Acrpost: A Project of the Pacific Association of Artist Run Centres

Event Description

. Sunday, August 26th IMU presents The Greatest Natives EVER...!!! Vancouver's 1st Annual G.N.E. Awards Show featuring MANIK, KINNIE STARR, MARTY BALLENTYNE, GOLD, DJ MAD ESKIMO & RICHARD VAN CAMP @ The Media Club, 695 Cambie. Doors 7pm, Tix $15-20 sliding scale at the door

MANIK 1derful, Vancouver's top First Nations rap artist, is heavily influenced by underground and avant-garde hip hop and was the winner of last year's Rap Olympics. Hailing from from the Haida & Cree nations of Northern Turtle Island, Manik has been making his mark on the scene for years with his unique combination of raw honesty and experimental flow and beats. A founding member of SUNDAY SKOOL DROPOUTZ with his favorite native MC, OS 12 and Vancouver producer Sichuanm, Manik's flow is rapid and harmonious and his involvement with the Native youth movement and a large hip-hop collective "Fresh Coast" has shaped him into a well-rounded, well-spoken artist. A battle champ and a voice for Native people, he does not want to be known as a good Native rapper but a rapper with skill and an artist with a purpose. Manik's message of empowerment and resistance against the corporate world stems from his desire to empower others through activism. http://www.myspace.com/mistermanik

KINNIE STARR - MC-singer-poet-actress-beatnik-musicmaker Kinnie Starr was born in Calgary, the daughter of Mohawk/Euro criminal defense lawyer Michael Starr and Irish/British guidance counsellor Donna Starr. Raised on heavy doses of Zeppelin, Sade and De La Soul, she discovered she could kick it live one fateful night in NYC when an open mic called and the crowd carried her through three blazing encores. Many years later and relocated in Vancouver, Kinnie has released four self-written, self-produced albums, been nominated for a Best New Artist Juno Award, sang and catwalked for Cirque du Soleil's erotic cabaret "Zumanity", and performed at the 2005 National Aboriginal Achievement Awards. Her unique blend of hip hop, rock, folk, electronica and R&B is embossed with the spirit of self-determination that has defined her career. "Female MC's in general are few and far between in hip-hop today, so those who are willing to bend the genre and craft their own sound are even rarer. This is precisely what makes Kinnie Starr such a standout." -- Billboard Magazine http://www.kinniestarr.com

MARTY BALLENTYNE, vocalist & guitarist in BREACH OF TRUST (winner of 3 Canadian Aboriginal Music Awards: best group/duo, best rock album and best songwriter ~ http://www.myspace.com/breachoftrust), has served as a National Native Role Model for the Saskatchewan Region and was chosen by Maclean's Magazine as one of 100 Canadians under the age of 30 in their "Faces of the Future" and Gen-X Magazine's "Leaders of the New Millennium". The General Manager of Missinipi Broadcasting Corporation, a network of Aboriginal radio stations in La Ronge, in addition to serving as vice-chairman of the Aboriginal Peoples Television Network, Marty's Aboriginal heritage has no effect on how Breach Of Trust markets themselves. "I have reservations about labeling ourselves as an Aboriginal band because this isn't traditional First Nations or Aboriginal music." That's an understatement, as the band's fiery, urgent, angry music combined with thoughtful and poetic lyrics delivered to the explosive beat of driving guitars, drums and emotional vocals, is far more comparable to Soundgarden, Korn, Nirvana, and Led Zeppelin - a powerful combination that reviewers have dubbed "visionary metal/alternative". http://myspace.com/madeskimo

DJ MAD ESKIMO - Montreal-based DJ Geronimo Inutiq is passionate about DJing. He discovered his aptitude for mixing & producing through experimentation with his father's old synthesizers and drum machines while living in Quebec City. As a youth, Geronimo would wander around the city and hang out at the basketball park where he met guys who were rapping, so hooked up with them and made beats with them as the Presha Pack. After the Presha Pack disbanded, Inutiq started producing his music digitally on his PC. "What I do now is removed from rap," he explains. "It's still linked because it's what you call urban music, but it's more of electronica, techno, slight influence of drum and bass, house a bit. I like to keep open boundaries." Inutiq says he's always thinking of new ways of making music to keep from stagnating creatively, and he''s committed to keep making music because "everything is music, the whole world is filled with music. My music is the old stuff with the new , that's where the future is "and I'm one of the only Inuit artists making this type of music." http://myspace.com/madeskimo

RICHARD VAN CAMP - novelist & children's book author Richard Van Camp is a proud member of the Dogrib (Tlicho) Nation from Fort Smith, NWT. Richard's poems, short stories and novellas have been published in anthologies and journals since 1992. A graduate of the En'owkin International School of Writing, the University of Victoria's Creative Writing BFA Program, and the UBC Creative Writing Master's Program, Richard currently teaches Creative Writing for Aboriginal Students at UBC and has established himself as a leader of the Aboriginal literary renaissance. Three of his short stories have been narrated by Cree actor Ben Cardinal and broadcast nationally as radio dramas on CBC, and he's also CBC Radio's Writer in Residence for their North by Northwest Program. Richard was awarded The Writer of the Year Award for Children's Literature in 1999 by the Wordcraft Circle of Native Writers and Storytellers for his children's book A Man Called Raven. Richard received the Canadian Authors Association Air Canada Award in 1997, honouring the young Canadian writer (under the age of thirty) deemed to show the most promise for the future in the field of literary creation. http://www.myspace.com/richardvancamp