O Kanata Day: Watch Mohawk Artist Jackson 2bears Remix Colonial "Heritage Mythologies"

Happy Anti-Canada Day—it's time to celebrate the country's Original Peoples.

That's right, we said it.

In a year of reconciliation, on a nationalized holiday of mostly mindless settler celebration, what better time than now to acknowledge not only the long and continuing history of colonialism that has built Canadians' Homes on Native Land, but also the strength and resilience of the Indigenous Nations and societies that predated the arrival of Europeans on our shores?

That's what Kanien'kehá:ka DJ/VJ and multimedia artist Jackson 2bears is doing.

2bears is marking this auspicious occasion with the release of a full-length version of his incredible video work, Heritage Mythologies, an artful deployment of re-appropriation and remix for decidedly Indigenous purposes.

The piece is part of a 2010 installation and live video remix performance at the SAW Gallery in Ottawa, that has since been included in the Beat Nation touring exhibition. Beat Nation demonstrated the unique ways Indigenous artists are using hip-hop and other forms of popular culture to create new cultural hybrids—in painting, sculpture, installation, performance and video.

In Heritage Mythologies, 2bears lets loose his VJ skills on an astonishing array of found footage and cinematic samples sourced from Canadian media, newscasts, CanCon beer ads, Olympic resistance, Canadian rapper Classified's settler anthem "Oh...Canada", those iconic Heritage Minute videos, Cape Breton's singer Rita MacNeil rocking the national anthem, footage from the so-called 'Oka crisis', text from residential school reports, right on up to Prime Minister Harper's notorious 2008 apology for the Indian Residential Schools system. And all set to a rolling hip-hop soundtrack.

Heritage Mythologies is ironic, funny, and a scathing critique of Canadian politics and nationalism.

Not only does 2bears expose the long and destructive misrepresentation of Indigenous Peoples on film and in the media, he does it with an artful, musical eye on the colonial politics at work in how we see and, therefore, how we come to know about the past and present of this country.

Heritage Mythologies closes with a wry twist on that beloved old settler classic, "This Land is Your Land", which strums along against an onslaught of imagery depicting the historical and continuing faces of Indigenous resistance flashing and crackling in the background.

The juxtaposition is potent, powerful, and a clear reminder of how far we still have to go.

So on this 'Kanata Day', why glorify colonial conquest when you can lay bare the deep mythological heritage that still holds sway in the Canadian psyche? Why celebrate a falsely imagined nationalism that overwrites Indigenous nationhood in all its forms when you can champion the work of Indigenous artists committed to the daily struggle of correcting media misrepresentations and representing ourselves on our own terms?

Jackson 2bears challenges our complacency and calls us to account for the inanity of pledging ignorant allegiance to the settler colonial state.

Instead of painting your face with the flag of oppression while shotgunning tallboys of Molson Canadian, or embroidering that maple leaf patch on your backpack ahead of your next drunken hostel excursion through Europe, let's pay more attention to what Indigenous artists are actually doing with the imposed legacy of invasion.

Artists like Jackson 2bears are reappropriating the weapon of representation to reflect back to us the destructive, colonial reality that's been carefully hidden behind the false flag of Operation Reconciliation. Time to take it back to the foundations and try again.

Now, who's ready for some fireworks?

Watch Jackson 2bears, Heritage Mythologies

Heritage Mythologies - O Kanata Day - 2015 from Jackson 2bears

Check out more of his work on Vimeo and at jackson2bears.net

Decolonize Your Playlist: Stream the New Mixtape from Sovereign Trax

Sovereign Trax is back with their June playlist of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander artists.

Our cross-continental collab continues with the crew from Sovereign Trax, bringing you the dopest sounds of "nue & old trax...from contemporary and experimental" artists from the lands of occupied 'Australia'.

