Throwback Thursday: Emergency Rally for Standing Rock NYC 2/22/2 #mniwiconi #NoDAPL
The forced removal of Indigenous people from our own land (although we don’t have the sense of ownership of Turtle Island that the dominant culture does…) at #StandingRock is part of a time-worn historical continuum of violence that this country operates on. A trail of broken treaties ghosted yesterday’s actions in North Dakota, the water protectors camps engulfed in flames as per this Time footage
( Kandia Crazy Horse @ Emergency Rally for Standing Rock @ Union Square (yesterday) in NYC, by Zapotec photographer & artist Javier Soriano from Puebla, Mexico )
Last night on Wednesday, February 22, I joined a group of water protectors gathered in Union Square to stand in solidarity with the water protectors at Standing Rock, as we had been alerted via digital smoke signals to the 2pm deadline for forcible eviction. Yesterday, the remaining core of water protectors were evicted from the camps — including Oceti Sakowin — near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation in North Dakota. It was also an occasion to enjoy some of the unprecedented pan-indigenous unity we’ve been experiencing, including Zapotec brothers from Puebla in Mexico to queer Pinoy activists holding forth about the conflict in Mindanao in the Philippines. I & a Lakota brother from Red Warrior Camp are both affiliated with Split Rock prayer camp in NJ & spoke to that at the rally to encourage our local tri-state sisters & brothers to engage with the fight against our own black snakes afflicting the Hudson River and surrounding areas — the resistance is not over yet, upon any part of Turtle Island. As one of the youngest speakers at the rally, Abby, mentioned, many of us come from so-called minority populations & indigenous communities disproportionately affected by environmental racism, and we cannot let it stand – A’ho*
A reminder: “The Oceti Sakowin Camp: a first of its kind historic gathering of Indigenous Nations. The most recent such assembly of Tribes occurred when the Great Sioux Nation gathered before the Battle at the Little Big Horn.
The Standing Rock Sioux Tribe supports the peaceful and prayerful message of the Oceti Sakowin leaders. The on-reservation camp allowed the tribe to explore longer term ways to meet the needs of the community that is 100% off-the-grid and features Solar & Wind power generation.”
See some of the photographs that Brotha Javier took of the rally here:
http://www.javiersoriano.com/2017/02/23/standing-rock/
I Still Stand With Standing Rock #NoDAPL
There may be a new administration in Washington & they are obviously in cahoots with the corporations behind the #KeystoneXL & the #DakotaAccessPipeline — but we of Indian Country & our allies are still determined to stop all black snakes from afflicting Turtle Island. I have received communication from LaDonna Brave Bull Allard of Sacred Stone Camp & others to come stand with our precious water protectors @ Standing Rock — or to organize actions locally to support them. I am pondering the latter with my fellow Afro-Native bandmate of Cactus Rose & some of my Tri-State Native Circle. We all must do our part, when they are raiding camps & dishonoring rights. We cannot let this stand. And I shall still be acting in support of the Ramapough Lunaape @ Split Rock with their efforts to #StopSpectra here in NY/NJ/CT. See you on the frontlines! A’ho*
Throwback Thursday: Kandia Crazy Horse’s top albums of 2016 x Other Music NYC
I have been mostly focused on the Red Road > powwow highway > doing activism on behalf of Indian Country especially for Standing Rock / #NoDAPL during 2016. Yet once I was a rock journalist & music editor in a previous life, and I perpetually remain a vinyl collector & music fanatic. Amongst the many losses to the music world this year was my dear folks’ seminal record store in the NoHo section of downtown NYC: Other Music. I bought my last hauls of records there back in the spring/summer & we feted their existence with a great parade down the Bowery, followed by a concert @ Bowery Ballroom starring Yoko Ono & many other artists. So it’s now bittersweet to be closing out the year by voting for my most memorable recordings of 2016 in company with the OM fam — here’s my list:
KANDIA CRAZY HORSE 2016 ALBUMS (I will shortly be submitting ballots for the Village Voice Pazz+Jop in Manhattan & the Nashville Scene country music critics poll for Nashville, TN as well…)
& the other Other Music staff + fellow update contributors’ choices can be read HEREIN
& some scenes from the closing of Other Music…A’ho*
( Kandia Crazy Horse & Other Music staffer / WFMU DJ / Bim Marx producer Duane Harriott inside Other Music’s East 4th St store on the final day of operations )
( The last 2 physical copies of my debut album Stampede for sale @ Other Music NYC )
( Other Music co-owner Josh Madell & I outside the Bowery Ballroom on Delancey Street, after the parade / before the farewell concert started )
( Other Music staffer / bandleader of Chouette Amanda Colbenson & I outside the Bowery Ballroom after the OM parade down the Bowery, NYC )
( The banner that used to hang above the entrance @ Other Music on East 4th Street, NYC )
“Manhattan Given Back To Indians…” & Benny Andrews’ Bicentennial Blues & Frohawk Two Feathers’ Frenglish New York
Given that I was out all day yesterday — primarily attending an uptown art salon in Lower Harlem, where I sang — I completely missed this odd bit of NYC local news: MANHATTAN GIVEN BACK TO INDIANS (well at least a part of it)
Although I have some close ties with the Ramapough Lunaape and am acquainted with Chief Dwaine Perry, I have not to my knowledge crossed paths with the New York Post article’s cited chief Anthony Jay Van Dunk nor have I met the cited son of artist Louise Bourgeois — I have been a fleeting fan of hers due to her longevity/continuing to create but expertise on her life & oeuvre lies with my twin sister, the art historian — Jean-Louis Goldwater Bourgeois. I don’t know quite what to make of this transaction, but if the ultimate result is a patahmaniikan (prayer house) then fine. I did not get to participate in the Ramapough winter ceremony this past Saturday out @ Split Rock, for it was cancelled due to snow/inclement weather; so I have not heard any direct commentary from the Source, as it were.
The article says Bourgeois fils has been a Standing Rock benefactor, yet I was more interested to learn of other Natives’ participation in the Occupy Movement for in all the months I was involved in it, particularly Occupy Music, I never met any. Now, if only this M. Bourgeois would get behind the fight to establish Indigenous Peoples Day in NYC. Overall, it was just a little odd piece of news to be sent to me by other Urban Native friends, at the end of the year when Standing Rock has become such a Hollywood trendy Cause (Elvis’ grand baby appearing at hyped LA benefits) & indigenous chic itself has been atomizing err’where — especially on the backs of musical artists with no Native roots including hip-hop ones & judges of The Voice like Alicia Keys — but I am still encountering folks who never heard of what’s going on with the Dakota Access Pipeline (or any other of this land’s black snakes). It’s weird to be revisiting the apocryphal sale of Manhattan by the Lenape to the Dutch, even as our Tri-State news is dominated by news of president-elect Trump’s vast real estate holdings here, the need to barricade Trump Tower in Midtown, and the ongoing discussion of the City as Trump’s fiefdom. I hope the Ramapough do not get targeted by limousine liberals, due to their local residence. Meantime, instead of hashtagging activism, focus & funds need to be directed to the many Native protectors of Standing Rock who are now facing felonies / about to have their cases trafficked through the courts in North Dakota — and there’s inadequate legal representation for most. Some of us staying woke despite the narcotic of holiday cheer.
