Independent Lens

percussive music

crowd cheering

Link Wray's "Rumble"

Our peoples are part of the origin story of blues and jazz and rock-- of American music. From Charley Patton to Link Wray-- Robbie Robertson invented the genre. Jimi Hendrix was the best in his field. Jesse Ed Davis-- everybody wanted him. Well, that's interesting, isn't it? Figuring out that these people were Indians-- and then we started to ask ourselves, "Why didn't anyone else know that?" They went after every part of our culture, so of course they're gonna go after the music. Director Catherine Bainbridge and co-director Alfonso Maiorana bring you a film about Native Americans' influence on American music. It has been a long time, but we're still here. Yeah, you wouldn't let me talk about it before. Well, now I'm gonna talk real loud. "Rumble: The Indians Who Rocked the World," now only on "Independent Lens."

insects chirping softly

man singing in Native language

rhythmic drumming and singing

music continues on record player

One can't help but notice the rhythms of... of the pulse that was here-- that is here, been here. The feel of Native American is in a lot of rock and 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.

cheers and applause, recording continues

playing Link Wray's "Rumble" on the guitar

It's interesting how much of the Native American element just filters through. The mixture of cultures-- you never know what's gonna come of it. And from that, sometimes very interesting artistic things happen, you know? From Charley Patton to Link Wray-- Robbie Robertson invented the genre. Jimi Hendrix was the best in his field, you know? Jesse Ed Davis-- everybody wanted him. Well, that's interesting, isn't it? Our peoples are part of the origin story of blues and jazz and rock-- of American music-- but we were left out of the story consistently, from the beginning. 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.

chords quickening

steady power chords

music fades

heavy guitar music

It was that the sound of that guitar is the key on Link Wray, and aggression. The sound of his guitar embodied all my aspirations. It was the sound of freedom.

applause

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 Townshend thought Link Wray was one of the great guitar players of all time, that this guy had in-- that this guy had invented the power chord. Pete made it new, put more color on it, put more weight on it, turned it into "I Can See For Miles."

building guitar music

Link Wray's "Black River Swamp"

I was born down in The country Down where The cotton grows And this is Jim Pewter with Link, and "Black River Swamp" is really a nice tune. Yeah, that's about the 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 live in the country in a place called Black River. 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, you know, it was-- times were really rough. Stretching 'cross 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 Ku Klux Klan was after anybody who wasn't white. Blackness of the night And if you were known to be an Indian, you were just as susceptible as any African American person. Were there early rock and roll influences? I mean, you were amongst the-- There was no rock and roll then.

playing rockabilly music

I was doing this hop at this record hop in Fredericksburg, Virginia, 1957. The kids were gathered around in this arena, and they were yelling for "The Stroll." Link says, "I don't know a stroll." Said, "I don't know a stroll." Doug said, "I know the beat behind one," and he...

imitating strolling beat

And you'd think--you know, so I said, "Okay," and then I went like this, and then, my God, man, watching me, you know. And He said, "Bam." I went...

playing power chords

imitating cymbals

Link Wray's "Rumble"

It's in the middle of the night, and the radio is 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 and roll was gonna go. And then I found out that he was an Indian.

music quickening

music steadying

That was the rawest form of the kind of guitar that-- a lot of the guys that I had listened to, that's where it started, you know? And it even still sounds better when he does it.

laughs

You know? I was in the cafeteria, and on the university PA system, I heard...

imitates power chords

imitates drums

I said, "What? Whoa. What is that?" "Rumble" had the power to...push me over the edge, and it did help me say, "

bleep

it. I'm gonna be a musician." I think Link Wray purely loved rock and 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 the superficial, almost reactionary level is, like, "to fight," right? But for me, it means "to disrupt," "to roar," "to be active." So Link Wray announced with the "Rumble" 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." -

laughing

Here comes Link Wray with the theme song of juvenile delinquency, you know? "Hey, rumble!" I was surprised it got any airplay, to be honest. I mean, I'm not surprised it was banned.

cheers and applause

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 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, mother

bleep

! Yes! Uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh Uh, uh-huh, uh, gotta kick 'em out

playing 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, 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 'ching.'" And I said, "No, I want it to go..."

