniform Charlie Kilo, Yankee Oscar Uniform ranges from anger to despair, to outright indignation.
If anger and its various synonyms are the first emotions we experience it is by no means the driving force – or feeling – of the album. Saputjiji is the Inuktat for ‘designated protector’. For what pervades the album is Tagaq’s desire to prevent what has gone before from happening again.
Both When They Call and Exit Wound (the first of which features Jeffrey Zeigler on cello) deal with Nunavut’s high suicide rate amongst its youth. Tagaq’s lyrics and singing are haunting, and this is matched by Zeigler’s droning cello bowing on When They Call. The call for those contemplating taking their lives is presented as a personal matter and as a cultural matter too. It is indeed an affecting message.
These and other tracks such as Razorblades and Bohica stand in contrast to other songs on the album; from the near ambient to the industrial-adjacent. But throughout the designated protector is always present. Take Ikualajut. Delivered as spoken word the lines “They say there’s safety in numbers/It depends who’s counting” and “While we eat our puke off our residential school dining room floor” contain contempt for those that perpetrated and facilitated horrors upon the indigenous population’s children whilst at the same time, educate and empower us so that it never happens again.
Whilst Tagaq’s take on throat singing stands alone amongst the Inuit she does duet with Celina Kalluk on closing song Imiq. Musically and vocally it is beautiful and hypnotic – a reminder that when we work together (notwithstanding the pragmatic reason Tagaq throat sings solo) and collaborate instead of trying to punish and destroy, or control that which we should not, we can create and support for the betterment of all.
Saputjiji will be an album that you will love or hate. I am one of those that loves it. Not only for what it is by itself, but because it further cements the position of Tanya Tagaq as a moral guide. Not only for the Inuit, and Canada and its historic colonial forces, but for all people around the world. Given the events in the world in the immediate run up to its release, it’s a vital album that will stand the test of time.
Find Tanya Tagaq via her Instagram
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All words by Adam Brady, who hosts The Adam Brady Show on Louder Than War Radio. You can find his author’s archive here
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