Chuquimamani-Condori Shares Self-Titled Album Under New Los Thuthanaka Moniker: Listen

Chuquimamani-Condori has debuted a new moniker—Los Thuthanaka—and shared the project’s debut self-titled album. Surprise-released yesterday (March 22), the follow-up to 2023’s DJ E is a full-length collaboration between the Bolivian American artist formerly known as Elysia Crampton and their brother, Joshua Chuquimia Crampton. The record is available to purchase on Bandcamp.

In a note to Pitchfork, Chuquimamani-Condori wrote: “This record is a milestone for me & my brother, bringing prayers for rain & gratitude. The music is part of our ayni to the relatives & our queer guardian, Chuqi Chinchay.” The statement continues:

My friend Juan Vargas Rollano reminds us of a saying in our maternal language, told to him by Elizabeth Yana, that goes: “Don’t pity q’iwa (queer) people because they walk looking at the stars”
[ Janiwa llaqisañaqiti q’iwanakata jupanakaxa warawaranakana uñxatata sarnaqaphiwa ].

For us, the star is also called Chuqi Chinchay, who the great Aymara chronicler Joan de Santa Cruz Pachacuti wrote was “muy pintado, de todos los colores, dizen que era apo de los Otorongos, en cuya guarda da a los ermafroditas, yndios de dos naturas”.

We should recall the earliest known carbon-dated depiction of God in the Americas is a gourd etched with an image of Chuqi Chinchay as the “staff god”— Chuqi Chinchay’s iconic fusion with what we call Viracocha. A key attribute of Chuqi Chinchay’s qillqa (iconography or language) throughout millennia has been their hominid, simian, avian, reptilian, amphibian, & insectile transformations, among others.

Read about DJ E at No. 9 on “The 100 Best Albums of the 2020s So Far.”

Los Thuthanaka:

01 Q’iwanakax-Q’iwsanakax Utjxiwa
02 Jallalla Ayllu Pahaza Marka Qalaqutu Pakaxa
03 Huayño “Ipi Saxra”
04 Huayño “Phuju”
05 Caporal “Apnaqkaya Titi”
06 Kullawada “Awila”
07 Parrandita “Sariri Tunupa”
08 Salay “Titi Ch’iri Siqititi”