imitates distorted chord

"Like Link Wray, you know? I want that--that fuzz. I want the distortion." So you trace heavy metal and punk rock and all that back to The Clash and the Ramones, 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 was huge on all modern electric guitar players. If they're saying he didn't influence, they're lying. Oh!

cheers and applause

Thank you very much.

water sloshing

birds chirping

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.

singing soulfully in Native language

all singing powerfully in Native language

You can hear the spirit of some of the old music before plantations and slavery and so forth and colonization.

singing continues

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." The land of the Southeast itself informs the sound. We hear the birds here. We hear the water here, the rivers, the canoe songs, 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.

singing fades

animals chatter softly

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

haunting music

And people were arrested; singers and dancers incarcerated for performing this music, treaty-guaranteed rations withheld from them.

steady thrumming music

The federal government begins passing law after law in an effort to control Native people in every way that you can imagine.

singing in Native language

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 ancestor. 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.

man singing forlornly in Native language

On December 29, 1890, the U.S. Army surrounded a number of Ghost Dancers at Wounded Knee and slaughtered over 300-- mostly women and children, but also men-- who were participating in the Ghost Dance.

slow, bleak percussive music

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

bleak percussion

fireworks booming

crowd chattering and cheering

marching band playing rousing music

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

bleep

, you know? This doesn't have anything to do with Mardi Gras. If you want to witness and participate in the real Mardi Gras here, you have to go to the heart of the ghetto. That's the staging area.

people cheering, percussion jingling

slow organ chords

When my family came up to my home in Louisiana, they migrated during the time when, 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.

cheering and drumming

Big Chief! Big Chief! Hey, boy, what they say? Mardi Gras's more than a hell of a day, but Mardi Gras morning when the Indians come, we all gonna get together and have some fun.

cheering and drumming

'Cause we're gonna take them downtown

all

Two-way-pak-e-way - Early in the morning Two-way-pak-e-way - Set it on fire Two-way-pak-e-way - In the morning Seeing the Indians at Carnival was getting to know who I was. That was the only time that black men could put on feathers.

people chanting and drumming

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

overlapping voices and tambourines jingling

overlapping singing

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It was a Muscogee 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. Let's go together - Way uptown, now Let's go together - Four miles down, now Let's go together When you hear that up against blues, rock, jazz--it's part of the origin. Indian river

all singing

all

Everybody in the neighborhood, everybody has grown up on this. They've been doing this 150 years.

all chanting

all

Basically, they're Indians masquerading as black people in daily life.

people chanting in Native language

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Because the Indians were treated even worse than the slaves.

steady music

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When European settlers came here, they first enslaved Indians-- lots of them. And they figured out the best way to do this is to ship the men elsewhere. Being hunter-gatherer societies, they knew how to escape and how to evade the raiders and how to come back and fight. So you ship the men to the Caribbean, ship some of them to Africa, keep the women here, and then later on bring in African slaves. 90% 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 85% of African Americans who had 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, "Oh, 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 "colored," so whether you were Indian or black, you became "colored." If you have 10% African, you're considered black. You could be 90% 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.

people cheering, tambourines jingling

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Meet the boys on the battlefront Meet the boys on the battlefront Meet the boys on the battlefront Oh, the Wild Tchoupitoulas gonna stomp some rump The Indians come When the African poly rhythms and the Native American four on the floor came together, that was the beginning of what became American music. Rulers on the holiday To me, I think 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 flavorful. The Indians, let 'em through Meet the boys on the battlefront Meet the boys on the battlefront

woman singing rhythmically in Native language

banjo and percussion music

women singing in Native language

all

For me, it was just a huge revelation that the banjo was an African instrument. The banjo, for the first 100 years of its existence, was not a white instrument, you know, at all. It was a plantation instrument.

women singing rhythmically

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Our music is very much what you would hear-- I've heard people call it "pre-blues."

playing lively banjo music

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

train engine chugging

playing bluesy acoustic guitar

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Baby, saddle my pony Hitch up my black mare Baby, saddle 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 important-- singularly important blues guitarist, singer, songwriter-- the whole package-- the greatest one that ever was in the early 20th century, if you try to convince them to come up with that answer, they'd probably say Charley Patton.