Last month, SovTrax launched the second issue of their new zine, Sovereign Apocalypse, blending artful contributions into future imaginings of Indigenous sovereignty. Their latest issue, appropriately rocking on an Indigenous Futurism vibe, is themed around "Galactic Imaginings"—and features an interstellar mix of interviews, art, poetry, fashion photography, lyrics, recipes, and more. Equal parts Indigenous intervention and aesthetic subversion, SOVAPOC is bringing new forms to decolonizing self-representations and Aboriginal reimaginings of our collective present and future freedom.

Shout out to co-creators Hannah Donnelly and Gabi Briggs for pushing the #IndigenousMusic and media movement forward. Check this recent review via The Lifted Brow:

The zine was launched last month in Melbourne with an all-star line-up of live performances by Seeka, Birdz, GekkZ, Tahu Dubs and Marze, as the SOVAPOC collective continues to update your essential listening list with the best of contemporary and experimental music by black artists. Blackfulla musicians, artists and writers en masse whether in performance, playlists or publications can evoke a great sense of solidarity and excited strength among blackfullas, but also offer something thrilling and new to a general public. This is what this eye-catching, tactile zine is doing in Melbourne, I think, and perhaps its applicability is because it feels as if it has come from Wiradjuri country, country pre-colonisation (only 230 years ago, I’ll keep saying it, it’s such a short time), and country now urbanised, slick and gritty and flashy – the mix of both these truths finding popularity in the hand-selling and online selling of this publication.

On the musical tip, the latest selections of Sovereign Trax celebrate indigeneity and resistance in multiple forms, featuring new songs from the likes of R.3.B, JPoint, Robbie Miller, and Lady Lash. The talent runs deep and the sounds are an effortless mix of hip-hop, electronica, R&B, reggae, and bluesy-acoustic...all representing Indigenous pride and power.

Enjoy.

STREAM: SOVEREIGN TRAX - JUNE MIX 

Sovereign Trax: June Playlist - Track List

1. E.T.P - Habit’s Die Hard
2. Nathan Morrison x Robbie Miller - Oceans
3. Golden Features x Thelma Plum - No One
4. Coedie Ochre Warrah - GRIIIND
5. Marze x Seeka - Lady Lady
6. Lady Lash - World Gone Silly ft. Pyne
7. Philly - Dreamchaser
8. JPoint - Get Wrecked
9. Zaacharia Fielding - She is the Light
10. Scott Campbell - Tipsy
11. Bow and Arrow - Midnight
12. Paul Gorrie - Pay the Rent
13. Karate Surfing - Shadows
14. Eastern Reggae - Grog’s No Good
15. Marlene Cummins - Pemulwuy

City Natives Form Like Voltron, Listen to Their Rugged New Single, "Ruler"

Stream "Ruler", the lead single from City Natives' new album, Voltron.

Voltron is not just the title of City Natives' latest album, it's also an apt metaphor for the crew's collective power.

Energized by Indigenous camaraderie and lyrical skill, the New Brunswick and Nova Scotia-based quartet of MCs and producers—Beaatz, IllFundz, Gearl, and BnE—has consistently delivered some of the dopest hip-hop coming out of Indian Country.

Last year's Red City was one of 2014's finest releases, and this year the group returns with their latest effort, Voltron, the crew's third LP. Continuing to build on the strength of their established sonic palette—rugged rhymes paired with head-knocking production—the crew's consistency trumps all else; and they're becoming increasingly adept at interweaving the dextrous flows and intricate wordplay between each MC. Every track on Voltron bumps like a long lost classic posse cut unearthed from the dusty crates of hip-hop's bedrock foundations.

On "Ruler", the crew declares their supremacy as "natural born lyricists" committed to maintaining hip-hop's ethos of self-determination and self-made success. There's no denying their claim to a rightful place in hip-hop's pantheon of greatness—but as an Indigenous crew, they're harnessing a uniquely native set of superpowers that makes their collective form all the more compelling and dynamic in what it represents for the people.