#IStandWithSplitRock
(Chief Van Dunk, Ramapough, & art patron/architectural historian Bourgeois via New York Post)
Anyroad, I believe this story jumped out at me due to a long conversation about Native American roots out of the Mid-Atlantic and “outsider art” creation we had on Friday afternoon in Chelsea, on the verge of a gallery crawl through the ‘hood to see Titus Kaphar’s opening @ Jack Shainman & the great Bicentennial Series show of one of my favorite painters/fellow Georgian Benny Andrews @ Michael Rosenfeld Gallery. Some strange confluence out of the dialogue and Early Colonial (Kaphar) plus Bicentennial/Jim Crow reflection (Andrews) stirred things up…& made me recall the peculiar but beautiful work of Frohawk Two Feathers who was de vogue a few years back, with prominent Chelsea gallery representation & who I have never met but this particular project is extremely similar to my inner imaginorium/worldview – although he is younger than I, born (interestingly) in the year of the American Bicentennial, 1976: Heartbreaking and shit, but that’s the globe. The Battle of Manhattan
(By Frohawk Two Feathers)
Chicago-born, LA-based Frohawk Two Feathers is the alias of Afro-Native artist Umar Rashid (who also does vanguard and alt-hip-hop music under the monikers Kent Cyclone & Tha Grimm Teachaz); and the 2014 culmination of a series of his work blending Afrofuturism and fact / fiction of early settler colonialism in the Americas caught my notice for decades prior to my arrival in New York City — in part due to my Native American great aunt Helena’s residence in Harlem since the 1930s — I had been an (alternative) history buff preoccupied with the lore of the Ramapough, Jacks-and-Whites / other isolates of the area; the apocryphal sale of Manahata and the Algonquin villages of the landmass; and the religious/occult traditions arising from the upstate Burned-Over District. [Which also drew my interest to the now-defunct Sundance network show The Red Road, which focused on Ramapough, starring half-Hawaiian actor Jason Momoa who claims Native American & for which my cousin’s wife Marcey Tree-In-The-Wind served as a consultant.] Two Feathers’ work seemed to at least gloss similar concerns:
“Bonnie Prince Johnnie, flamboyant pharaoh of New York; Francesca, a.k.a. Tisiphone, Native American assassin; Maurits de Wolff, former slave and soldier extraordinaire; Akosua Van Der Zee, wrathful feminist and malicious schemer.
These are a few of the characters in a wildly original telling of the fictional Battle of Yonkers in 18th-century New York; their portraits and those of other tattooed warriors, misled rulers and vengeful women…
…[final] installment of “The American Proteus: An Invocation and the Wars Between the Rivers,” an alternative account of the colonization of northeastern North America that is both written and visual in form, epic in scope, and built around the imaginary Republic of Frengland (a combination of England, France and Ireland).”
There were paintings that were meta portraits or sometimes reminiscent of historical battles depicted on deerskins or echoing ledger art, mixed with art forms of ancient KMT & tipis on display as well. They were somewhat unnerving, for it was like an unknown Spirit had excavated my interior landscape & reproduced it for all eyes to see. And I will leave it at that for now, for there’s far more concerning this work that I wish to explore…A’ho*
(By Frohawk Two Feathers)
Throwback Thursday: Meeting Anna Deveare Smith
Yesterday was an afternoon well-spent in Midtown: attending the matinee of Anna Deveare Smith’s new play #NotesFromTheField @ Second Stage Theater & enjoying a post-show discussion of the school-to-prison pipeline and creative process. I was fortunate enough to see the work by the generosity of my friend who is planning to film the play in 2017, and then to meet Ms. Deveare Smith briefly afterwards. Of the many brilliant characters from various walks of American life that were featured in the play, I most enjoyed her voicing of Congressman John Lewis (D-Georgia) who is the activist that remained most at the forefront of my consciousness during 2016 & the presidential election cycle, as he urged folks to vote.
On a more personal note: Anna Deveare Smith gave me a treasured, high compliment – that my sounds / performance style / interaction onstage with space remind her of Sweet Honey In The Rock. Some of my most precious praise for my creativity that I have received & was happy to learn that Ms. Deveare Smith is from Baltimore, Maryland, aka B-more & thus of the same mid-Atlantic region – #DMV represent!
( Anna Deveare Smith & Kandia Crazy Horse, backstage @ Second State Theater in Midtown NYC )
Either through its staging or the eventual film, looking forward to Notes From The Field speaking to a wider audience. It is a masterwork engaging with this hard, turbulent moment of murders, #BLM, Standing Rock and the “New Jim Crow” on the prison-industrial complex that Angela Davis, Ava DuVernay & several others have been holding forth on, even as one of the major prison strikes in U.S. history has been unfolding this season with very little notice or coverage. How primary school students in minority / underserved communities are being treated is something we all need to think long & hard about…
Rebel Music In The Hour Of Chaos: protest music concert @ Decolonize This Place NYC 12/12
“Rebel Music In The Hour Of Chaos:” Music emanates directly from my indigenous soul. Therefore, it immediately made sense for me to perform my music again this year as a soundtrack to our overlapping struggles – including #NoDAPL. Sounds, including freedom songs past & present, most powerfully link us together & amplify what’s transpiring from the actions in the streets. I was born in the Season of Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going’ On,” an album that dominated my childhood as the strivings for Total Revolution continued past the 1960s societal upheaval; and the inspiration to become an artist-activist sprang from that era. I remain under the influence of rebel music from many artists and cultures – Please join us on Monday 12 December @ Decolonize This Place. 55 Walker St, TriBeCa NYC (Doors 8pm). when we will perform some songs of protest & be in conversation about our activism with Brotha Rob Fields (Bold As Love / Black Rock Coalition) – A’ho! Cactus Rose ft. Special Guests: Abiodun Oyewole (The Last Poets) & Mahina Movement
This may be our final show of 2016, so we really appreciate you coming through & all of your support during the many Standing Rock resistance actions – Wopila tanka, y’all
( Afro-Native sisterhood from Virginia: Kimberly Robison/KAR & Kandia Crazy Horse of Cactus Rose, Native Americana / cosmic country band, @ Decolonize This Place in TriBeCa this past Sunday for Black Art & Activism Now, curated by Dr. Camara Holloway & Tavia Nyong’o (Yale University) )
( preliminary poster for REBEL MUSIC IN THE HOUR OF CHAOS by artist Kyle Goen (Decolonize This Place/MTO Collective) #KyleDidThis )
( Jeff McLaughlin, lead guitarist / vocals of Cactus Rose )
( Kandia Crazy Horse with Lorena, Vaimoana & Gabby of Mahina Movement @ Decolonize This Place NYC )
( Kandia Crazy Horse & Abiodun Oyewole of The Last Poets – Cactus Rose Instagram: @cactusroselovesyou )
Standing With Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #defendthesacred
Just returned a bit earlier from my twin Camara’s #blackartandactivismnow event in TriBeCa @ our home away from home #DecolonizeThisPlace — fortunately, my Black Rock Coalition/Bold As Love good friend/compadre Rob Fields was seated by me at the program, sharing the digital smoke signals about the #NoDAPL good news with me during the panel & then, upon returning home, got a ring from my friend Jonathan from the camps @ the frontline in North Dakota giving the confirmation that the easement was not granted to ETA – if they git’er done, Jonathan’s footage will appear on the Tavis Smiley show on PBS Tuesday night. I finally truly believe in the power of prayer, happy to see such a great outcome after many months of organizing, laboring, marching, rallying & of course, singing, in support of #StandingRock.