soulful guitar strumming

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I'm goin' away To a world unknown He was the grandfather of-- to all of the Delta Blues guys. No matter how rough those recordings are, how hard it is to listen to it, there's nothing as immediate as listening to that stuff. It's like a bomb went off.

laughs

all

I mean, his sound is so guttural and so... It sounds like what I imagine that time must have felt like. Like, it's just-- he's just getting it out. There's--you know, there's--it's-- he's not even trying to make it pretty.

laughing

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It's just as raw as it gets. My rider got somethin' She's trying to keep it hid 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

bleep

all

in the world." Howlin' Wolf. Chips flyin' everywhere He was from that 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.

man singing in Native language

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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. To a world unknown I'm goin' away -

laughs

all

See, so, when I hear this, it's Indian music to me, you know? Won't be worried long And that rhythm...

clapping to beat

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My rider got something 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?

laughing

all

Yeah?

vocalizes to melody

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new Charley Patton song playing

unintelligible singing

singing along wordlessly

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That's Indian music with a guitar, you know? That's where it went, you know? That's where the traditional music went. It went like this. Lord, I'll tell the world the water I hear it in the singing. I hear it in the singing, and I hear it in the rhythm, because he plays his guitar like a drum. The whole round country, Lord Creek water is overflowed It was illegal to own a drum in plantation slavery America. You could not own a drum, or you would 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. Now look now in Leland, Lord River is rising high 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.

man singing in Native language

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And 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. I live in town, I I ain't got no brown, I An' I want it now, my jelly, my roll And they would do gigs. It would be, you know, Saturday night at somebody's house, somebody's back porch. And play all night, play for some drinks. Maybe somebody'd fry some fish. My roll, sweet mama, don't let it fall I ain't got nobody here but me 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. 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. Son House was another one that came here and played. Howlin' Wolf came here as a youngster.

playing jazzy blues music

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A man come through the plantation, picking a guitar, called Charley Patton. And I liked his sound. Every night that I'd get off of 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's 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-- really is a pleasure. Thanks to Howlin' Jack Wolf. - So I think it's about time you shut up and we have Howlin' Wolf onstage! -

laughing

all

Yeah, I agree. Okay. Let's get him on. Howlin' Wolf, bring him on!

cheers and applause

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How many more years Do I have to let you dog me around? How many more years Have I got 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.

harmonica solo

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cheers and applause

swinging big-band music

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I'm gonna leave you 'cause it's high time Somebody else is beating my time But you never hear me cry 'Cause long as you live, you'll be dead if you die You had your--

band continues playing

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What's going on? - You started too soon. Well, I can't help it. - Hold on. Oh,

bleep

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, I don't know how it goes. It's all the same. I can't tell where to come in. One, two...

music resumes

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I'm gonna leave you 'cause it's high time Somebody else is beating 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. You're giving me an awful brush-off You'll be sorry by and by But when Mildred Bailey came to New York in the late '20s, early '30s, 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. As long as you live, you'll be dead if you die If you die, you'll be dead Mildred was a cornerstone. She serves as a cornerstone in the direction that jazz took.

closing trumpet notes

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Yoo-hoo!

high, soft droning

slow music

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This was her mother's land for generations before Mildred. And my grandmother was the recipient of ancient music.

woman singing gliding, high notes

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

singing pure, high notes in Native language

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The way the notes are stretched and condensed and move over the bar lines... I remember every little thing

voice gliding

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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

voice gliding

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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. The sky is blue Rocking chair

slow dance music

voice gliding

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Old rocking chair's got me She was one of the great improvisers of jazz. You know, you say... Old rockin' chair's got me You sing it-- maybe it's written that way, but always there's a...

improvising

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Old rockin' 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 80 years old, you know. What am I talking about? I'm 88.

laughter

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And, uh... And, uh, from 16 to 20 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. -

on radio

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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.

swinging big-band music

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Noah, Noah Let me come in Doors all fastened 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.

band plays final notes, audience applauds

whistle blows

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Seeing as this is an unlawful assembly, see that they disperse.