And, not that we can take the credit, but all the way back in 2013, we hailed their imminent ascendance as "a young Native rap Voltron" poised for break out success. Looks like it's taken City Natives a couple years to grow into the title. But they've earned it.

Tour dates and album purchase info below.

STREAM: City Natives - "Ruler"

CITY NATIVES - TOUR DATES :: SUMMER 2015

June 24th - Kingsclear, NB @ Jedi June 26th - Halifax, NS @ Multicultural Festival June 30th - Elsipogtog, NB @ CC's Bar July 3rd - Eskasoni, NS @ Pow Wow July 12th - Antigonish, NS @ Evolve Festival July 19th - Fredericton, NB @ The Capital Complex July 31st - Fredericton, NB @ The Capital Complex August 1st - Listuguj, QC - @ Real Bar August 8th - Toronto, ON @ Planet Indigenous August 19th - Millbrook, NS @ Summer Games August 30th - Charlottetown, PEI @ Babas Lounge

City Natives' Voltron is available now on iTunes. Stream the full album on Spotify below:

Silver Jackson Premieres New Music Video for "Starry Skies Opened Eyes (Pt.II)"

Silver Jackson drops a video for the title track from his latest album, Starry Skies Opened Eyes.

One of our favourite releases of 2014, Silver Jackson's Starry Skies Opened Eyes is a bold imagining of an Indigenous future found in the reclamation of life and the rediscovery of present possibilities in the here and now.

Collaborating with Diné filmmaker Dylan McLaughlin, the Tlingit Unangax̂ artist has released an evocative black and white music video for the album's title track, "Starry Skies Opened Eyes".

Here's what he had to say about the clip and the album:

"Starry Skies Opened Eyes features" vocals from multidisciplinary Métis artist Moe Clark. The album was recorded over a three year period that saw Jackson narrowly escape death in a hunting accident, and traces his path to newfound perspectives on life through love and gratitude…friends and family.

Watch the video below and stream the full album, Starry Skies Opened Eyes, right here on RPM.

Silver Jackson - Starry Skies Opened Eyes (Pt. II) from Dylan McLaughlin

Listen to the Sultry Sounds of Once A Tree's New Single, "Take Me"

Toronto duo Once A Tree drops their latest single, "Take Me".

Once A Tree is a band of the moment.

Although their trap-inflected take on downtempo, dreamy, electronic pop at times harkens back to the chilled out sounds of the early 90s, Once A Tree wraps their low key beats in a hazy 21st century collage of aesthetic influences.

Saulteaux singer Jayli Wolf's lilting vocals pair beautifully with husband Hayden John Wolf's 808-stamped beat production, and their sound is completed with soaring synths, spacious pads, and drifting melodies.

"Take Me" fits the bit bill perfectly and further locks Once A Tree's rep as a duo to watch closely as they continue their rapid rise into pop cultural notoriety. It's only a matter of time.

Their debut EP, Thousand Lives, drops July 10, 2015 on Foreseen Entertainment.

STREAM: Once A Tree, "Take Me"

DOWNLOAD: D Ojibwe 1's "Summer Mix 2015"

D Ojibwe 1 drops a fresh summer mix just in time for pow wow and backyard BBQ season. 

Y'all ready for summer yet?

Rama First Nation DJ and occasional producer D Ojibwe 1 (aka Drew Douglas) is helping you get set for a long hot season of gettin' out, kickin' back, and vibing with your peoples—where you are.

Featuring a fresh mix of old school classics, remixes, mash ups, and re-edits, D Ojibwe 1 drops an airtight collection of hip-hop, soul, funk, dance, trap, and EDM that will set the mood for whatever your summer party plans might be.

Interspersed with Indigenous vocals, samples, and native producers, this is a mix fit for a true NDN Summer.

Did we really just hear Joy Division transition into Ol Dirty Bastard? You know we did. Full track list after the jump.