Yet this is not the end, for we #blacksnakekillers of the Tri-State must be heartened by this result & continue to fight to #StopSpectra #NoAIM #NoAlgonquinPipeline & I remain #standinginsolidaritywithsplitrock >>>>>>>—–))—>♥ Sometimes we on the right side of history can prevail & conscience trumps greed and corruption. Thank you, President Barack H. “Walking Eagle” Obama & the Army Corps for your action!
Overjoyed that we water protectors have won! The Dakota Access Pipeline will be re-routed, which is a hard-won victory for the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe & rest of the Oceti Sakowin. The ordered environmental impact statement will take months to complete, so it’s not all over & done yet. Still, we celebrate this huge victory & I will report back on the gnosis and mood of tomorrow night’s Democracy Now! event held by Harry Belafonte & Danny Glover et al @ Harlem’s Riverside Church – A’ho!
ARMY HALTS CONSTRUCTION OF DAKOTA ACCESS PIPELINE!
Throwback Thursday: Cactus Rose x Mahina Movement
Here’s a snap by youngblood Claude from last night @ Decolonize This Place, just before the sistren of protest music trio Mahina Movement sang a mighty powerful song In The Spirit of 1491. Contributing some guest vocals — impromptu, I joined them on singing “Ella’s Song” by Sweet Honey In The Rock, and some other tunes — & bearing witness to the live recording of their album for Palestine was a great way to end Native American Heritage Month.
(L-R) Kandia Crazy Horse, singer/songwriter/activist of Cactus Rose; Mahina Movement: Lorena Ambrosio (vocals, cajon, spoken word), Vaimoana Litia Makakaufaki Niumeitolu (vocals, spoken word) & Gabby (vocals, guitar), activists
We be #strongresilientindigenous & we’re looking forward to performing together come 12 December, back @ Decolonize in TriBeCa – A’ho!
#womenwarriorwednesdays #femalesingersongwriters #artists #activists #indigenousrevolutionaries #tbt #NoDAPL #FreePalestine
Still Standing In Solidarity With Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL
As I have been these many months, I continue to be engaged in the Dakota Access Pipeline resistance in solidarity with the Oceti Sakowin of North Dakota – & now, supporting Split Rock as well (sanctioned by Red Warrior Camp), in solidarity with my cousin’s wife’s people, the Ramapough Lunaape of New Jersey, in order to stop the construction of the Algonquin Pipeline. Due to the escalation of attacks on the water protectors @ Standing Rock last Sunday night, I am receiving many communications on the cause & have now been invited to perform at yet another benefit for the camps, which will take place in NYC before Christmas. Other things are afoot as well & will relate about them as they unfold. Glad to note my Virginia Native great aunt is taking up flooding the phones to the president & state representatives with her circle of elders on behalf of Standing Rock!
( Kandia Crazy Horse, water protector, in Midtown NYC #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #NoAIM #defendthesacred #blacksnakekillers of Turtle Island )
For now, reflecting on having participated in the rally > march for Standing Rock last Wednesday @ Trump Tower in Midtown Manhattan & then performing at the Benefit For Water Protectors of #StandingRock on Friday night — making our debut as Cactus Rose at Brooklyn’s famed Jalopy Theater for ole-timey/hillbilly/folk/mountain music. It was an honor to serve as the headliner for this benefit, with our special guest: Seminole/Shawnee/Mikisúkî singer/songwriter/activist Lonnie Moon Fire Harrington. I have been told by the organizer that the event raised almost $2,000 in donations, so – Wopila tanka to all who came through!
Enjoying these last days of #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth — before band rehearsals resume for our full slate of December performances & attending two events this week for artists I greatly admire: tomorrow’s BET screening of the Sharon Jones documentary (in memoriam) & the private viewing of Morrison Hotel Gallery’s traveling Neil Young exhibit in SoHo on Thursday evening. Looking forward to seeing y’all out-n-about, as well as at the Standing Rock teach-in later this week @ Decolonize This Place – A’ho!
( Cactus Rose, Native Americana/cosmic country band, debut @ Jalopy Theater – pix by Jan Bell of The Maybelles )
Kandia Crazy Horse x Thanksgiving Week #StandingRock actions & benefit concert 11/25 in NYC
Howdy y’all / Osiyo skidoi, all my relations! I have not been able to report back much nor update this site, due to all the many #StandingRock actions & Native American circle pre-thanksgiving ceremonies & events I had over this past weekend & some. Among other events, I sang some of my Native Americana music @ the opening of Urban Native exhibit Cave To The Stars – Urban Natives Unrecognized @ Bread & Roses Project Gallery in Midtown last Thursday; I did #HonoringOurAncestors with the central Harlem Native circle on Saturday, followed by the Thunderbird American Indian Benefit Auction that night on the Upper East Side. And still working on my #LeonRussell memorial article, even as I rehearse for this Friday’s Benefit For Water Protectors concert in Brooklyn @ Jalopy Theater. Ho wa, will share some pix of all this activity by-and-by, but now am learning new songs & also preparing for tomorrow’s Standing Rock action in Midtown – if you somehow missed the horrible news of the chemical weaponry, water cannons & rubber bullets unleashed on the Standing Rock water protectors Sunday night in sub-freezing temperatures & its fallout, now is the time to become aware & join us in these support actions & by donating to the camps. I am receiving many communications suddenly from friends who have been relatively apathetic pre-election & several fellow country / Americana artists now querying me about the Standing Rock resistance; so it will be interesting to see how this continues to unfold & whether President “Walking Eagle” Obama will finally do something definitive in response to these unconscionable attacks on my prayerful relations out West. Still enjoying #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth somewhat — despite the unceasing musical losses: sadly, #SharonJones has walked on, claimed by the same cancer that took my dear mother. This has cast a further pall on the holiday week. A’ho*
Art for tomorrow’s #StandingRock action, by my brotha-in-struggle Kyle Goen #kyledidthis
& a lil’ lighthearted #ThrowbackTuesday snap by #NedSublette of me & my brothas Teddy K aka DJ Soul Punk & Cap’n #KirkDouglas of #TheRoots (the last time I got to see Sharon Jones & the Dap-Kings live was @ The Roots Picnic in Philly) @ my live #BlackHillbilly #countryandwestern music series #TheHarlemHonkytonk #SaddleUp!
