All language subtitles for Rumble.The.Indians.Who.Rocked.The.World.2017.720p.WEBRip.x264.AAC-[YTS.MX]

Downloaded from
YTS.MX

Official YIFY movies site:
YTS.MX

* [singing]

One can't help but notice the
rhythms of-or the pulse that was
here, that is here, been here.

The feel of Native American
is in a lot of rock 'n' roll.

A lot of R&B musicians
and blues musicians talked
about having Native blood.

The one group that hasn't
really been investigated

in terms of their contribution
is the Native Americans.

[crowd cheering]

* [three-chord
introduction to Rumble] *

It's interesting how much of
the Native American element
just filters through.

* [three-chord riff]

The mixture of cultures;
you never know what's
gonna come with it.

And from that sometimes it's
very interesting artistic
things happen, you know?

From Charlie Patton to
Link Wray; Robbie Robertson
invented the genre.

Jimi Hendrix, the best in
his field, you know; Jesse Ed
Davis, everybody wanted him.

Well, that's
interesting isn't it?

* [three-chord riff]

Our peoples were part of the
origin story of blues and jazz
and rock of American music,

but we're left out of the story
consistently from the beginning.

* [three-chord riff]

Figuring out that these
people were Indians and then
we started to ask ourselves

why didn't anyone
else know that?

**

It's an American story.

It's a human story;
don't break it apart.

Pay the respect that is due.

**

**

**

It was that-the sound of
that guitar is the key.

Link Wray and that aggression.

The sound of his guitar
embodied all my aspirations.

It was the sound of freedom.

Link Wray.

Oh, boy. I've wanted to
meet you for a long time.

There might not be a Who were
there no Link Wray;

there might not be a
Jeff Beck Group... were
there no Link Wray.

There might not be a
Led Zeppelin if there
were no Link Wray.

Pete Townsend thought Link
Wray was one of the great
guitar players of all time,

that this guy had
invented the power chord.

Pete made it new; he
put more colour on it,
put more weight on it.

Turned it into I
Can See For Miles .

**

**

* Link Wray sings:
I was born down in the country
Down where the cotton grows *

This is Jim Pewter with, uh,
Link and, uh, Black River Swamp
is, uh, really a nice tune.

You know that's about a
place where I was born,
down in North Carolina.

Oh, yeah?
-Yeah.

I'm from North Carolina.

And I'm out in the
country of Dunn.

And Dunn's a real small place
but I lived in the country

in this place
called Black River.

* There's a place down
in the country. *

* where the pine
trees grow so tall *

And they struggled;
they were very poor

and I'm sure he
probably fished in the pond

to try to get food because,

um, you know it was-times
were really rough.

* Stretchin' across
Black River Swamp *

He's got Shawnee on
there; Native American.

You didn't go around
telling everybody you
were Native American;

everybody hid it because
of the way other people
looked down on them.

Link said that he hid
under the bed one day

because they could hear
the KKK coming through;

because, like all cowards,
they would come at night

and they would terrorize people
when they least expected it.

* I can hear them
bullfrogs croaking *

The Ku Klux Klan was after
anybody who wasn't white.

* in the blackness
of the night *

And if you were known
to be an Indian,

uh, you were just as susceptible
as any African-American person.

* [church singing]

My Shawnee mommy, she went
out into the fields and was
preaching to the blacks

and to the Cherokee Indians
and poor whites saying,

"You keep your morals high;
believe in God." You know.

And me and my brothers we
were singing, you know,

Will The Circle Be Unbroken

and all those gospel songs
behind my mom you know,

when she was out
there preaching.

* [singing]

I was, uh, taught by a black
man called Hambone who was
raised up in the circus

and he could play
everything, you know.

And, uh, he taught me how to
play the blues, you know,
and I started off from there

and then I started paying
bands, you know, to let
me sit in with them

so I could get better,
you know.

Were there early, um,
rock 'n' roll influences?

I mean you were among
some of the--

There was no rock
'n' roll then.

**

I was doing this hop at this
record hop in Fredericksburg,
Virginia in 1957.

The kids were gathered
around in this arena

and they were yelling
for, uh, the stroll.

Link says, "I don't
know a stroll."

I said, "I don't know a stroll."

And Doug said, "I know
the beat behind one.

[imitates beat tapping
on guitar]

Ba-bow" And you thi-you know.

So I said, "OK." Then
I went like this.

And then my God, man,
they're watching me.

You know. He said, "Bam!"
I went (plays guitar).

* [three chord riff]

**

It's in the middle of the night
and the radio's on and here
comes this sound, you know,

that makes you levitate
out of bed about four feet.

**

What is he doing?

There's no sound like
that nowhere on the air.

**

It changed everything.

Rumble made an indelible mark
on the whole evolution of where
rock 'n' roll was gonna go.

And then I found out
that he was an Indian.

That was the rawest form
of the kind of guitar

that a lot of the guys
that I listen to-

it's where it started. You know?

And it even still sounds better
when he does it. You know?

**

I was in the cafeteria and on
the university P.A. system

I heard "Bam, bam, bam; domp,
domp, domp, domp."

I said, "What? Whoa,
what is that?"

Rumble had the power to
push me over the edge and
it did help me say,

"Fuck it. I'm gonna
be a musician."

**

I think Link Wray purely loved
rock 'n' roll and felt

pissed off and annoyed
and disappointed

that in some ways because he
was Shawnee, half-Shawnee,

and his family had
been treated so badly

he took that bitterness and
created something that was
not reductive but proactive.

**

And the idea Rumble just
from a superficial, almost
reactionary level

is like the fight, right?

But for me it means to
disrupt, to roar, to be active.

**

So Link Wray announced with
the Rumb that there was
a shift happening in culture.

You know, this is not going
to be the bop and the stroll
it's going to be the Rumble .

**

Here comes Link Wray
with the theme song
of juvenile delinquency.

You know. "Hey, rumble."

**

I was surprised it
got any airplay.

And to be honest I mean I'm
not surprised it was banned.

* [piece ends]

[cheers]

He is the only person who has an
instrumental - no words - banned

for fear it would incite
teenage gang violence.

It was the sound, the
chord progressions;

that was the thing.

It was the way they didn't
understand the feedback;
it was the groove.

It was-it was so many things
that turned people off.

You know, everybody can't be Pat
Boone. You know what I mean?

His influence was so immense.

Every musician in the
world loves Link Wray.

I don't know why the rest of the
world hasn't figured that out.

* Kick out the jams,
motherfucker! *

* [punk rock]

In the MC5, we would do
these recording sessions and the
engineers would always say,

"Oh, it's all distorted, man.

You punks-aw, you're
playing the amp too loud."

And I'd say, "Yes, I want it
distorted; that's what I want."

"No, no; you want it clean like
at Motown so it goes 'chink'."

I said, "No, I want it
to go (makes distorted
sound) like Link Wray.

You know, I want that-that
fuzz; I want the distortion."

Link Wray's certainly one
of the architects of my
sound and the MC5 sound,

and a thousand other rock
guitar players since then.

I mean, you know, if you
trace-if you connect the
dots back, you know ...

so you can trace heavy
metal and punk rock and
all that back to The Clash

and The Ramones; uh,
the New York Dolls, The
MC5 and a few others.