DOWNLOAD: D Ojibwe 1's - Summer Mix 2015

TRACK LIST

Mobb Deep - Shook ones part II (Goodfellas Hybrid Party Break) Mobb Deep - Shook Ones part II (Tron rmx) ? - Miigwech Will Smith vs Lovin Spponful - Summer time (Wick-it Mashup) Summertime (Rankenstein rmx) Mustang Sally (JR.Dynamite re-edit) Bobby Byrd - I Know You Got Soul (Boby Cooper re-edit) Daft Punk - Get Lucky Daft Punk - One More Time DJ Woody - Dirty Scruff Nightcrawlers - Push the Feeling On (DJ Sign Private rmx) Real 2 Reel - I Like to Move It (M&S 2015 rmx) Red Hot Chili Peppers - Otherside (Deepdink bootleg) Phunk Junkies - Big Spender rmx Krafty Kuts - Hustle Rolling Stones - Gimme Shelter (Phunk Junkies rmx) Rolling Stones - Gimme Shelter (DJ Tripp rmx) Mark Ronson f Bruno Mars - Uptown Funk Party Break (DJ Sam) The Beatles - Ob La Di (Goodfellas drum edit) Skee Lo - I Wish (Tron rmx) Harry Belafonte - Jump in the Line (Codes Moobah rmx) Top of the World (Deejay Theory rmx) Sublime - Doin Time (Zeds Dead rmx) Boogey the Beat - Bear Song ? - The Jump Off 2014 Otis Redding - Dock of the Bay (Scratch Bastid edit) Crooklyn Clan - Be Faithful (reggae chop) BlackSheep - The Choice 2012 re-edit I Feel Love vs Rollin in the Deep CArly Rae Jepsen - I really Like You (Broiler rmx) Scream and Shout (Kassanova Fat Man Scoop rmx) Hideaway (Deejay Theory edit) Hideaway (EMG rmx) New Order - Blue Monday (Antonis Kanakis edit) Bob Marley - Jammin (CMC and Silenta rmx) Martin Garrix - Forbidden Voices (Blvk Sheep rmx) Calvin Harris - Summer (Thrizzo Trap rmx) Jay Z - Big Pimpin (CEDEK x Niko Javan rmx) DJ Kool - Let Me Clear my Throat (Deep Trvpped rmx) Headphone Activist - Ocean Floors Joy Division - Love will Tear us Apart ODB - Shimmy Shimmy Ya (Tron rmx) Bone Man - Summer Breeze Ahas - Take on Me (Take Her Back rmx) Jack Ace-Get Free - Cinema VIP

DOWNLOAD: Logan Staats' "Running Like the River"

Download "Running Like the River", the lead single from Logan Staats' debut solo album, Goodbye Goldia.

Mohawk singer Logan Staats is about to take over Indian Country.

The Six Nations musician, born and raised in Brantford, Ontario, has emerged on the Indigenous music scene bearing his guitar like a weapon, and his raw talent and emotion like a suit of armour in a war of heartbreak and redemption.

Staats, who first became known to us as the frontman for Ghost Town Orchestra, has been making waves with his solo work, after debuting a few solo tracks, performances, and videos through his label, 6 Arrows Media.

His debut album, Goodbye Goldia, is set for release on June 21st, and here's a first taste of what to expect: the clarion call of emotional immediacy, a singularly identifiable gift for melody, and an impassioned vocal delivery that overflows with joy, sadness, pain, and power.

This is acoustic music that explores the depths of human experience at its most honest and vulnerable. And Logan Staats is a conduit for that special magic that music holds—a transformative force for remaking pain into pure artistry.

Incredible.

DOWNLOAD: Logan Staats - "Running Like the River"

Stryk-9 Channels Ancestral Power in New Single and Video, "In The Spirit"

Stryk-9 represents for the people on new single and video, "In The Spirit".

Hochunk-Northern Cheyenne hip-hop artist Kunu Dittmer—aka Stryk-9—has been at the game for years, building and creating throughout the Northwest with his Indigenous crew, the Burial Ground Sound Collective.

