Black Belt Eagle Scout At Subterranean

Review by Sharah Hutson
Photos by Jaida Grey Eagle

I spent high school traversing the depths of the internet and my local record stores to find new music for my growing collections of playlists and mixtapes. Some mixtapes I made for my friends, others I kept for myself. I gravitated toward indie rock thanks to Tumblr, radio stations, and my friends, opening my eyes to endless amounts of new artists. I remember being mesmerized by Black Belt Eagle Scout’s At the Party With My Brown Friends, with songs such as “Scorpio Moon” and “My Heart Dreams” often being pitched to my friends as the type of songs that you wish you could hear from the first time endlessly.

Black Belt Eagle Scout is an Indigenous Swinomish/Iñupiaq artist whose lyrics honor her ancestral land while embracing intergenerational knowledge and the strength it takes to cultivate sustainable communities. Katherine Paul’s music is often described as a warm embrace. Every note contains “a love letter to Indigenous strength and healing.”

With the recent release of The Land, The Water, The Sky, I was excited to see the first tour that Black Belt Eagle Scout was doing with this album. I watched the hush fall over the room as Katherine took the mic to start the set, and I knew I was about to experience something that would transcend me to another realm.

During the set, Katherine took time to describe a few of the songs that Black Belt Eagle Scout would be performing that night. The story of “Sčičudᶻ (a narrow place)” is that:

“There is this particular patch of cedar trees there that when I walk through them and visit them, I would always notice that one of them was looking at me. It’s [a] nice feeling when you recognize that there are trees and [they recognize you.]. I wrote this song about how that made me feel and how whenever I am there, I feel 110% like myself, as if I was meant to be in that place. That connection that I have is so meaningful to me and feels almost as if I am dancing.”

“On the River” is described as a song that is “about a place called the Scantic River, and I wrote it when I was living in Portland so desperately wanting to be home. I kept envisioning this particular spot where the ground meets the water, and it is really misty. It feels really nice. I have this really big urge that I really want to be there.”

Before playing “Spaces,” Katherine described the song by telling the crowd, “My dad is [a] Powwow singer. When they were in the studio with me, they never really recorded in a studio. We record with [a] click track, but when we tried it that way, they couldn’t do it, and I suggested that we just sing it how you sing it. Of course, he had this big powerful (the sound of someone letting out an ululation), and it was very fitting and wonderful to have him on it.”

After watching Black Belt Eagle Scout’s set, my friends and I stood in our spots for a moment with our jaws dropped underneath our masks, expressing our deep appreciation for what we had just experienced. Throughout the show, I felt as if I was transported into the inner workings of how the album came together. Katherine’s descriptions of what some of the songs that were performed meant to herself and the band gave me an insight into the abundance of intention and collaboration that went into making their latest record.

Catch Black Belt Eagle Scout this summer at Pitchfork on Saturday, July 22 and check out their Bandcamp.