And then before that,
who was there, you know?

And he was one of the first
that really had a tone that
pointed a way to the future.

Link Wray is huge on all
modern electric guitar players.

If they're saying
he didn't influence,
uh, they're lying.

[cheering]

Thank you very much!

[paddling]

In the whole southeast area what
we all know, what we've heard
through our own families,

is that back when first
contact happened,

we had a very specific
style of singing.

* [strong voices in unison]

* [strong voices in unison]

And you can hear the spirit
of some of the old music

before plantations and slavery
and so forth, and colonization.

People are really shocked
when they hear the traditional
music of the southeast.

They're, like, "That's
Indian music? I thought
that was African music."

* [harmonizing]

The land of the southeast
itself informs the sound.

We hear the birds here.

We hear the water here, the
rivers, the canoe sounds.

And that informs what
comes out of our mouth.

All of American music that came
from the south was informed by
our land and therefore by us.

[birdsong]

A music by Native people
presented a threat,
was seen as dangerous.

And people were arrested,
singers and dancers incarcerated
for performing this music;

treaty-guaranteed rations
withheld from them.

**

The Federal government begins
passing law after law in an
effort to control Native people

in every way that
you can imagine.

**

They went after every
part of our culture

so of course they're
gonna go after the music

because it's an integral
aspect of our culture.

Because back in that time, in
those times, everybody had a
morning song to greet the day.

They were songs of ancestry;
they were songs of the old way.

They went after our culture.

It was genocide and they
wanted to erase every

cultural perception of
reality that we had.

On December 29th, 1890,

the U.S. Army surrounded
a number of Ghost Dancers

at Wounded Knee and slaughtered
over three hundred,

mostly women and
children, but also men

who were participating
in the Ghost Dance.

And this is essentially the
beginning of the banning

of Native music in
the United States.

When I hear stories about Wovoka
creating the Ghost Dance,

the dance that would make the
Native Americans invulnerable to
the bullets of the white man

so that they could rise up
from the reservations

and kill off their oppressors;
they were that desperate.

Was what music the blues?

It might not have sounded
like it, but baby, that
was the blues.

That was the blues.

[fireworks explosions]

* [marching band]

Most people in America, what
little they have of Mardi Gras

is drunken white people
on Bourbon Street
packed wall-to-wall

hollering at some woman
to show her tits. You know?

This doesn't have anything
to do with Mardi Gras.

**

If you want to witness
and participate in the
real Mardi Gras,

you have to go to the the
heart of the ghetto;
that's the staging area.

[percussion instruments
and shouts]

**

When my family came up from my
home in Louisiana, they migrated
during the time when, uh,

you know, things was
rough for the Indians so
they came to New Orleans

and they passed off as black
because they was dark-skinned.

And they never even talked
about it; they'd never mention
it because, you know,

they were scared because
they didn't want to get
sent to the reservation.

* [shouts and percussion]

Big Chief! Big Chief!

Hey boy! What they say!

Mardi Gras more than
a hell of a day.

But Mardi Gras morning
when Indians come

we all gonna get
together to have some fun.

[shouts]

* I'm gonna take 'em downtown!

* Early in the mornin'!

[shouts]

* I'm gonna take 'em downtown!

Early in the mornin'!

Seeing the Indians at Carnival
was getting to know who I was.

That was the only time that
black men could put on feathers.

[shouts and percussion]

We're all a combination of
indigenous people and
indigenous people of Africa.

**

It was a Muscogeeon
village through this area.

Our music is called Stomp
Dance and what you hear
first is the calling,

a call and response

where the leader calls out
and then the men answer.

**

When you hear that up
against blues, rock, jazz,
it's part of the origin.

* [singing]

Everybody in the neighbourhood,
everybody has grown up on this;

they've been doing this a
hundred and fifty years.

**

Basically they're in
there masking as black
people in daily life.

Because the Indians were treated
even worse than the slaves.

**

When European settlers came
here, they first enslaved
the Indians, lots of them.

And they figured out the
best way to do this is to
ship the men elsewhere.

Being hunter-gatherer societies
uh, they knew how to escape and
how to evade the raiders

and how to come back and
fight. So, you ship them
into the Caribbean ships,

some of them to Africa,
keep the women here.

And then later on,
bring in African slaves.

Ninety percent of the people in
the ships coming from Africa on
some of those ships were men.

Who did they have children with?

And this is why eighty-five
percent of African-Americans who
have been in this country

before the Civil War claim
Native American ancestry.

And all of them almost
say great-grandmother

on the mother's line.

**

And runaway slaves
would be taken in

on different
Indian reservations.

They're like, aw, come on,
man, you know, you can hang
out with us; we'll hide you.

And the next thing you knew,
there was these little black
Indians running around.

Everyone that
was not white,

was classified
as "coloured,"

so whether you were Indian or
black, you became coloured.

If you had ten percent African,
you're considered black.

You'd be ninety percent Indian,
but you're considered black.

Why? Well, because it prevents
Native Americans from making
claims to the land...

and taking back what was stolen.

And if they claimed their
land and claimed Indian,
they could be shot.

b

* [live band
performing zydeco] *

When the African poly
rhythms and a Native American,

four on the floor
came together.

That was the beginning of
what became American music.

**

To me, I think of-of gumbo,
which is the quintessential
New Orleans food.

When I was growing up, gumbo
was you put everything you
had in a pot.

All that stuff together
makes this great meal.

I'm part Native American,
part African by way of Haiti,
part French, part Italian,

and that's kind of what
New Orleans is, and it
comes out so flavourful.

Giacomo Fina Ne is what they
say, Big Chief coming,

so tell them, better
get out the way.

New Orleans, the home of the
strong, home of the brave,

so don't bother nobody with a
feather in their head.

They bring lightning in the
morning, they won't bow down,

tambourine rain is such
a beautiful sound.

Uptown lightning
it comes down

when my Chief on
the street steps

the thunder all
beneath his feet.

His suit can't be beat,

That child wild from
the sun to the night

And when he opens
such a beautiful sight.

* Here comes the end
Just let 'em through *

**

* [solo female voice]

* [other voices join]

* [other voices join]

For me it was just a huge
revelation that the banjo
is an African instrument.

The banjo for the first
hundred years of its existence
was not a white instrument,

you know, at all, it was a
plantation instrument.

**

**

**

Our music is very much
what you would hear.

It's-I've heard people
call it pre-blues.

And so it really sounds
very much like the
roots of blues music.

**

**

**

[train tracks clattering]

* [blues
fingerstyle guitar] *

**

**

* Baby, saddle my pony

* Hitch up my black mare

* Baby, saddle up my pony

* Hitch up my black mare

Blues buffs, blues scholars,
although they can't
really agree on anything,

if they were forced
into a room and they had
to identify, you know,

perhaps the most singularly
important blues guitarist,
singer, songwriter,

the whole package,
the greatest one that ever was
um, in the early 20th Century,

if you tried to convince them to
come up with that answer, they'd
probably say Charley Patton.

**

He was the grandfather to all
of the Delta Blues guys.

No matter how rough those
recordings are or how hard
it is to listen to,

there's nothing as immediate
as listening to that stuff.

It's like a bomb went off. I
mean, his sound is so guttural,

it sounds like what I imagine
that time must have felt like.