Stryk-9's new single, "In The Spirit", is a heartfelt portrait of empowerment and Indigenous struggle that comes drumming through your speakers with the spirit of Crazy Horse. Opening with a throwback soul sample that flips a traditional hand drum song and vocal over a head-knocking hip-hop beat, Stryk-9 spits raw verses about bringing his creativity into action for clan, fam, and all relations.

But as he asks in the track's closing lines, what can we do in the face of "world wars and global warming", when we're "living the story of creation / the destruction of the system that's corrupting the spirit of women and men / is it the beginning or the end?"

Politically charged, but decidedly personal in its ambition to bring truth to the light for the benefit of all Indigenous Peoples, this is a revolutionary warrior's anthem for the conscious, proud, and free.

Catch Stryk-9 and the Burial Ground Sound Collective, alongside Almas Fronterizas and Katrina Benally (Diné), at "Uprising at the Abbey"—an all ages, hip-hop showcase organized as part of the One Flaming Arrow Festival's closing night—Sunday, June 14 in Portland, Oregon. Full event info here.

DOWNLOAD: Stryk-9's - "In The Spirit"

Watch Stryk-9's "In The Spirit"

Winnipeg Hip-Hop Artist Young Kidd Returns With "In My Dreams"

Young Kidd re-emerges into the hip-hop limelight with his new song, "In My Dreams".

It's been a minute for Young Kidd.

The Winnipeg-based hip-hop artist was making moves and building his fan base a few years back, but then everything changed.

In 2013, Franklin (Young Kidd) Fontaine was sentenced to three years in prison for shooting off a prohibited firearm in a Winnipeg sports bar back in May 2009. It not only curtailed his freedom, it forced him to reconsider where his life was headed.

As a father to a young girl, Young Kidd took the time to reflect on his own choices and, having recently gotten out, he's returned with an introspective hip-hop track charting the course of his recent years.

Flipping his handle on SoundCloud to YK The Mayor, Young Kidd spins a tale about family, incarceration, love and loss, and his determination to get right.

"When you locked up, all you got is time", he speaks at the track's close, "It's just a matter of what you do with that time."

STREAM: Young Kidd - "In My Dreams"

STREAM: Postcommodity's 'We Lost Half The Forest And The Rest Will Burn This Summer'

Postcommodity is back with a snarling new album of decay, decomposition, and cyclical renewal.

Acclaimed Indigenous artist collective Postcommodity—Nathan Young, Kade Twist, Cristobal Martinez and Raven Chacon—return with their new album, We Lost Half The Forest And The Rest Will Burn This Summer, a darkly brilliant new album of noise and experimental sonics.

From the disintegration of its opening chord, We Lost Half The Forest lurches into a jarring and unrelenting movement toward some unknown destination or origin. The seeming soundtrack to an imminent decline, whether that of Western Civilization or a litany of other obliquely inferred societal ills—the rusting stench of rapacious global capitalism, the destructive, crushing force of the colonial machine—Postcommodity's virtuosic evisceration of the melodic comfort of the listener also makes space to suggest, however subtly, an inchoate sense of Indigenous presence, resurgent return.

There is the hum of something else amidst the chaos and destruction.

The 16-song concept album, the collective's third, was recorded at the Banff Centre for the Arts during a recent residency, and its contours mark not a linear trajectory of inevitable apocalyptic anxiety and decline but, instead, an imminent journey inward, and down—into and through—the land itself.

The album traces "the ever-cycling decay of a desert drought from the view of its flora and fauna", and We Lost Half the Forest makes audible the dirge and drama of a world crackling, humming, and burning. A world starved for water—gasping for air—spinning down "the only path" available to itself to reclaim some sense of disoriented direction.