The Guardian UK on 300 WATER PROTECTORS INJURED AT STANDING ROCK report
Kandia Crazy Horse & Cactus Rose debut @ Jalopy Theater, Brooklyn, for Standing Rock #NoDAPL
As a fan/supporter of the Americana & Alt-Country scenes for decades, as well as a longtime rock journalist/music editor covering the country genre, I became aware of Brooklyn’s Jalopy Theater at its inception & used to frequent it a lot in the earlier days of its existence when I socialized with a lot of rural transplants to the City from elsewhere in Mainland America. Since I started writing songs & then playing out, have long wished to play there for Jalopy is the main equivalent in NYC to what the Nashville country Mother Church, the Ryman, provided for generations of hillbilly singers & players during the 20th century. So I am pleased that I am finally making my debut appearance @ Jalopy Theater on 25 November, with my new Native Americana / Cosmic Country band Cactus Rose: Jeff McLaughlin (guitar, vocals), Evan Taylor (drums), Hilary Hawke (banjo, vocals) & our frequent guest star, Seminole elder/artist/activist Lonnie Harrington (guitar, vocals). Thanks to the organizer of this benefit for the water protectors of Standing Rock that we are performing in support of: Jan Bell of the Maybelles & #BrooklynAmericanaFestival
( My picker, Jeff McLaughlin, with his signature Heritage guitar, during our Cactus Rose band rehearsal this afternoon, High Harlem NYC – We are pleased to continue our activism & being of service via our art on behalf of Standing Rock — as well as the Split Rock — water protectors in North Dakota & New Jersey #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #NoAIM #StandingInSolidarityWithStandingRock #LoveWillWin )
It will be fun to again share a bill with the husband of my dear sistahfriend & fellow Georgia Peach, Amanda Jo Williams, that I have sung with for years: Matthew O’Neill – Matthew’s also a big Neil Young fancier & we commune often about Neil’s sounds & Native lore; so great timing to do a show with him during Native American Heritage Month & right after Thanksgiving. Looking forward! Nee Ah Nee – A’ho*
Kandia Crazy Horse on The Red Road East (the sequel) #NoDAPL #NoAIM
Last night, I received Supermoon Medicine & then journeyed to the television station of Bronxnet to serve as a guest artist-activist on Fierce-Truthseeker’s (Tsalagi) show The Red Road East, which covers art, entertainment & political issues of Indian Country. As you may recall, I was the guest on the first-ever episode of the program & was happy to be asked back again — specifically for Native American Heritage Month — to speak on the Standing Rock & Split Rock resistance movement in the NYC / Northeast area, what actions we have done & plan for the future & promote the upcoming Standing Rock benefits I will be doing here: on 25 November @ Jalopy Theater in Brooklyn & the weekend of 16 December on Manhattan’s Upper East Side @ Ibex Puppetry. Additionally, I will be doing an artists & activism program on the current state of protest music, back at Decolonize This Place in TriBeCa on 12 December, with my Native Americana / Cosmic Country band Cactus Rose & special guest Abiodun Oyewole of The Last Poets. Stay tuned / follow me on Instagram for posters, ticket links & updates on these events.
When The Red Road East airs, will share the footage here for y’all outside the local NYC network. The Standing Rock benefits of Neil Young, Jackson Browne & Dave Matthews have gotten a lot more notice than the efforts of our grassroots collective of activists & generally, it’s difficult to get the media to pay attention to the creation of independent musicians without multi-million dollar teams behind them. Yet we are trying hard with very few resources to contribute to the cause with an all-female artists lineup Standing Rock benefit – the one slated for mid-December — to remind people that, despite the election outcome, #TheFutureIsFemale …So we thank you heartily for your support & for coming through to the concerts. I am a mite weary, but enjoying #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth to the fullest! A’ho*
( Kandia Crazy Horse @ Bronxnet studios, before the live taping on “The Red Road East” )
( Kandia Crazy Horse of Cactus Rose & Abiodun Oyewole of the Last Poets @ Bronxnet, after the taping of “The Red Road East” #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth x #BlackPower50 #indigenousfutures #IStandWithStandingRock )
(The set / studio of “The Red Road East” hosted by Fierce-Truthseeker #Tsalagi #Cherokee)
“Those who damage Mother Earth, damage us all / Forgive them / They don’t yet see”
– Neil Young
Standing Rock National Day of Action #NoDAPL #NoAIM NYC
( Ramapough Lunaape president/chief Dwaine Perry & Kandia Crazy Horse, Native Americana singer-songwriter/activist, of Cactus Rose band @ Central Park, after the Ramapough Lunaape clan mothers’ march in Manhattan )
We of the Eastern Nations in NYC / the Tri-State area are standing in solidarity with Standing Rock today for the National Day of Action. Check your local groups for opportunities to participate. I did prayerful advance marching with the Ramapough Lunaape Nation clan mothers & their Chief Dwaine Perry who came into Manahata from New Jersey on Sunday. We proceeded from Columbus Circle up through Central Park where we held the circle & performed water ceremonies prior to the Supermoon rise. I have been invited to sing in support & be of service at the Ramapough Lunaape water protector camp @ Split Rock in future & look forward to it. Many of us indigenous activists of the NY / NJ / CT area are committed to stopping Spectra, the Algonquin Pipeline, & halting any other pipeline projects that arise in the Northeast. As Sister Davidica Little Spotted Horse of the Oglala Lakota told us last week, the goal is for folks to attend to the black snakes in their own backyard rather than everyone converging on Standing Rock – still we have much to learn from the Oceti Sakowin & remain strong in solidarity with them as they defend The Mother – A’ho* #IStandWithStandingRock & #SplitRock #StandingRockNationalDayOfAction #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #NoAIM #LoveWaterNotOil
America: We Got To Work for Peace
“We got to work for Peace / Peace ain’t gonna be free / Gotta go to war…” so often sang my late hero & artist-activist influence Gil Scott-Heron (but he was not a warhawk, he was singing of peace-waging), when I used to see him annually in NYC at venues such as S.O.B.’s downtown. And, while I listened to his tunes “B-Movie” (about Ray-Gun America in the 1980s), “Winter In America” (a reminder for #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth & due to escalated actions around the Dakota Access Pipeline resistance & halting other black snakes of Turtle Island) & “Gun” (for obvious reasons in trigger-happy America & upon Veterans Day), this week & then just spoke with my Pamunkey great aunt Ethel from Virginia, who is an activist/southern belle/church lady in the truest sense & at 91 would have been embedded all year @ Standing Rock were it not for ailments, I was reminded indelibly that we cannot despair at this hour of chaos after the presidential election. We must be strong, we must be prayerful if we follow Native tradition & other faiths, and we must seek to be united as possible in order to work for Peace in the coming days of a New Nation that does not honor nor respect the rights of all of its citizens.
