Osheaga, Montreal’s annual summer music festival, one of the largest in Canada, has a great line-up this year. Bands such as ‘Florence and the Machine’ are performing during the 3-day event that begins on Friday July 31.
‘A Tribe Called Red‘. is also on the bill and this native electronic trio has created what’s known as Electric PowWow. The three men, Ian Campeau, aka, DJ NDN, Tim Hill, aka Bear Witness, and Dan General, aka DJ Shub, mix and sample indigenous music and sounds which results in some amazing tunes.
They’ve also played a leading role in the ban on native headresses. They have an ongoing campaign to educate people about the affront it is to indigenous communities to take these symbols and pieces and wear them as merely costume.
Described as “fashion racism” the hiptser culture or pop culture that adopted native headresses as ‘cool’ in everything from fashion shows to rock concerts are now strongly discouraged from doing so.
Incidentally, Osheaga, is a Mohawk word that means “where they met the people of the shaking hands” and it was a term used around the time Jacques Cartier made contact with native people in what is the region of Montreal today.
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