Acoustically, as is their oblique aesthetic tendency, the group combines Western classical instruments and performers, with their own Southwestern-rasquache electronics, into a deceptive blend of sonic assault, quiet hums, and melodic passages. With contributions from Marc Sabat, Nico Dann, Cecilia Bercovich, Achiya Asher, Cohen Alloro, Aaron Bannerman, Dory Hayley and Ilana Dann, the collective swells and crashes through Godspeed You! Black Emperor levels of intensity, while recalibrating the terrain of Indigenous noise and melody.

As the blasting, searing sounds of "Chacoma" rise to a crescendo of dissonant trumpets, feedback, colossal bass drums, vibrating strings, struck piano, and the haunted wails of far-off voices, the "end" the album evokes seems to eclipse the possibility of its own arrival. The swirling burn of "Dia Del Cabrón" cascades into caterwauling, recursive feedback loops, while in later tracks like, "Dios Nunca Muere", the feedback has ebbed and faded, and all that is left is the undulation of frequencies set adrift. Winding back and worth, the album marches and warbles on, as though the sound of weather-worn metallic leaves were clawing back to life in the abated breath of a passing storm.

Postcommodity are masters of both the severe and the serene.

Their music, an art of calculated counterpoint, stages an elemental clash of forces that spins through clouds of anticipated violence, but refuses the finality of obliteration. To listen to this album is to become immersed within it, to be grasped by its ravenous, tentacular clutches, to be pulled deeper into a desertification of the mind.

Postcommodity walks with you—or perhaps they just walk you—solitary, blindfolded, out into an unknown landscape's dry, raw heat, until only the rhythms of parched plants can be heard. Until even those collapse and burn, while the ululating shape of the land's breath grows ever louder in your ears. Until your own heartbeat thrums wildly in your chest. Until, at the end, when the blindfold is removed, you look wildly about for a horizon that you know has grown only into a deepening darkness, the sound of the ground above you, enclosing, enfolding everything.

PREMIERE: Postcommodity, "Chacoma"

DOWNLOAD: Postcommodity's We Lost Half The Forest And The Rest Will Burn This Summer

Postcommodity's We Lost Half The Forest And The Rest Will Burn This Summer is available in a limited run of 200 vinyl copies, with jacket printed and embossed with ash. Naturally. For more information visit postcommodity.com

Listen to Golden Features' Epic New Track, "No One", Featuring Thelma Plum

Could this be the song of the summer?

Mask-clad Australian dance music producer Golden Features just dropped an epic new track featuring rising Indigenous star, Thelma Plum.

And oh what a track it is.

Plum's ethereal vocals provide the perfect complement to Golden Features' floating, melodic production. And the ever-intensifying, four-on-the-floor dancefloor destroyer that "No One" becomes is some kind of beat-based hypnosis. By the time the "it's getting higher" refrain arrives, you'll forget how you even got there. And then with that drop? Forget about it. It's over.

Blast this one with the windows rolled down and the midnight summer heat still blazing. Thelma Plum's stellar ascent continues its rapid rise.

STREAM: Golden Features - "No One (feat. Thelma Plum)"

Golden Features' new EP, XXIV, is available to pre-order on iTunes

Watch Tall Paul's New Video for "Walk Rite"

Anishinaabe MC Tall Paul releases a new music video for the track, "Walk Rite".

For the past several years, Minneapolis-based, hip-hop artist Tall Paul has been dropping tracks as part of his #AheadoftheGame series/mixtape, where he releases a new song each week the Minnesota Vikings play, prior to the game.

Last year he compiled those tracks into the Ahead of the Present mixtape, a nice collection of hip-hop jams and thoughtful lyrics.

Now the sunny and soulful, Bahwee-produced joint, "Walk Rite", gets a fresh visual treatment—just in time for #ThrowbackThursday—courtesy of Jake Handegard at Morningside Films and co-directed by Tall Paul. Check the clip and download the track below.

Watch Tall Paul - "Walk Rite"

DOWNLOAD: Tall Paul - "Walk Rite"