Like he's just, he's
just getting it out.

You know, he's not even trying
to make it pretty. (laugh) It's
just as raw as it gets.

He was a profound influence
on Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton,
Jack White, Bonnie Raitt,

the list goes on and on and on.

Charley Patton was an Indian.

And he was the baddest
mother-fucker in the world.

Howlin Wolf.

**

He was from the area of
the Mississippi Delta,

which is an area that is
rich in Blues history.

It's not far from
the Choctaw country.

It's very likely that Charley
Patton was of Choctaw ancestry.

**

Charley Patton's family
has an oral tradition

of Native ancestry,
of white ancestry,

Creole ancestry,
African-American ancestry.

All of those people
made Patton who he was.

* [Charley Patton song]

[laugh]

See, so when I hear this, it's
Indian music to me, you know.

And that rhythm...

[clapping]

I love Charley Patton, his
spirit and his music,

it just connects
me right back

to where I come from, you
know? I can hear all those
old traditional songs.

Do you hear it?

[laughs and sings along]

* [new song]

[sings along]

That's Indian music.

With a guitar, you know.

That's where it went, you
know? That's where
traditional music went.

It went like this.

**

I hear it in the singing.

I hear it in the singing and
I hear it in the rhythm

because he plays the
guitar like a drum.

**

It was illegal to own a drum
in plantation slavery America.

You could not own a drum.

Or you will be killed
because a drum was an
insurrectionary instrument.

You could communicate to people,
you could organize people
over distances for rebellion,

You know? So that's why
Charley Patton had to
play drum on his guitar.

**

Patton was born during some
of the worst racial violence
in the United States,

so one of the ways that
you could perhaps get away

from some of the worst
of the racial violence

was to be secure inside of a
world such as here at Dockery.

It was a place where people
could go and make money.

The Dockery Plantation
offered people more

than they were getting in their
home communities in Mississippi.

And that's why Patton's
family moved there

because they could have a
better life for themselves.

* [singing]

There were Choctaw
folks that moved there;

there were
African-American folks;

there were Europeans
that worked there.

Charley Patton would have heard
a combination of influences

that led to the emergence of
his guitar playing style.

**

He was not very much
into farm labour,

but you didn't have too
many other opportunities.

They would do gigs. It
would be, you know, Saturday
night at somebody's house,

somebody's back porch. Play
all night, play for some drinks.

Maybe somebody
would fry some fish.

After they got out of the
church, even the reverends

would go take their girls

and go to the juke
joints, you know, where
they had sex and food

and gambling and
all that stuff.

Back then, rich and poor
had to go to juke joints if
they wanted to party.

Son House would say, you
know, Patton would throw
the guitar up in the air

and catch it and, you
know, not miss a beat.

And just think, he's been
working all week;

and you ain't heard nothing but
lightning and birds and wind.

And all of a sudden,
you hear somebody go

(imitating guitar sound).

And I mean, the hair's
probably standing up on
the back of your neck.

* [guitar and voice]

He was doing Jimi Hendrix
long before Jimi.

Charley Patton may have started
the whole showmanship thing.

But, you know, they
had to find their own identity;

they had to separate themselves
from the other guys.

I mean, there was probably a
lot of guys out there trying

to not have to work
in the cotton field,
you know what I mean?

It's like, same as today, OK?
We're all trying to not work
in that cotton field, right?

**

The big deal about Dockery
is that Charley was here
for such a long time

that people came to him
and he took the time to
teach them how to play.

He taught Pop Staples how
to play when he was a child.

Sun House was another one
that came here and played.

That Howlin' Wolf came
here as a youngster.

**

A man came through the
plantation picking a guitar
called Charley Patton,

and I liked his sound.

Every night that I'd get off
from work, I'd go to his house

and he'd learn me how
to pick the guitar. So
I got good with it.

Wolf was the guy who
basically took Patton's music
into the electric realm.

The Stones got
Howlin' Wolf to come.

You can see Brian Jones' face.

He's just like, "Oh my God, we
actually pulled this scam off

and we got Howlin' Wolf
to do this show."

Tell us something
about him, Brian.

Well, when we first
started playing together

we started playing because we
wanted to play Rhythm and Blues

and Howlin' Wolf was one
of our greatest idols

and it's a great
pleasure to find he's been
booked on this show tonight.

So I think it's
time we shut up and
had Howlin' Wolf onstage!

[audience starts screaming]

Yeah I agree, let's get him
out, Howlin' Wolf, bring him on!

**

* How many more years
Do I have to let you
dog me around? *

**

* How many more years
Do I have to let you
dog me around? *

**

* I would rather be dead

And once again, that mystery of
what it is and how awesome it is

goes right back down to Charley
Patton and Dockery Farms.

**

America didn't let the blues
reach the white kids until the
British guys started playing it,

then they thought it was
something new the British
guys was bringing here.

The Stones, the Beatles
and whoever else was
picking up a guitar.

* [song ends]

There's a definite thread from
Charley Patton, Howlin Wolf
to Led Zeppelin, you know,

it went like that basically.

Jimmy Page will tell you
that if you ask him.

* [thirties big band
swing jazz] *

* [Mildred Bailey singing]

* I'm gonna leave you
cause it's high time *

* Somebody else is
beatin' my time *

* But you never hear me cry

* As long as you live,
you'll be dead if you die *

[she starts next
verse but stops]

[band member shouts]

Mildred: Well, I
can't help it.

[band stops]

Oh fuck, I don't
know how it goes.

It's all the same; I can't
tell where to come in.

[band counts the song back in]

* I'm gonna leave you
cause it's high time *

* Somebody else is
beatin' my time *

Mildred began singing
in speakeasies, and she
became big in speakeasies.

In this little speakeasy that
she and Benny the Bootlegger
had, she brewed her own beer.

* [song continues]

But when Mildred Bailey
came to New York

in the late
'20s, early '30s

uh, everything was
completely segregated.

She knew who the great musicians
were and she started recording
with black musicians

almost from the
moment she got here.

* [song continues]

Mildred was a cornerstone.

She serves as a cornerstone in
the direction that jazz took.

* [song ends]

* [single drone]

* [single drone]

This was her mother's land for
generations before Mildred

and my grandmother was the
recipient of ancient music.

* [single female voice]

On the Coeur D'Alene
Reservation, there was no social
gathering without singing.

* [pure high notes]

**

The way the notes are
stretched and condensed and
move over the bar lines.

Mildred sings from
Lover, Come Back to Me

* I remember every little
thing you used to do *

When Mildred Bailey does
it, it's hard not to look at the
way those glides are used

in the traditional songs of
the region where she grew up.

* Every road I walk along
I've walked along with you *

When asked how she came to be
the singer that she became,

she pointed to the Indian
songs of her youth.

**

* Old rockin' chair's got me

She was one of the great
improvisers of jazz.

You know, you say,
(sings) "Old rocking
chair's got me."

You sing it, maybe it's written
that way, but it always says,

(sings) "Old rocking
chair's got me," you know.

You just change it,
you know, whatever you
feel at the moment.

It's something that you
can't learn in school.

I'm eighty years old, you know,
what am I talking about, I'm
eighty-eight and uh (laughter)

from sixteen to twenty
years old, I was working
as a singing waiter

in Astoria, Long Island here and
that's the only thing I listened
to, was Mildred Bailey.