( Caitlin Rose & Kandia Crazy Horse @ Mercury Lounge NYC (w/ photobomb by Roddy of Daniel Romano’s band – Follow @cactusroselovesyou on Instagram )
2016: A year of sonic loss, domestic terrorism against #NoDAPL water protectors & days of rage in newly-minted Trump America…I will not retire from my activism & I am feeling a renewed dedication to songwriting, illuminating the folkways of the postmodern New South, and collaborating with other (Native) artists that also follow the Way of the New World to work towards indigenous futures. So, instead of wallowing — although I was/am mighty weary — I went out into the fractious City, finding fellowship & even some laughs with other indigenous activists from near and far as well as musicians from Argentina (Nico), Canada (Daniel Romano & band), & my sistah-in-twang Caitlin Rose (Nashville via Texas). While we raised a toast of Tecate backstage @ Mercury Lounge in the East Village/Lower East Side to Canadian singer-songwriter icon #LeonardCohen & #MightyBaby’s Martin Stone who just passed & then I rotated sounds of my treasured record collection overnight in their memory + for Veterans Day (my step-great-grandfather Mr. Bridges of SW Georgia fought bravely in World War I & always remember him upon this day) — Elyse Weinberg, Stevie Nicks (who I mightily wish I could catch on her current tour!) & Fleetwood Mac, Jon Lucien, Rufus Wainwright — it was deeply impressed upon me that we must be thankful that #WeAreStillHere able to sing, play, laugh, dance & write songs, despite possible dark days ahead on Turtle Island and all of the many sad losses that have befallen the music world in 2016. As discussed with #CaitlinRose, I look forward to playing in Nashville, doing some festivals & sharing new songs in 2017, with my trusty band Cactus Rose holding me down. Some don’t like (colored) women who are brave & fly the freak flag high; there are concurrent wars against us of the #NoDAPL resistance and the collective body of black women in this society; and there are some entities that have tried/want to silence my Voice – but still I shine on. And I am going to stay #BlackHillbilly ’til I die. Here’s to #TGIF — as my great aunt would say — and looking forward to enjoying the remainder of #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth
A’ho #countrygirlsdoitbetter
( Nico Bereciartua of Magpie Salute (from Argentina) & Kandia Crazy Horse of Cactus Rose band (in hat Karen Dalton) @ Henry Diltz’ Morrison Hotel Gallery in SoHo for “Midnight Rider” photography exhibit on Gregg Allman of the Allman Brothers Band by Patricia O’Driscoll, NYC )
>>>>>>—–))—>
( Why I want to see Stevie Nicks (who I have never seen) live…She composed this song “Silver Springs” while on the Road in my homeplace of the #DMV. I used to spend special times with my late mother in Silver Spring in the brief period before she walked on & grew up going there often in my “Maryland is for crabs…Virginia is for lovers” shirt in the 1970s. Precious memories…& songwriting inspiration! )
( How I came to truly know/love Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” – via my beloved & the best male Songbird of my generation #JeffBuckley (RIP) #ScorpioRising #ScorpioSeason – In Memoriam for all the Singers & Players & Freedom Fighters )
( & Leonard Cohen & Jeff Buckley’s acolyte who’s one of my most beloved contemporary artists: #RufusWainwright – This 11/11 tune comes from his double-LP masterpiece Want One / Want Two that was life-changing for me in the early Aughts. I still treasure getting to meet Rufus once backstage at a taping of the Jimmy Fallon Show in Manhattan, courtesy of my brotha Kirk Douglas of The Roots )
Kandia Crazy Horse x Kimberly Robison #KAR on the march of Manahata for Standing Rock #mniwiconi #NoDAPL
Some of the great photography that’s come in from Afro-Native artist & milliner from Texas, Kimberly Robison / KAR. I look forward to performing with her here in NYC next month, as well as being involved with various actions on behalf of Indian Country. When I did the same march up Wickquasgeck back in early August with Brooke & Luis of Eagle & Condor Community Center, there were only 10 of us. So it was heartfelt & illuminating that so many have come to stand in solidarity with Standing Rock in the time since – A’ho*
#mniwiconi #IStandWithStandingRock #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth
(With my fellow NYC artist Cheadah, upon our arrival @ 107th Street)
(In the sage smoke…)
(Kandia by Kimberly / KAR in my “Karen Dalton” hat)
Martin Stone of Mighty Baby RIP – A master of Anglo-Americana
Sho’nuff, I got post-Election 2016 Blues & been nursing ’em by spinning a lot of fitting tunes by my hero / influence as an artist-activist, Gil Scott-Heron — including “Winter In America” & “B-Movie.” Feeling even more wintry this grey November day in New York City for just found out that musician & bookseller #MartinStone has walked on. Regret that have not had the resources to cover a favorite song by one of his former bands, my beloved #MightyBaby, as long planned; but still hope to do so one day. Like the great Ian Matthews of Fairport Convention/Matthews Southern Comfort (who I briefly met once when he got me into his tour of Gene Clark’s No Other that came to the Music Hall of Williamsburg in Brooklyn) & my new friend/fellow sister country singer who used to dwell in the Ozarks, Jan Bell of the Maybelles / Brooklyn Americana Festival, who hails from Yorkshire, Stone was one of a select elite of master musicians that interpreted Anglo-Americana, perhaps the most interesting & exciting moment of the original British Invasion of the 1960s/early ’70s.
I have fortunately been invited by Jan to perform at the Jalopy Theater benefit concert for Standing Rock that she has organized, on 25 November @ 9pm in Brooklyn. Tix available here: KANDIA CRAZY HORSE x CACTUS ROSE singing in support of the STANDING ROCK water protectors camps
Here’s my beloved “Virgin Spring,” lachrymose, gossamer beauty befitting the vibes today in America. Mighty Baby was the UK’s answer to the Grateful Dead — a band I followed for aeons — & it’s interesting that they made their transition to this sound roughly around the same time that Jerry & ‘nem were trying to remold themselves in the manner of then-emerging Crosby Stills & Nash (& sometimes Young), as you hear on my favorite Dead LP, Workingman’s Dead >>>>>>>—–))—>
Sending you love o’er the Big Water in Fair Albion (despite #Brexit & #BritsSoWhite), to my brotha Mark Pringle, co-head of London’s Rocksbackpages.com which archives my early music journalism – Thankye, Mark, kindly for what correspondence did get to have with Martin Stone – A’ho*
Make America Native Again & #ImWithHer – Presidential Election 2016
I am an independent, stubborn southern belle & outlaw queen — Always been, always will be. Still, I believe #TheFutureIsFemale & I am also, of course, here for #IndigenousFutures – so I voted today in remembrance of my heroines: my Pamunkey mother Anne Marie from the Shenandoah Valley & Miz Fannie Lou Hamer, The Black Panther of Lowndes County. Sho’nuff, neither party gave us much of a decent choice & Kaine has only paid lip service to #NoDAPL on the eve of the election, smacking of desperation. Yet I have got to take the long view for the Turtle Island Liberation Movement I am a part of & with deep south kin still alive who were persecuted and firebombed by the Ku Klux Klan for daring to vote & mobilize their African-descent community to do so, I will never take my right to vote for granted. And a #NastyGal does step into the breach & flex her power, too – Love, that’s America! A’ho*
#KandiaCrazyHorse #NativeAmericana #singersongwriter #CosmicAmericanMusic #NativeAmerican #artist #activist #indigenousrevolutionary #AfroHippie #IStandWithStandingRock #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth #LoveWillWin #Merica
Sidenote: as a Black Bullette/Taurus Woman & Wonderlove(r), this was great to read today: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/stevie-wonder-driving-equals-trump-presidency_us_5820c1a0e4b0aac62485fa21 KANDIA CRAZY HORSE loves STEVIE WONDER (a key influence)
( Kandia Crazy Horse #IdleNoMore in the voter queue today in Hamilton Heights / Harlem-on-the-Range, Uptown NYC – @cactusroselovesyou Instagram )
( Coming out of my polling place, a school named for Adam Clayton Powell Jr. – IG: @cactusroselovesyou )
( Some local Latina sisters were gifting us #StarsAndStripes Hershey kisses while we waited to vote #VoteNYC – IG: @cactusroselovesyou )
Marching Manahata in solidarity with Standing Rock
It’s a great day to be indigenous, Sisters & Brothers! Leaving out anon to march Manahata along the Lenape trail Wickquasgeck, with my friends & fellow activists of the Eagle & Condor Community Center — we all stand with Standing Rock. This is my fight song…well, theme music for the Trail, anyroad; was singing this, “Broken Arrow” by my favorite band Buffalo Springfield, last Friday night acapella with filmmaker Jonathan Demme who’s a fellow Neil Young stan, after our #ProjectAmericana performance @ Symphony Space.