overlapping shouting

hooves stomping, people screaming

folk guitar strumming

indistinct police radio chatter

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men grunting

dog barks

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Can you remember the times That you have held your head high And told all your friends Of your Indian claim? Proud good lady and... 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. In your heart for these ones 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 of the people who are most of the time the most excluded, the most-- the most trampled upon. This is a song about a human being who was also an Indian...

tuning guitar slowly

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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. -

speak-singing

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For a thousand years The sparkling water rushed Till the white man stole their water rights For Natives, for the singer-songwriters, 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 activism that had an audience. He's 5'2", and he's 6'4" 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. This is not the way we put an end to war

sharp closing chords

cheers and applause

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Old Custer, he split his men Well, he won't Do that again No, the general He don't ride well anymore Johnny Cash had been wanting to make a folk record, and he had seen La Farge perform. 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 was 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 a 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 got 100% for you tonight. It's good to be here.

cheers and applause

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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 didn't you play 'Bitter Tears'?" And it was the same answer. "Well, it makes me feel guilty, you know? "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 play--" "Well, we can't do that."

stirring music

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Here they were. They was all hunted down up this canyon, as far as those pine trees are, across the creek over there. Chief Big Foot... 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 20, 25 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 suppressing 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. I think I could have been more effective had I not been gagged in the U.S. 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.

bluesy guitar music

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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 100 years old, which is amazing feat in itself, but her father was a slave, freed. Her mother was half Cherokee, and she grew up on the reservation, So she always kept that 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.

clapping rhythmically

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She was 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. He was very, very fair and he had caramel-color skin and beautiful almond-shaped eyes, and you could definitely tell he had various cultures that he was born with. 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.

electric guitar playing, crowd cheering

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

cheers and applause

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The hippies, the flower children are 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.

cheers and applause

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When we reached the site of the Woodstock Festival, Mitch Mitchell, the drummer, looked out, he says, "Oh, my goodness." He had never seen that many people before. And I said, "What is it, Mitch?" And I looked out and said, "Oh, no."

cheers and applause

all

And then Jimi looked out, and he said, "Hmm." 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 onstage, "so let us take that energy, utilize it, and send it back to them."

cheers and applause

all

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 his generation, to sound, you know? It was a pretty-- pretty amazing moment.

playing "The Star-Spangled Banner" on electric guitar

all

chords resonate distortedly

all

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 got to do is listen.

cheers and applause

melancholy music

all

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.

rockabilly music

all

All you women, now here's how I see When I was 16, Ronnie Hawkins hired me to play in the Hawks. Hey, Bo Diddley Hey, Bo Diddley All of the sudden, they were our Beatles. These guys could do no wrong. They just killed me. Hey, Bo Diddley 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?"

electric guitar solo

all

Robbie came up with something that I hadn't heard anybody else do. He just didn't play like anybody else.

bluegrass music

all

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 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."

twangy rockabilly music

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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.

laughs

all

Oh, my God. - It's hard to get in tune when they're booing, you know? - Yeah. 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.

laughs

all

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 Dylan, he says, "Play it

bleep

all

loud." And they--he plays "Like a Rolling Stone." And Robbie is there-- and literally, I think he's the one who said, "Play it

bleep

all

loud." Bang! Turned it up. You've went to the finest school all right Miss Lonely, but you know you only used to get Juiced in it Nobody's ever... They were phenomenal, all right? This is one of the greatest-- the band's the greatest tours ever in history.

harmonica solo

all

And people would boo.

crowd shouting

all

Thank you very much. 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...

laughs

all

And people would boo you and throw stuff at you. And you'd think, "What a strange way to make a buck," you know?

laughs

all

Robbie Robertson told me, he says, "We started taping the shows "to listen to in the hotel room, "because we're like, 'What are we missing here?'"

laughing

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"'Why are we-- why are they booing this? 'Cause it 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 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." Sure would like to see That's when that little love of mine Dips her doughnut 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 songwriting, and Robbie Robertson, one of the great songwriters of all time, had effectuated that change by his own sensibility and The Band's sensibility. Yoo-hoo 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. Lordy, Lordy, Lordy, Lordy Oh, no, hoo

engine rumbles

all

My name is B. Mitchel Reed, 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.