I was completely influenced
by Mildred Bailey.

She sang perfect, for me.

Radio announcer: And here's
your rocking chair lady,
Mildred Bailey!

Hi everybody, come right in and
cut yourself a share of kicks
around that old rocking chair.

* [forties big band swing]

* Noah, Noah, let me come in

* Doors all fastened and the
windows pinned... *

She's the first female
band singer, period.

And the first female
to have a radio show.

* Noah said you done
lost your track. *

Frank Sinatra went up to
Julia Rinker at a recording
session in the '70s and said,

"I knew your aunt, and
she is one of the most
significant people

in terms of how I learned to
sing and who I emulate to this
day." Frank Sinatra said that.

* Keep your hand on
the plow, hold on! *

Ella Fitzgerald, Billie Holiday,
Bing Crosby, she had a hand
in shaping jazz vocal style.

* Wanna get to heaven,
I'll tell you how *

* Keep your hand on
the gospel plow! *

It's important not just to
re-situate Mildred Bailey
in that jazz narrative,

but by doing that, we bring
the story of the Native
American perspective

into that jazz narrative.

[song ends / applause]

[whistles]

Loudspeaker: Seeing as this is
an unlawful assembly. Disperse.

[screams]

* [folk guitar strumming]

[Buffy Saint Marie sings Now
that the Buffalo's Gone]

[Buffy Saint Marie sings Now
that the Buffalo's Gone]

* Can you remember the time

* That you have held
your head high? *

* And told all of your friends
of your Indian claim *

* Proud good lady
and proud good man *

I went to Greenwich Village
and I was not in show business.

I was a college girl on her
way to India and I thought I
would try my luck at singing.

And it was folk music time.

* Oh, it's written in
books and in songs *

* That we've been
mistreated and wronged *

All of a sudden the streets
were just alive with people

with broader minds than
the generation before.

And it was just the perfect
time for me, you know.

If it had been a different
time, I probably never
would have had a career.

* And you feel you're a
part of these ones... *

At the essence, folk music is
telling the stories of the day.

And it's telling stories of the
day or the people who are most
of the time the most excluded,

the most-the most uh,
the trampled-upon.

This is a song about a human
being who is also an Indian

and if you don't
remember his name,

I think you may after this
song. It's called Ira Hayes.

The first folk singer signed
at Columbia was not Bob
Dylan, it was Peter La Farge.

* For a thousand years
The sparkling water rushed *

* Till the white man stole
their water rights *

For natives, for the
singer-songwriter, Peter
La Farge was the man.

He was addressing the
reality we were going through
and our attitude towards it.

We were listening to
each other's music.

There was a real protest
movement going on about Vietnam.

Universal Soldier on, you know,
I mean, she was an activist;

she was the first woman of of
activism that had an audience.

* He's five-foot-two and
he's six-feet-four *

* He fights with missiles
and with spears *

She was very instrumental
in making those images

and those points clear to a very
open and willing audience.

* And he's fighting in Canada
He's fighting in France
He's fighting in the USA *

Unlike my peers in show
business uh, who had never
been to a reservation,

and unlike my peers on
the reservation who had no
clout or power or voice um,

I had those two.

* This is not the way we
put an end to war. *

[song ends/applause]

* Old Custer he split his men
Well, he won't do that again. *

* The general, he don't
ride well anymore. *

Johnny Cash wanted to
make a folk record and he
had seen La Farge before.

And he said, "I have
to meet this musician." And
Johnny Cash felt very connected,

and then they hung out and
spoke and he said, "I want to
take some of your songs

and turn them into a record."

He was in an extremely
high moment in his career

coming off the success
of Ring of Fire.

* I went down, down, down
And the flames went higher *

* And it burns, burns, burns The
ring of fire, the ring of fire *

And even at that moment, riding
the high of these giant hits,

Columbia Records are still
trying to block him
from making this record.

Johnny was fighting and
ready to throw his career away

if they wouldn't put
this record out.

He was going to put it out, you
know, no matter what they said.

He knew this album was
essentially censored and banned.

So Johnny Cash decides to write
a letter about his displeasure.

Line after line of
scathing indictment of
the record industry.

And he himself putting the
letter in the record sleeve

and then personally not
just mailing the record
to the specific DJs,

but appearing in the city when
he was performing to the DJ with
the record and saying,

"Just give it a chance."

I've got very little
Indian blood in me myself,

except in my heart I've got
100% for you tonight.

[applause and whistles]

* Gather round me people
There's a story I would tell *

* About a brave young Indian
That we should remember well *

* From the tribe of
the Pima Indian *

* A proud and peaceful band...

Well, I asked the DJs, "Why
don't you play Bitter Tears?"

And then it was the same
answer, "Well, it makes
you feel guilty, you know."

"Uh, I didn't
wreck your damn life."

"You know, I didn't
take away your damn
land, it wasn't me."

I'm, "Well, so what?"

"I'm not telling you did,
why don't you put..."

"Well, we can't do
that."

**

Here they were.

They were all hunted down,
up this canyon as far
as those pine trees are,

across the creek over there.

By America banning
that album,

it just closed
everyone's conscience

of the American Indian
and their struggles.

I was no longer a marginalized
person writing Universal Soldier

or talking about Native American
issues in a coffee house.

All of a sudden I was
talking about those things
on big-time television.

And all of a sudden
everything disappeared.

All of a sudden there
was no interest.

And it was only twenty,
twenty-five years later
that in Toronto,

a radio broadcaster started an
interview by apologizing to me

for having gone along
with letters written on
White House stationery

commending them for
supressing my music, which
"deserved to be suppressed."

And that's the way he
started the interview

Apparently, I had FBI files
and got blacklisted, although
I didn't know it at the time.

And later on it was the
CIA as well, I understand.

They went after Buffy and they
went after a lot of people

at that time just to kind
of keep them silenced.

Buffy: I think I could have been
more effective had I not
been gagged in the US.

But who was it who
owned the newspapers?

Who owned the
television stations?

Who owned the radio stations?

Were they going to play
Buffy Sainte-Marie? No!

It was the oil companies.

It was people who were digging
for uranium, stealing uranium,

transferring it
into private hands.

That's who owned all that.

You think that they were
going to be making me a star?
I don't think so.

* [soft piano]

* [acoustic blues]

* [acoustic blues]

Well, what Jimi was
doing when he was playing
Hear My Train A Comin',

it was for a television
show, I think.

No amps, no pedals, no
wah-wah's, no tricks, no dancing
and no playing with his teeth.

And he's just bringing
pure-the power of the earth
and history through him.

* Waitin' for the train, yeah

He's bringing the Charley
Patton, you know, he's
bringing uh, the Link Wray,

he's bringing all those
things up through him.

Well, I knew he had music in
him, because when he was small,
his daddy bought him a guitar,

an old guitar for him to
play on, you know,
around with the boys

and so I knew he was musical.

But I didn't know that he had
that much music in him, you see.

**

My grandma lived to be a
hundred years old,

which is um, amazing
feat to itself but um,

her father was slave, freed.

Her mother was half
Cherokee, and she grew
up on the reservation.

So she always kept
that um, memory

of being proud of
being Cherokee.

Being part Native was very
meaningful to my grandmother.

