When I ponder on extraterrestrial life, I almost always think if they’re as selfish and crochety as our race the oh so self-righteous humans. Just look at this list on wikipedia – the list of active autonomous and secessionist movements , there’s not even one country who’s not having a problem with a minority group. How much more evolution do we have to go through to leave these stuff behind. (On a side note majority of Republicans don’t believe evolution a report by Gallup. so it might take more than planned.)

The Sámi people (The Laplanders) are but one of these problematic ethnic groups, who until the ’50s couldn’t speak Sámi in Norwegian schools and were forced to adopt Norwegian identities and change their names. They’re nomadic tribal people living together with reindeer in the Laplands and were exploited by Sweden, Norway, Finland and Russia because their ancestoral lands take the top of Scandinavia (Lapland). Adjagás is a Sámi band that revives the traditional hypnotic yoik chanting of the Sámi people and mashes it with bluesy guitar and drums to create a weird folk/world music album.

Yoik is not about making stories about people, animals, situations or landscapes. Yoik is the young woman, the eagle, the grass field by the river – they are recreations of a moment, a sense, a memory – how the wings of a bird slowly touches your chin, the smell of a fireplace and and how it ewokes memories. The yoik is about bringing memories into the light of day, making them available and inviting new people into this special world.

The name Adjágas signifies the state between sleeping and waking (a state which doesn’t have a definite name in western culture?) and I have to mention that it’s produced by Andreas Mjøs of Jaga Jazzist fame and released on the small one-woman Norwegian label Trust Me. They’re getting international acclaim nowadays and I guess this album is accurate in depicting the life in Laplands and the Sami People (I guess because I’ve only seen the Sami People on a documentary!) who have like all ancient tribes a fresh perspective on life that the modern people has already forgotten.