funky rock music

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Now, there's a Change in the ocean, change in the Deep blue sea, well, there's a change In my baby, but there ain't never no Change in me, everybody I can't say enough about how valuable Jesse Davis was. 'Cause if they don't make the changes, baby They're gonna wind up... He had a special touch, special sound for the blues, which I love the way he played. When I listen to his solos, to this day, I--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. Everybody Now, you know they all change sometime 'Cause if they don't make no changes, baby 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 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 look 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 rock and rock and rock and roll and groove, baby Rock and rock and roll and groove, baby Move and move and move 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. Got 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. Yes, yes, yes, you know The desert could not hold All the love that I have in my heart for you If I could spread it... 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 got to commend him for being bold enough to come right out and being proud of his culture and proud of his bloodline. Jesse had a bit of exotica 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 love 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'd ever heard.

cheers and applause

all

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. - Sure. I just jumped at the chance. Mr. Jesse Ed Davis.

cheers and applause

all

Everybody wanted to use him at that point. Here he is with the Beatles, Clapton, you know. 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'll 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?"

laughing

all

I said... "Yeah, well--yeah, okay, cue up that other song." You know, and that other song was the song that he wound up playing on--"Doctor, my Eyes." He played it once. I mean, he literally said-- he listened to it for a minute, and he said, "Okay. I can play this. I can play on this." And he goes, and he says, "Just cue it up," you know? He goes out and he...and he's tuning his guitar while-- 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, "Okay, that's the solo? Okay." And he didn't listen to the whole length or anything like that. He's like... "Okay." And he played this solo once.

bright guitar solo

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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 They cannot see the sky Is this the price...

bleak guitar music

all

He was hanging out with some very important people, big rock and 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 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 in to 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, and I was doing a speaking thing 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 told me his name, and the second thing he said to me was he could make music for 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. Like perfume water 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 sergeant-at-arms and so is John.

laughs

all

When he showed up in my life, ex-drug-addict, and he's fighting a habit, and me-- and I'm an ex-kicked-out militant political activist.

laughs

all

I mean, really, you know, who's gonna take us on? Because there's no demographic for that. I'm real proud to be playing with John Trudell. I'm real proud to be an Indian. And this is something I hope that doesn't go by you, what we're trying to do.

soft music

all

What Jesse did was he brought me music, he gave me a band, he dressed me up as a rock and roller, he put me onstage, helped me learn how to be onstage, and then he checked out.

chuckles

all

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. 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. We played the music that we loved. And, uh... I mean, only some of us lived to talk about it.

"Doctor, My Eyes" solo

all

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 They 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?"

cheering and whistling

all

both

Do you wanna dance and hold my hand? Tell me, baby, I'm your lovin' man Oh, baby Do you wanna dance? My grandfather had a guitar, and he set it above the armoire, you know, and said, "When you can reach that guitar, you can have it." And so I stood on a chair and took it.

laughs

both

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 gonna either go to New York or LA to pursue the music"-- to pursue the dream, you know? And we flipped a coin. It came out LA. Dad, was it hard? Like, when you guys first came to Hollywood, two guys from northern California, you know, dark skin. Yeah. - I know it must have been hard for you to get jobs and

bleep

both

, 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.

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. Really? - Yeah. Did they have all sorts of different bands rotating out? No, just one band. - Just one band? Pat and Lolly Vegas.

both

Lovin' man, oh, baby Do you wanna dance? We were wearing really nice mohair suits with nice black shoes. Do you, 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 on to 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.

all chanting in Native language

drum pounding along

both

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.

chanting and drumming continue

both

Here we were, four young Native Americans doing these chants, these primitive chants, and then all of a sudden going to this rock and roll. And then put the two together, and the people would just say, "Wow, what's going on? What's going on here?"

chanting and drumming continue

drum fill, "Come and Get Your Love" begins

both

Hell - Hell What's the matter with your head, yeah? Hell - Hell They couldn't believe that here they are, these four Indians, with, you know, garb and moccasins and all the things that they've seen in films actually playing rock, you know? And our album came out, and it just took off, and it just went crazy. They were a great band, and they're great artists. You know, 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.