She talked about that a lot
and really instilled that in
all of us, but especially Jimi.

She was a-a singer, a dancer,
and she was in Vaudeville.

**

She had this beautiful
trunk, and it had feathers
and boas and velvet,

and Jimi used to love
to play in this trunk.

Try on the vests, try on the
hats with a huge feather

and beautiful tan suede coats
that were full of fringe.

Back then, my room was
covered with Jimi posters.

And I used to have to
kind of laugh because
some of the posters,

they made Jimi really dark,
like really like super dark.

And I was just like,
he wasn't that dark.

And he was very, very fair and
he had caramel coloured skin and
beautiful almond-shaped eyes,

and you could definitely
tell he had various cultures
that he was born with.

* [electric guitar riffs]

The package that was Jimi
Hendrix was that indigenous
quality that he had in him

that a lot of people don't know
that he had in him.

But, you know, to bring that
to the stage and celebrate
it through his music

and his presence, you know,
that adds to the power, man.

**

So during that period of
time, now Indians are in.

The hippies, the flower
children emerging.

So they want to be
Indians themselves.

When he went up to Woodstock
you have the beautiful
white jacket with fringe,

with turquoise beading.

Part of it is, yes, it is the
'60s, but for him it was much
more meaningful than that.

When we reached the site
of the Woodstock Festival,

Mitch Mitchell, the
drummer, looked out he
says, "Oh my goodness!"

he'd never seen
that many people before.

And I said, "What is it,
Mitch?" And I looked out
and said, "Oh no!"

[roaring crowd]

And then Jimi looked out
and said, "Hm," with all
the wisdom that he had,

I don't know where he got this
wisdom, but he said,

"You know, those people
are sending a lot of
energy up on stage,

so let us take that
energy, utilize it, and
send it back to them."

[cheers and appluse]

I see that we meet again.
Hmm. Well, well, well.

And when he's doing
the Star Spangled
Banner at Woodstock

it just sounded like
everything that had happened
up to that point in his life,

in his family's life, it
was this amazing collision

of putting what the country was
going through or or his
generation to sound.

You know, it was a
pretty amazing moment.

* [Star Spangled Banner]

I think he was including
all of his frustration

with civil rights,
with racism,

with the war in Vietnam,
with political oppression,

and I think they all
come out in his playing.

I mean, you hear it. He's
painting a picture for you.

All you gotta do is listen.

**

Some people thought at that
time it was sacrilegious.

And my dad got really tense
and he wasn't breathing and
I was like, "Are you OK?"

And he said (shakes her head).

He kept looking over at the
police officer and he said, "I
really..." once it was over,

he could breathe, because he
thought the police officer
was going to arrest him,

because you just
didn't do that then.

**

He was very proud.

I mean, he was very proud of
being Native and being African
American and being Scottish.

It's part of your legacy;
it's part of your heritage;
it's part of who you are

and what you want to
reflect and represent.

It's kind of the American
superhero in a way.

It's like, he's a little bit
of everything and uh, and,
but none of it's diluted.

It's like he's more
powerful because of it.

**

[car horn honking]

* [rock 'n' roll]

* [rock 'n' roll]

Yonge Street from when
I was very young, it
was a centre of music

that I didn't know
how things were

in Chicago or
Detroit of New York,

but Yonge Street was on fire.

**

You'd try to listen
through the doors or
peek through the windows,

and then somebody would
go in one of these places

and you would hear the
music come flooding out

and it would be like, "Oh,
did you hear that?" you know,
just those few seconds.

* [Bo-Diddley]

When I was sixteen,
Ronnie Hawkins hired me
to play in the Hawks.

**

All of a sudden, they
were our Beatles.

These guys could do no wrong.
They just killed me.

* Hey, Bo Diddley!

And Robbie was just outrageous.

He'd launch into a solo and we'd
just stand there and think, "Oh
my God, listen to this guy play.

How does he do that?"

* [solo guitar]

Robbie came up with
something that I hadn't
heard anybody else do.

He just didn't play
like anybody else.

**

* [bluegrass band]

**

My real guitar lessons were at
the Six Nation Indian Reserve.

All my cousins, uncles,
aunts, everybody, seemed like
they could play an instrument.

* Oh, sometimes I can see
The things you wanted me to be *

This mix between a
Native kind of music and a
country kind of music.

So I thought, well, this
is just what you do.

I've got to learn how
to do this. I've got to
get into this club.

And there was this
key expression,

"Be proud you're an
Indian, but be careful
who you tell."

**

And I used to tell everybody
that one of these days

I'm gonna go out and I'm gonna
play music all over the world.

And they'd be like, "You
know, we don't want to see
you get a broken heart,

because that doesn't
happen to people like us."

**

I was like, "No, no, no, you
can't spoil my dream. I'm in the
middle of it." You know.

"Don't wake me up now."

And so I went and I
pursued these things.

And then joining up with
Bob Dylan, and then we're
in a musical revolution now.

Now we're doing something
that has reverberations
around the world.

Don't boo me anymore.

Don't boo me, God they're
booing, I can't stand it.

Oh my God, it's hard to get
in tune when they're booing!

When Bob decided to take a
band out, he chose the Hawks.

Just as the folk
world's starting to

finally relate to
him, he leaves.

He plugs in, causing
enormous reactions.

That group considered
electrified rock
and roll commercial.

And therefore, a
betrayal politically.

And I think they
caught the brunt of it.

I think then Dylan says, "Play
it fuckin' loud." And they
played Like a Rolling Stone.

And Robbie is there
literally, I think he said,
"Play it fuckin' loud."

Bang! He turned it up.

* [Like a Rolling Stone]

And they were
phenomenal, all right.

This is one of the
greatest--the band's greatest
tours ever in history.

**

And people would boo.

[boos mixed with applause]

Every night in every place
we'd play, people would
boo and throw stuff at you.

You'd pack up your equipment and
you'd go on to the next place

and people would boo you
and throw stuff at you.

And you'd think, "What
a strange way to make a
buck, you know."

Robbie Robertson told me,
he says, "We started
taping the shows to listen

in the hotel room because we're
like, what are we missing here?

Why-why-why are we-why
are they booing this?

Because this sounds
pretty good to me."

But after a while, we got so
we were doing it really well,

and there was an attitude
towards the music.

And uh, a violence and a
dynamic and something that you
just didn't hear anywhere else.

And as that grew, I started to
think, which is pretty bold,

we're right, and
the world is wrong.

* [The Band: Cripple Creek]

* That's when that
little love of mine *

* Dips her donut in my tea

* Up on Cripple Creek
she sends me *

* If I spring a leak,
she mends me *

* I don't have to
speak; she defends me *

* A drunkard's dream if
I ever did see one. *

The entire industry got
right back to song-writing
and Robbie Robertson,

one of the great song
writers of all time, had
effectuated that change

by his own sensibility and
the band's sensibility.

**

It seems like at a time when
everything was psychedelic
and all this stuff,

then The Band came out
and they kind of brought
everything back to earth.

I mean, Clapton wanted
to be in The Band.

And George Harrison
wanted to be in The Band.

Everybody wanted
to be in The Band.

They became instant
classics, and they were
milestones in American music,

because it was a new standard.

We wanted it to be more than
just a concert, we wanted
it to be a celebration.