Thinking of the Missouri River (with “O Shenandoah” also echoing in my Soul) via these lyrics:
Did you see them in the river?
They were there to wave to you
Could you tell that the empty quivered
Brown skinned Indian on the banks
That were crowded and narrow
Held a broken arrow?
Today, I shall be singing freedom songs all the way from Columbus Circle to Shorakapok. We will be holding a water ceremony, after a stop at the Indian Caves of Inwood Hill. Stay tuned for my report. Rocking my mocs on out the door…! >>>>>>>—–))—>
Hope y’all are enjoying #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth & have a grand ole weekend – A’ho*
#KandiaCrazyHorse #NativeAmericana #artist #activist #CactusRose #band #IStandWithStandingRock #MniWiconi #ProtectTheSacred #NoDAPL #BlackSnakeKillas #HonorTheTreaties #StopSpectra NO #AlgonquinPipeline #rockyourmocs #VOTE!
Throwback Thursday: Of race, Country music & the 2016 CMAs
Well, since my sentiments about the state of Nashville’s country music establishment on and beyond Music Row tend to be unwelcome even amongst my former circle of rock critic colleagues, I wasn’t going to weigh in on this year’s CMA Awards, the 50th edition, which I did happen to watch. However, in my absence offline, an apparent controversy has been brewing on the subject of race and country music, due to the much ballyhooed performance of “Daddy Lessons” by Texan artists Beyonce (pop, urban) & the Dixie Chicks (once modern country royalty). Although I don’t wish to gas up TMZ, the site is one of the prominent places that has cited the CMA site & social media having scrubbed their entire online platform of images/references to said Beyonce-Dixie Chicks summit in response to copious racist reactions to the awards show appearance on Twitter & elsewhere: VIEW HERE
Now, I am no Beyonce fan nor “stan;” and I have no fear of the BeyHive in stating this — my backpages as a longtime music critic & editor for over 20 years clearly delineates where I stand on her & chronicles many of my thoughts on the history and contemporary scene of black artists who create in the overlapping country & western, bluegrass, hillbilly, Cajun, prewar stringband, mountain music, Americana, and roots genres. I also happen to have served on a panel @ CUNY Graduate Center in NYC earlier this year, holding forth on Black Banjo, my role in the country & western genre as an artist and touring fan, the Affrilachia movement, and the recent publication of scholar/banjoist Laurent Dubois’ book THE BANJO – America’s African Instrument. Talked about the fictional Darlings of The Andy Griffith Show a.k.a. The Dillards, and how Doug Dillard became my favorite banjo player and influence via Dillard & Clark. And I am a veteran of my friend Greg Mays’ annual Harlem Hoedown, where I always square dance as I learned as a babychile in rural Virginia to the sounds of my dear friends the Ebony Hillbillies. I was a “primordial” adopter, supporter, and then critic of the Americana scene in general, way back into the 1980s, and have watched successive waves of cowpunk, neo-southern rock, alt-country, y’allternative, insurgent country, progressive country, Ameripolitan, indie folk, etc etc come to consciousness and come to market; and always pondered about the African presence in all of these scenes and on the record business side up to this day where Americana is now on the Billboard chart — the year’s big news in music. The pop/urban mix with country as a featured event of the CMA Awards has obvious precedent; many of my former colleagues are still talking about Justin Timberlake (who’s in the process of going Country & recording a country album) performing with Chris Stapleton last year. Yet this year’s turn, especially at the 50 marker, is notable less due to Beyonce but rather down to the fact that at a time when Bro-Country is waning, Taylor Swift has defected for pop, and nigh every classic arena rocker has cut a country record/moved to Nashville to revive flagging careers, country (&western) still has a glaring race problem and its related business wing cannot develop or sustain virtually any artists of color not named Darius Rucker. Opening the show with a too-brief turn by black country icon Charley Pride underscored this issue; the fact that the CMAs chose to have Stapleton and Dwight Yoakam — great & skilled though they are — pay homage to Georgia R&B hero & country maverick Ray Charles, to illustrate the S-O-U-L of country music instead of even summoning their own recent hitmaker Mickey Guyton or Americana star Rhiannon Giddens who was present at the awards (backing up Eric Church) showed exactly where they stand. The citing of SOUL, as it always has been, is code for the blackness in twang; the modern country (&western) scene and business has never quite progressed beyond the early 20th century moment of Race Records and segregating sounds by racial and regional provenance. And all hell broke loose on social media yesterday and today, as country music fans of the dominant culture rushed to show their displeasure with the inclusion of a black (pop) artist on the CMAs, accusing her of trying to take away country music from whites who supposedly have eternal ownership of the genre — despite the patent & well-documented African and Native American origins of country besides the Scotch-Irish contribution. I myself am a Native Americana / cosmic country & western artist in no small part because I am of Native American, African, and Scottish descent, a rich hybrid made in America’s Southeast from which the Source of the music eternally springs. I am also just a fanatic of bluegrass, mountain music, and cowboy tunes — and I claim as much ownership of that Creation as anybody. Keen observers have known for a spell that one of the most vibrant bluegrass scenes in the world is in Japan, and that events and festivals like the Black Banjo Gathering in Boone, North Carolina, have been yielding a younger, new wave of twang talent of African descent.