all

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 and applause

hip-hop mix of "Come and Get Your Love" looping

all

I come from East Los Angeles, California. Yes, yes. - Living in the barrios. I lived in the barrios. - You did? Where? I was in East LA on Geraghty. Dude, I lived in Boyle Heights--Dogtown. I was in Geraghty, dude. - Wow! -

laughing

all

Yes! East LA, represent, dude. Bass line off of your song, it mirrors the song we had, called "Let's Get It Started" that we did in 2003. - I loved that, I loved that. Yeah, I love that. - Yeah, it's got that-- it's got that haunting, like, walking, like...

imitates bass line

all

And the bass keeps Running, running, and running, running And running, running, and running, running And running, running, and running, running Everybody, everybody You got 25,000 people in an audience singing "Let's Get It Started," dancing to that bass line, and people are going bananas. Let's get it started, hot Let's get it started in here The Black Eyed Peas sold 60 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 photo albums. By bringing me into her culture, which was 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? "I 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.

Western guitar music

all

Motley Crue's Girls, Girls, Girls

all

Girls, girls, girls Long legs and burgundy lips Girls, girls, girls Dancin' down on the Sunset Strip Girls, girls... I moved to LA 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.

screaming

all

You'd be in front of the Roxy, and you'd see Axl and Slash, Matt Sorum. You'd see all these guys that were pretty much gonna be the future of rock and 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 that I was going to have to come up with some kind of identity if I was going to make it. In LA, 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, like, 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, 'cause those guys could play funk like on a whole nother level.

funk music

all

Then I'd get around my white friends, and, like, I'd play some funk, and then my funk would, like, blow their funk away, right? So, to them, they all thought I was this funk guy. All of a sudden, I'm at the Philadelphia Spectrum playing in front of 25,000 people with Rod Stewart, ripping a solo on the song "Dynamite." I got a stupid little job It's drivin' me insane With those keyhole people, all they do is complain I mean, this whole thing was madness to me. I mean, my last band was my high-school band. Stevie Salas--bad rock and roller, rock star. You got to have balls, and that's what it takes for rock and roll. So I'm on a private jet; I'm making tons of money, 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. And he could tell I was losing my mind. He said to me, "I'm going to take you to New Mexico."

drum solo

all

Randy Castillo. Randy Castillo from New Mexico. He'd be, like, playing his drums, and I remember he always did this thing where he hit the kick drum-- boom, boom, boom. Mega star. Mega star. Cover of every magazine. Mr. Randy Castillo!

laid-back rock music

all

Randy Castillo was confident and loved being an Indian-- heads up, loud and proud and representing, you know. 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 and applause

all

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

all

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

wild percussion

all

Go wild! Come on! Randy had become one of the most influential heavy-metal drummers in the world because of his work with Ozzy.

drum solo

all

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.

man singing in Native language

all

Oh, say... my brothers. How you been? Good to see you. How are you?

rhythmic drumming and singing

all

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.

drum solo

all

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...

imitates pounding

all

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

pounding drums, crowd shouts

all

It was his heartbeat. Randy's playing the heartbeat. And that's it. It's it. It's Indian country right there. Bam!

cheers and applause

all

A lot of that funk, it's from the Earth. it's organic, you know. It comes from the war dances. There's something tribal about it.

cheers and applause

all

It's very primal. That I always equate to his roots. You know, he had a grandmother who was a curandera, 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-- 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.

somber music

all

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?" He goes, "Well, there's, like, a little bump." And I said, "Well, it's probably you picking "at your, you know, whiskers all the time or whatever it is that 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... I went to the doctor about that today," and he said, "I'm just gonna go home." And I go, "What's going on?" And he goes, "Well... that thing that I have 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.

cheers and applause

drum solo

all

cheers and applause continue

all

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.

Indigenous music

all

Stand up Indigenous people being left out of the story of music of course has everything to do with land. It has to do with the way of imagining the American dream, which was a land cleared of Indigenous people.

helicopter blades whirring overhead

Buffy Sainte-Marie's "Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee"

all

The reservations and the corporate banks They 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... 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. 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. 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. Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee We carry a medicine in us, you know, especially the medicine of the arts. Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee

chanting

all

Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee Bury my Heart at Wounded Knee

wild cheering

song ends, cheers and applause

Link Wray's "Rumble"

all