He said that The Band is gonna
give its last performance

and they're gonna have
all these guests.

Everyone from Van Morrison
and Muddy Waters

to Joni Mitchell, Neil Young,
you know, Ronnie Hawkins.

I said, "Well, forget it." I
said, "This has somehow
gotta be recorded."

* The night they drove
Old Dixie down *

* And all the people were
singing, they went *

* Nah nah nah nah nah

Listen to the lyrics of The
Night They Drove Old Dixie Down

over and over again and still
find something new.

It's still, when you hear their
music, it's not of the past.

It's of the present.

[cheering]

[hum of the city]

My name is B. Mitchell
Reid and I'm talking here
with Jesse Ed Davis.

How'd you pick up a guitar?

Jimmy Reed and Elvis
Presley came on.

That really did it for me.

**

**

I can't say enough about how
valuable Jesse Davis was.

He had a special touch, special
sound for the blues, which
I love the way he played.

When I listen to his solo to
this day I hear every note.

But with Jesse Ed you
always felt like there was
more in his back pocket.

You never felt like you
got everything he had.

**

I particularly fell in
love with Jesse Edwin Davis
because he was with Taj Mahal,

and Taj's album is what
spurred me to rock more.

That-that touched
something inside of me.

**

So we're playing live
at the Whisky a Go Go.

I usually played my harmonica
with my eyes closed.

And I happened to open
them up in the middle and
looked down on the floor

and there's Mick Jagger dancing;
there's Brian Jones dancing;
there is Keith Richards dancing.

And it was just one
of the best times.

It was just--it couldn't
have been better.

And somewhere along the last
part of November, eight tickets
came to our manager's office.

First-class round trip
tickets on BOAC to London.

And to be asked to
the Rolling Stones.

The rest is history.

**

I don't think Taj was selling
a lot of records at that point,

but then they went to
England and did the
Rock and Roll Circus.

**

And Jesse met John Lennon.

And they hit it off
like long lost brothers.

And so of course John just
fell in love with this guy.

**

When Jesse went over and they
found out that he was Native,

they were so enthralled
with that, they took to
him right away.

I gotta commend him for being
bold enough to come right out
and being proud of his culture

and proud of his blood line.

Jesse had a bit of
exotic about him too.

He was Native American, he was
a cool dresser, and he played
great, tight, dynamic blues.

And the British rock
aristocracy, they
loved this, you know.

This is something they
can't get naturally.

They have to import it.

So that's why Jesse
became such a go-to guy.

John Lennon loved
Jesse Ed over the moon.

He thought he was one
of the greatest guitar
players he's ever heard.

That's how I got into
the Bangladesh concert.

About two days before the
concert, Eric Clapton
came down really sick

and George called me up and
said, "Look, will you play?"

And of course I said yes.

I just jumped at the chance.

This is Jesse Ed Davis.

[applause]

Everybody wanted to
use him at that point.

Here he is with the
Beatles, Clapton, you
know uh, the biggest,

most important musicians in
the world, they all wanted him.

When I was making my first
record I thought, you know,
like I get Jesse Ed to play,

and I called him and he
listened to the song I had in
mind for him to play

and he said, "I don't really
hear myself playing on this.

You got
anything else?"

I said, "Yeah, well, okay,
cue up that other song."

And uh, and that other song
was the song that he wound up
playing on Doctor my Eyes.

He played it once. He listened
to it for a minute and he said,

"Okay, I can play this.
this. I can play on this."

And he says, "Just cue it
up and I--" he goes out and
he's tuning his guitar.

I mean, I wound up
just recording everything.

I said, "You better record
everything." So he tunes up as
he's getting to the solo

and he says, "OK,
that's the solo? OK."

And he didn't do the whole
length of it or anything like
that, he's like, "OK."

And he played this solo once.

* [solo from Doctor, My Eyes]

My record comes out and he's
shocked to find out that it's a
hit; it's like a top ten hit.

Like, he's all over the
place; everybody's saying,
"Who is that guitar player?"

And people still want
to play that solo if
they play that song.

* Doctor, my Eyes
Cannot see the sky *

He was hanging out with
some very important people,
big rock 'n' roll people,

who were very into heroin.
And they just did it.

It was like, "Want
to try some of this?"
-"Sure."

The Jesse Ed that I knew
before he left on the, uh, Rod
Stewart and Faces tour

was not the Jesse
that came home.

He came back from that tour a
junkie, and he wasn't before.

He went and checked into
yet another rehab for Indian
people: the Eagle Lodge.

And by then I was done.

I'm, like, "Show me a year; I
want to see that one year chip
or don't bother coming home."

In 1985 I was speaking
at Cal State Long Beach and
Jesse was in a halfway house,

the Eagle Lodge Halfway
House in Long Beach

and so that whole crew from
that halfway house came to
my speaking thing.

And then Jesse introduced
himself and the first thing
he did was he me his name

and the second thing he
said to me was he could
make music from my words.

See, and I had been
looking for two years
for somebody to do that.

* Grafitti Man's got
something to say *

*

* Message in a scrawl

* Message on the wall

* Put on blinders!

Grafitti Man with John Trudell;
I thought this was so original

and there was something just
beautiful about what
they were doing together.

And Bob Dylan got a copy of
it and he did this interview
with Rolling Stone

and he said it was the
best album of the year.

He's the one that
got attention to us.

This is '85 when they did
the first record and he
was completely sober

the entire time he was doing it.

I know he was because I'm
the Sobriety Sargent-at-Arms,
and so is John.

[laughs]

When he showed up in my
life, ex-drug-addict; he's
fightin' a habit

and I'm an ex-kicked out
militant political activist.

You know, there's no
demographic for us. Fuck.

[laugh]

I mean in reality who's
gonna take us on?

Because there's no
demographic for that.

**

I'm real proud to be playing
with John Trudell and I'm
real proud to be an Indian.

And this is, uh, something I
hope that doesn't go by you,
what we're trying to do.

**

What Jesse did was he brought
me music, he gave me a band;

he dressed me up as a
rock 'n' roller.

He put me on stage, helped
me learn how to be on stage,
and then he checked out.

(chuckles)
That's what Jesse did.

I mean that's the
way I look at it.

**

Now here's a guy who can play
guitar; can make you cry

and make you laugh
and make you think.

Yet he was self-medicating
himself to a degree; he must
have been in so much pain

that he was taking so
much medicine that it
eventually killed him.

And they found him dead on
the floor of the laundry
room of his apartment building

in Culver City with
a needle in his arm.

So the demons came back.

If he had been cleaned up,
something got him back.

It broke my heart.

We thought our contribution
was really very positive.

We walked the land, played
the music that we loved.

And, uh, some of us
lived to talk about it.
(chuckle)

* [Doctor, My Eyes solo]

There's nobody who
plays like him.

He's not gone;
he is everywhere.

I can't put a radio on,
I can't go to the market...
anywhere-he's everywhere.

**

I want that music to
continue to bring joy and
blow people's minds always,

and it always will.

* Doctor, my eyes
Cannot see the sky *

* Is this the prize For
having learned how
not to cry? *

That's why Pat and Lolly Vegas
ask you, Do you want to dance?

**

* Do you wanna dance
and hold my hand? *

* Tell me I'm your lovin' man

* Oh baby, do you wanna dance?