(My shot of superstar country artist #BradPaisley & #CharleyPride opening #CMAAwards50 – credit: @kandiacrazyhorse Instagram)
Here’s what I posted in response to the show on Wednesday night, while live-blogging portions of it on Facebook & Instagram: “I am watching #CMAAwards50 & pondering deeply about the African & Native American roots of the genre; plus how far Nashville & Music Row still have to go in honoring these legacies. Wonderful to see my hero #CharleyPride open the show with my fellow Virginian #BradPaisley (Yep, I’m a fan, despite the unwieldy “Accidental Racist;” I blame LL Cool J); but still tinged with some sadness and confusion. Someday, #NativeAmericana & #BlackHillbilly will take their proper place. For now, enjoying seeing all the 1960s & ’70s country women I grew up on that made me aspire to sing in twang, besides my Native American triumvirate (Buffy Sainte-Marie, Karen Dalton, Rita Coolidge): Loretta Lynn, Tanya Tucker, Barbara Mandrell (!!)…& Reba…Waiting for Dolly [Parton], of course…! #KandiaCrazyHorse #NativeAmericana #mountainmusic #AppalachiaSounds from #Virginia #countrysinger #southernbelle #countrygirlsdoitbetter #AffrilachianNation”
Quibbling about how pop or authentically country any given act is — that’s something I leave to the working music critics. Certainly, the Dixie Chicks’ reappearance on the CMAs was controversial due to their past & interesting to have that baggage reexamined so close to the presidential election. Some staunch country loyalists were always going to react negatively to that. Yet the main issue — just as a decade-plus battle for Country Music’s soul reaches its zenith (see the site Saving Country Music for consistent dispatches on this topic) — is that country (&western…& Americana) is the last frontier for artists of African descent — whether that be Virginia-bred me, Kandia Crazy Horse & my new band Cactus Rose, or Kenya’s leading country singer, Sir Elvis Otieno — and the country establishment and much of the genre’s audience still views it as their own private safe haven away from the predations of urban music/culture/style and technology-tied modernity. It is interesting that Bro-Country, which would often feature the likes of Florida-Georgia Line duetting with Nelly and Blake Shelton attempting to rap, is fading just as there is a rise and music industry push behind a range of country and Americana acts that claim rock and other musics as influences or stylistically and attitude-wise invoke 1970s Outlaw Country: Kacey Musgraves, Sturgill Simpson, Margo Price, Sam Outlaw, etc…and are hailed for restoring “true” country sonics and values […with nods to their precursors Shooter Jennings and Hank III (both of whom I often loved & covered as a critic in the past)]. Yet there’s still apparently little to no room under the twang tent for we country artists of color, cosmic or otherwise.
Hey, I love Tompall Glaser and Clarence White & Willie Nelson as much as any other ’70s babe of my generation; and as a singer-songwriter, I am clearly influenced by my most beloved Gene Clark and the Buffalo Springfield — hear my paeans “Quartz Hill” & “Americana” “Tula” (en espanol) & “Scene & Herd” etc — and the less-celebrated Ladies of the Canyon like Judee Sill, Claudia Lennear, and Essra Mohawk. Neil Young, I see you (& thanks for singing for Standing Rock). I spent the early 1970s toddling behind my dear lil’ Pamunkey mother from the Shenandoah Valley at the bluegrass tents of Folklife Festival, snuck viewings of my favorite show Hee-Haw (’twas grand to see Roy Clark pickin’ an’ grinnin’ on the CMA, yep?), dreaming of growing up to play the Grand Ole Opry (at the Mother Church Ryman, of course) just like Darius Rucker; he ain’t the only one! Sweetheart Of the Rodeo by The Byrds & The Notorious Byrd Brothers were always & still are major for me. I am talented, and I am well-versed in the breadth and depth of country; I am extremely proud of my southern roots. All we want, after so many moons of flying the freak-flag high for Black Hillbilly & Native Americana, is to have a permanent non-conditional seat at the (farm) table, per Mrs. Knowles-Carter’s great sister Solange.
As I go prepare to march for Standing Rock again this weekend through all of Manhattan, please note that the date for the Jalopy Theater water protectors benefit in Brooklyn has been changed to 25 November. Follow the new Cactus Rose band Instagram account at @cactusroselovesyou for more details as they are announced. I continue my personal commitment to ongoing activism on behalf of the Standing Rock water protectors, and the band & I are very much looking forward to playing with our friends from the Brooklyn Country scene! I expect this to be one of my treasured highlights of #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth 2016
A’ho*
Kandia Crazy Horse x Jimi Hendrix: Native American Heritage Month
Hope yer gettin’ over The Hump well this week, Sisters & Brothers! For those that don’t know: November is #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth
Here in New York City, I will be doing lots of actions & activities to honor that. Among them, I am doing a prayerful march through the entirety of Manhattan Island this Saturday with my friends of the Eagle & Condor Community Center (in Queens), from the National Museum of the American Indian @ Bowling Green (the southernmost tip of Manhattan) all the way to Shorakapok (the Indian Caves @ Inwood Hill on the Spuyten Duyvil). The march goes from 10 am until 6pm. I will also be rolling through the Black Farmers Conference in Harlem this weekend.
This month, I will be performing at another benefit for Standing Rock, on November 25 @ 9pm, this time at the City’s premiere venue for hillbilly/old-timey/bluegrass/roots music — the Jalopy Theater in Brooklyn. I have been trying to work it out to play at Jalopy for a long time, so happy to finally do so for a great, beautiful cause so near and dear to my Native heart. This will also be the proper debut of my new Native Americana / twang band Cactus Rose. More details TBA!
(Kandia Crazy Horse @ Electric Lady Studios in vintage fringed buckskin jacket, Greenwich Village NYC, by Camara Dia Holloway)
Made my #NativeAmericanHeritageMonth pilgrimage to #ElectricLadyStudios in the Village, honoring #JimiHendrix’ Native #Tsalagi roots. Received some purple & feathered energy from Jimi that I will be unleashing when I perform @ the Standing Rock benefit @ Jalopy – A’ho*
#Jimi Hendrix #AniYunwiya #KandiaCrazyHorse x #CactusRose #Pamunkey #Afrohippies #CherokeeMist #TaharqaAleem #Ibeji #TheAleems #TwinsSevenSeven #NativeAmericana #ICanHearAtlantisFullOfCheer #MniWiconi #ElectricLadies #CosmicAmericanMusic
Hawk Medicine in Hudson Canyon
We three Native American sisters & NYC artists, representing three Nations & both the Upper and Deep South, had a lovely, impromptu gathering down by the riverside of Hamilton Heights yesterday before the rains swept along the Hudson River. Surrounded by several circling & swooping hawks, we began a powerful conjure straight out of Hudson Canyon — look forward to us being involved with the recently-discovered Lenape burial mounds at 125th Street in Harlem, among other projects – A’ho* #KandiaCrazyHorse #TessReese #KimberlyRobison / #Karline #HawkMedicine
(Kandia Crazy Horse on the Hudson River, view of the Palisades, by Tess Reese, Choctaw)
(Karline x Kandia x Tess, by Kandia Crazy Horse)
(Stormy Sunday in Hudson Canyon by Kandia Crazy Horse)
Chelsea Girls: Kandia Crazy Horse x Carrie Mae Weems x Claudia Lennear in NYC
Here’s a photo shot by one of the Jack Shainman Gallery’s gallerinas from yesterday: visual artist Carrie Mae Weems & (me) sonic artist Kandia Crazy Horse @ their space on W. 20th Street in Chelsea, for the opening of her new exhibits (see description below). Carrie & I used to share workspace way back many moons ago when I attended Hampshire College & she was teaching there. Nice to see how far our respective Creation has come & find now in her a fellow fan of my Afrohippie & bluegrass singer-songwriter heroine/inspiration Claudia Lennear — two vintage yet manipulated images, “Blue Notes,” of Claudia are featured in the show.