My grandfather had a guitar.

He set it above the armoire,
you know, and he said,

"When you can reach that
guitar you can have it."

And, uh-so I stood on
a chair and took it. (laugh)

* Do you wanna dance?

I just got the bug, you know.

Once I got it, that
was it; it was over.

That's all I wanted
to do, you know.

My brother and I, we
said we're either gonna
go to New York or L.A.

to pursue the music, to
pursue the dream, you know?

And, uh, we flipped a
coin; it came out L.A.

**

Was it hard? Like, when you
guys first came to Hollywood,

two guys from northern
California; you know, dark skin.

I know it must have
been hard for you to
get jobs and shit so.

Yeah, 'cause they
weren't hiring.

The Sunset Strip and
Hollywood wasn't hiring
anybody that was ethnic.

Like black or brown. You
had to be strictly white.

Announcer: Now? Another
Gazzarri hotspot! Hollywood A
Go-Go on the Sunset Strip!

These are the lucky ones;
they got inside. Not
everyone was so fortunate.

We went and played at
Gazzarri's on the Strip. It
used to be a block, two blocks

down the street waiting
to get in every night,
seven days a week.

Did they have all sorts of
different bands rotating out?

No, just one band.
Headlining Vegas.

* Oh, baby! Do you
wanna dance? *

We were wearing really
nice mohair suits
with nice black shoes.

* Do you, do you, do
you wanna dance? *

And we did our Cajun set
and we wore bib overalls.

I had to keep changing so I
had to do something that we
could actually hold onto

and it would be ours.

Jimi was one of the people
that supported us the most.

He's the one that told us
in the very beginning, "Do
the Indian thing, man."

To see them on Midnight Special
doing Come And Get Your Love

in full regalia

doing the drum chants before
they would go into one of
their hit records...

That was actually-that
was pretty heavy.

* [chanting]

Pat: We used to mic
the floor, you know.

So when we came out, the
stomping sounded like a
herd of buffalo coming.

You know what I mean?
It really sounded loud.

**

There we were, uh, four young
Native Americans doing these
chants, these primitive chants

and then all of a sudden
going to this rock 'n' roll.

And then put the two together
and the people would just say,

"Wow, what's going on?
What's going on here?"

[song changes to pop tune]

* Hell, hell, what's the
matter with your head? *

They couldn't believe it.

Here they are, these four
Indians, with you know,
garb and moccasins

and all the things that
they've seen in film actually
playing rock, you know.

And our album came out
and it just took off
and it went crazy.

You know Come And
Get Your Love , it's in
Guardians of the Galaxy .

* Hell, hell what the matter
with your head yeah *

When the hero is marching
through the alien landscape
knocking off monsters

and all this stuff, he's
strutting to Redbone.

**

There's a real conqueror's
vibe to that song.

It's a great track;
it's a great song and
they were a great band.

And they're great
artists, you know.

Uh, it's not easy to come up
with a really accessible,
funky, heartfelt hit single;

that's not an easy thing
to do and they did it.

* Come and get your love
Come and get your love *

You can be explicitly political
and make an important point,

but ultimately getting
through is the best revenge.

You want to do it with class;
you want to do it with dignity.

And Redbone did that.

They had the class; they had
the dignity; they had the hooks.

And they got through.

So they win.

**

[cheers]

I come from, uh, East
Los Angeles, California,
living in the barrios.

I lived in the barrios.
You did? Where?

I was in east L.A.
on Geraghty.

Dude, I lived in
Boyle Heights-Dogtown.

I was in Geraghty, dude.

Wow!

Yes, East L.A.
Represent, Dude.

Bass line off of your
song it mirrors, uh,
the song we had, uh,

calledLet's Get It Started
that we did in 2003.

Yeah, I loved that.

Yeah, it's got that-it's
got that haunting, like,
walking, like,

* domp, domp, domp, domp, domp,
domp, domp, domp, domp, *
Ghost Spirit.

**

You got twenty-five thousand
people in an audience

singing Let's Get It Started ,

dancing to that bass line and
people are going bananas.

The Black Eyed Peas sold
sixty million records
around the world.

I grew up understanding
my Mexican roots more
than my Native roots.

There has to be something
that sparks you and some
people will be, like,

"Well, it was my dad or
my mom." But honestly for
me it was my grandma.

When I went to my
grandmother as I got older,

she would start breaking out
the old old photo albums.

By bringing me into her culture,
which was, uh, Shoshone,

it set me into understanding
where I come from.

It started making sense to him.

Like, "Why do I feel this way?
Why do I hear things this way?
Why do I dance this way?

And can fit these
rhythms in that are
neither black nor white.

I started realizing how
important and how beautiful

being Shoshone and
being Mexican were.

* [mix of new piece and Come
and Get your Love] *

When you hear something
that you sparked off and
inspired so many people

and you weren't aware of
that and it just takes you
by surprise-

Yeah. Yeah. It
was inspiring.

You know, I-I want
to do another one.

[laughter]

You know, I love that you and I
come from the same background.

Our stories are similar and
it's good to see positive
brothers trying to inspire.

That just lifts me up;
I'm off the ground
right now, you know.

That's a beautiful
thing for me.

**

* [heavy metal]

* [Motley Crue's Girls,
Girls, Girls!] *

**

Rock 'n' roll !
Heavy metal !
Party!
Rock's bitchin!

I moved to L.A. in 1985.

The Sunset Strip back then was
packed and crazy every night.

All the girls had like
no clothes on; all the
guys had crazy hair.

You'd be in front of
the Roxy and you'd see
Axl, Slash, Matt Sorum,

you'd see all these guys who
were pretty much gonna be
the future of rock 'n' roll,

I mean everybody was there.

I wanted to be a rock
star; I didn't want to be
like an "Indian rock star"

I wanted just to be a rock star.

I was homeless, I was
broke, but I knew I
was going to have to

come up with some kind of
of identity if I was
going to make it.

In L.A., I really didn't
fit in because I wasn't
black and I wasn't white.

So I was a rock guy but I
really loved black music.

I was playing with George
Clinton and Bootsy Collins

and everyone in town
thought I was this super
funk guitar player.

But the truth is they
wouldn't even let me play any
funk on their records at all;

they'd only let me play rock.

But I'd watch them and
I'd learn, because those
guys could play funk

like on a whole other level.

Then I'd get around my white
friends and I'd play some funk

and then my funk would blow
their funk away, right,

so to them they all thought I
was this funk guy.

All of the sudden I'm at
the Philadelphia Spectrum
playing in front of

25, 000 people with Rod
Stewart rupping a solo
on the song Dynamite .

**

I mean this whole thing was
madness to me. I mean, my last
band was my high school band.

Stevie Salas: bad rock
'n' roller; rock star.

You got to have balls and that's
what it takes for rock 'n' roll.

So I'm on a private jet;
I'm making tons of money
and I have all these women,

but pretty soon I don't
know who I am anymore.

Randy Castillo, he befriended me
knowing I was a Native American

and he met me right when I was
finishing the Rod Stewart tour.

I was going deeper and deeper
into alcohol and partying and
which girl I could be with

and how much money I could
make or house I could buy,

and he could tell I
was losing my mind.

He said to me, "I'm going
to take you to New Mexico".

[crickets]

**

**

I'm taking John Trudell
with me up to Taos.

We want to get together and have
a little bit of a talk about our
departed friend Randy Castillo.

Mr. Randy Castillo!

* [drum solo]

Randy Castillo.

Randy Castillo from New Mexico.

He'd be like playing his
drums. I remember he
always did this thing

where he hit the kick
drum: boom, boom, boom.

Mega-star.

Mega-star.

Cover of every magazine.

* [song ends]

Mr. Randy Castillo!

**

I was in Los Angeles and
spent my time then going
fucking nuts, right?

You know, just every
actress I could see, every
Playboy bunny I could get;

every cocktail I could drink.

Me and Randy started
becoming friends and he says,
"You're pretty fucked up."

He goes, "I need to
take you to Indian country."

Right.

I didn't really ever
have heard that phrase.

Indian country? He
brought me here.

The secret to Indian country
is when you're losing your mind

only lose the parts
that need losing.

Right it is.
Right.I'll tell you.

**

The last thing you
wanted to be when you were my
great-great-grandfather

was an Indian because
only bad things were
happening to Indians.

The Mexicans could chase
the Apache into America
without permission...

if they they were in pursuit
of killing Apache.

The Americans could cross into
Mexico without permission

if they were chasing Apache
and killing Apache.

It depended where you
were at in the land.

Some places they would rather
be an Indian than a Mexican.

And in some places they'd rather
be a Mexican than an Indian.

All right?

Uh, and in some places,
they didn't want to be
either but they were

so some of them would be
calling themselves Hispanic.

Randy Castillo was confident and
loved being an Indian, heads up
loud and proud and representing,

He was just such a beautiful
man and a great ambassador
for the American Indians.

He was just such a
great drummer, number one.

And he was an amazing showman.

Randy's roots, his Native
American roots, his New Mexican
roots, made him stand out.

He was like a spirit;
that's what you sensed
coming into the room.

You know, if you walked into
a room and he was there

and even if you didn't see
him, you knew he was there.

[cheers]

He was just out there and
he was putting it out there
and he was like a magnet.

I mean, he knew exactly
who he was, exactly
who he was gonna be.

We were really close.

When we had a day off
we'd spend it together;
we'd go to a nightclub.

He rapidly became one
of my best friends.

[chanting]

Ozzy! Ozzy! Ozzy!

Here's a song dedicated to Mr.
Randy Castillo, it's a number
called Tattooed Dancer.

**

Well, Randy had become one of
the most influential heavy
metal drummers in the world,

uh, because of his
work with Ozzy.

**

And Ozzy always said he
loved working with indigenous
people, Hispanic people.

It was like he had a
connection with them 'cause he
felt they had better rhythm.

And he always mentioned Randy
as being a direct connection

to that indigenous energy and
that rhythm that he loved.

* [indigenous singing]

**

**

Oh say...my brothers.

How are you, man?

Good to see you.

How are you?

[singing and drumming]

[singing and drumming]

It was always in Randy's
blood because...
being Apache you know,

but he took it to a different
level and went higher,

became one of the best
drummers in the world.

I know when he saw
Benito's drums he wanted a
whole trap set like that.

You know.

And too bad we didn't get to
do that, you know, for him.

**

He had a style that was
obviously influenced by
his roots,

kind of Indian drumming thing
that was going underneath it;

he didn't drum like
a normal person.

Normal people would
just-you know, they just
play drums like this.

But there was this
(makes crashing sound)

it was just this pounding
thing that was going
through everything.

It was his heartbeat;
Randy's playing the
heartbeat and that's it.

It's it; it's Indian
country right there.

Bam!

**

A lot of that funk,
it's from the earth;
it's organic, you know.

It's-it comes from
the war dances and there's
something tribal about it.

[crowd screaming]

It's very primal.

And that I always
equate to his roots.

You know he had, uh, a
grandmother who was a
curandero, a healer.

And he was very much in
touch with that kind of
spiritual thinking

and his indigenous ancestry.

He transcended all of the
civil stuff that you see on a
day-to-day level.

He sort of had this little
jump over where he had a path

that went back to that and he
was constantly tapping into that

and bringing that in
through his music, through
the way he played.

And one day we were going
somewhere and I went to pick
him up and he said,

"Hey, you know I found something
over here; I've got this
little thing over here."

and I go, "What's that?"

And he goes, "Well, it's
like a little bump."

And I said, "Well, it's
probably you're picking
at your, you know,

whiskers all the time or
whatever it is you're doing."

He goes, "No, it's underneath."

And I said, "Well, you know,
I don't know; maybe you
should get it checked out."

And he sort of neglected
it for a while and...
and one day he goes,

"Well, uh, I went to the
doctor about that today."

Then he said, uh, "I'm
just gonna go home."

And I go, "What's going on?"

And he goes, "Well, um-uh,
that thing that I've got
on my neck, it's cancer."

Just went from being this huge
personality to just this waif

of a memory of something
that once was.

* [piano]

[cheering]

I run into Hispanics,
Native Americans today
that come up to me

and ask me about Randy
Castillo, you know.

He's a celebrated hero
amongst that community.

**

Just keep on practicing
like a maniac.

Practice. Practice.

And listen and try to
play with other people as
much as you possibly can

because you can learn a
lot faster that way.

And, uh, the whole idea
is to play with a band.

You know you can lock
yourself up in your room
and practice forever

but if you don't play with
somebody then, uh, you're
gonna sound that way.

So, uh, stick with it, you
know and, uh, you'll do it
if you want it bad enough.

**

* Stand up, stand up!

* [chanting]

* Stand up, stand up!

**

When you're surrounded by
beautiful people that come
from the Nations,

and they're proud of
their heritage; it just
inspires everybody.

* We've been fightin' for our
freedom since the Nina and the
Pinta and the Santa Maria *

* Stand up! Like Geronimo,
Sitting Bull, Red Cloud,
Crazy Horse, Leonard Peltier *

Indigenous people being left
out of the story of music

of course has everything
to do with the land.

It has to do with the way
of imagining the American Dream,

which was a land cleared
of indigenous people.

* [Buffy Saint Marie sings]

* Don't stand between the
reservations
and the corporate banks *

* They'll send in federal tanks
It isn't nice but it's reality *

* Bury my Heart at
Wounded Knee *

It's been a long time but
we're still here; we're still
alive and we're singing.

* Cover me with pretty lies

* Bury my Heart at
Wounded Knee *

They tried to erase it
but it didn't get erased.

If they had erased
it, we wouldn't be able
to pick up the pieces.

* They got these energy
companies who want the land *

* And they've got
churches by the dozens *

Yeah, you wouldn't let me
talk about it before; well,
now I'm gonna talk real loud.

* want to guide our hand and
sing our mother earth over to
pollution, war and greed *

* Bury my Heart at
Wounded Knee *

The big racket's been
around for a long time.

And anybody who really wants
to be effective learns how
not to fight it...

'cause they'll outgun
you - but how to work
around it, through it,

how to even heal it up.

We carry a medicine in
us, you know, especially
the medicine of the arts.

* Bury my Heart at
Wounded Knee! *

* [line repeats]

* [line repeats]

[song ends]

[wild cheering]

* Link Wray's "Rumble'