Via Jack Shainman Gallery PR: “Jack Shainman Gallery is pleased to announce Carrie Mae Weems’ first solo exhibition in New York City since the historic retrospective at the Guggenheim in 2014. Her influential career continues to address the rifts caused by race, class, and gender via imagery and text that is both sharply direct and beautifully poetic. This two-part exhibition highlights her recent investigations into performance, entertainment, and history.
Blue Notes (2014) and An Essay on Equivalents, See… (2011-2015) highlight figures on the periphery, bringing them front and center. The photographic series are paired with the enigmatic video installation Lincoln, Lonnie, and Me (2012), originally commissioned by the Mattress Factory, Pittsburgh, PA. The work rests on a 19th century optical trick, “Pepper’s ghost,” in which a strategically lit pane of glass reflects people and objects as dematerialized versions on stage. Weems employs this phantasmagoria to examine her own relationship to history and two individuals in particular: the 16th president of the United States and artist/activist Lonnie Graham, her sometime collaborator. Here history becomes theater, a succession of ghostly projections that draw us in to the strange ways in which representation seduces and manipulates, and how some are left out of history altogether, their apparitions left to haunt the expanses of Western culture.
The theme of performance continues with Scenes & Take (2016). Weems dons her black-robed muse persona—recognizable from the now iconic Roaming and Museums series—to stand before empty stage sets, documenting these encounters with vivid color photographs. The contemplative pose of the artist raises issues of who gets to be shown on screen; what do the fictional characters in television, theater, cinema, and visual art say about the cultural climate in which they are created, and how do these representations shift across time?
All the Boys (2016) responds to the recent killings of young African American men and suggests a darker reality of identity construction. Portraits of black men in hooded sweatshirts are matched with text panels. The written descriptions evoke police reports, underscoring how a demographic is all-too-often targeted and presumed guilty by a system plagued with prejudice. […]”
(Shot of “Blue Note – Claudia Lennear” by Kandia Crazy Horse – Originally from an early 1970s Playboy feature on the Laurel Canyon singer-songwriter)
Claudia Lennear had famous affairs with Mick Jagger of the Rolling Stones, when she toured with them in 1969 as an Ikette (part of the Ike & Tina Turner Revue), & later with David Bowie during his LA burnout/Sigma Sound Soul phase in Philly – the resulting songs “Brown Sugar,” Claudia’s response “Not At All,” & Bowie’s “Lady Grinning Soul.” I am personally far more interested in her singing with my most beloved Master of Space & Time Leon Russell (as part of the Shelter People) & Claudia Lennear’s attempt to have a bluegrass trio in the early ’70s with her fellow Mad Dogs & Englishmen Tour veteran singers Donna Washburn (once a member of my most beloved/influence Dillard & Clark) & Donna Weiss (later a songwriter of some note; she had songs covered by, among others, another Mad Dogs star & my heroine/influence as a Native Americana artist, Rita Coolidge – I just recently filed an essay about Ms. Coolidge & this lore, which will be published next year in a tome on Women Of Country). A friend & Southern sonic forebear of mine, the late Memphis pianist/producer icon Jim Dickinson (aka James Luther Dickinson of “Dixie-Fried” & “White Horses”+ producing Big Star’s Third fame) promised to give me a photo of their bluegrass trio, as he was tied to the project, but then he walked on. Still hope to see the images someday! Of course, Claudia is active again, post- Twenty Feet From Stardom rediscovery, and leading two bands — one bluegrass — today in Los Angeles & recording an album David Bowie had sought her out to collaborate on before his passing. Looking forward to catching ’em live whenever I next make it to the Coast. I always do enjoy spending time in LA, amongst the newer Laurel Canyon & Topanga Canyon rock ‘n roll hippie glitterati — although most of them are East Side gentrifiers, particularly in Echo Park & Downtown (with satellites in Eagle Rock & Mt. Washington & out in the environs of Joshua Tree & Bolinas & Nevada City); this is why I always keep dear Odetta (who my late Virginian Native American mother Anne Marie wished for me to model & pick guitar in her image) & Claudia Lennear as my history-making twang foremamas & legendary Ladies of the Canyon.
I still plan to do a major project around the sound+vision of Claudia Lennear, Leon Russell, Rita Coolidge & their mutual benefactors, Delaney and Bonnie (& their fabulous Friends) during 2017 – Stay tuned!
(Two #BlackRockCoalition & #AfroPunk veteran chroniclers & rock-n-rollers outside Jack Shainman Gallery, Chelsea: #KandiaCrazyHorse #NativeAmericana #CosmicCountry #singersongwriter & #RobFields #BoldAsLove #blogger & festival founder – #FollowMe on #Instagram: @kandiacrazyhorse)
(LADY OF (HUDSON) CANYON: After Carrie’s opening, upon The Highline in Chelsea, by a fan – More NYC shows upcoming! #LadiesOfTheCanyon)
Project Americana: The American Slave Coast: Live in Amsterdam News
Here’s the first press for our #ProjectAmericana undertaking tonight in Manhattan at Symphony Space — from Harlem’s own Amsterdam News THE AMERICAN SLAVE COAST: LIVE in NYC
Enjoy your TGIF & see y’all out tonight! A’ho, #KandiaCrazyHorse
(Kandia Crazy Horse & DJ Soul Punk aka Teddy K in East Harlem with effigy of Frida Kahlo, #fbf)
Kandia Crazy Horse x David Archambault II #mniwiconi #NoDAPL #StandingRockSiouxTribe
Between rehearsals for #ProjectAmericana & getting to assorted meetings around NYC, this has been a busy, heady week. Amongst the events I am glad I was able to make time for: Indigenous Forum @ Columbia University. The best part of this was hearing from some of the Oceti Sakowin youth who ran from Cannonball, North Dakota to Washington DC to raise awareness about the Dakota Access Pipeline & related resistance, which I have been engaged in since the dawn of August. Their emotional pleas underscored why we need to keep up our prayers and support for the water protectors at Standing Rock.
(David Archambault II & Kandia Crazy Horse @ Columbia University, NYC)
It was also an honor to hear Standing Rock Sioux Tribe chairman Dave Archambault II speak, including about the long history of predations by the U.S. government & settlers on his Oyate’s sovereign territory and subsequent environmental threats to their lands; and then to get to speak to him briefly about my musical endeavors in Indian Country, as well as specifically on behalf of the water protectors of Standing Rock. Right now, we are watching the live feeds of leaders like LaDonna Allard & others, waiting to see what sadly is happening of the moment in North Dakota. Yet, I still have another musical benefit for Standing Rock in development (in NYC) & am committed to sing in support wherever, whenever may be called. A’ho*
#mniwiconi #NoDAPL #ProtectTheSacred #LoveWaterNotOil #RezpectOurWater #StandingInSolidarityWithStandingRock
kandiacrazyhorse.com 