#44 - Indian Basketball, Fancy Dancing and Indigenous Citation with Guest: Walter RunsAbove - Tribal Research Specialist: The Podcast

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Shandin Pete (00:00):
What I can hear Aaron No, he's got issue.

Aaron Brien (00:03):
Can you hear me now?

Yeah, I can hear you. There must be this right
gotta be then. Yeah, it's gottabe that.

Can I just keep using this?

Whatevs. Do it

is it working?

Yeah, I can hear you.

Is it whack a duck?

This guy man, you know what? This guy every time
is the same thing well last timewasn't. He's always fumbling
around trying to set his stuffup last minute. He's got all
kinds of cords. Ever get it?
Right. I even water it.

I don't want to hear it.

I'm not done telling my story. I don't need I
bought him this fancy arm andmicrophone rig material so he
could get nice audio. He'sprobably still in the box.

I don't like this at all. If well doesn't have to
have a fancy mic. Why do I got afancy mic?

Unknown (00:55):
Well,

Walter Runs Above (00:58):
the further Arab looks cool. Doesn't need
Yeah, looks like looks likegoose from Top Gun.

Your goose? goose egg

was not a Native American

that we know of.

Appreciate. Spell kidmore

No, goose was good. Oh yeah. Goose was Val
Kilmer

part. Part.

Well, he went to the stronghold

Red Deer table Red Deer table

counts for something
he's drinking drinky drink willcome up with oh, what's your
what's his name? Whole auntie.
What's her name?

I don't know.

That actress.
Lucy? twos? Yeah, yeah.

Come in and have some more color pee.

Gonna throw that in there a little bit more.

Oh, okay. You do it.

Yeah, well, I wasn't a follow up. Oh.

I think Shawn Dean actually sounded more like the
lady on Tinder than you did. Aman before we start, let's say
congratulations to well, man.
He's a champion.

What? What happened?

This week? This weekend? He's a champion, man.

What did he do?

What he's chasing the dream. What did you do?
chasing the dream?

I see. No.

You know, it's something when the Indian guy
says oh is nothing.
Nothing. Nothing. Went to themoon. It's nothing.

He wants to Ford Hall for Hall and one the 40 and
over

basketball. Right?

Right. Well

where do you know over 14 over camps?

Or do you know we're no dunks? Don't know can't

Yeah, no layups No.

head shake. And then throughout is see five.

Dislocated bag right here. Yeah. Holy cow,
man.

What did you What was your score? How did how did
you get? How did you do?

Ah, well, we I felt really bad our first game
because I was reading the rules.
Yeah. And one of the rule likethe Mercy rules was like 50.
Anything over 50 You know, justwherever you're at in the game,
it just stops. Oh, yeah. Andthen I think the next mercy rule
down was like, like, after fourminutes, are at four minutes in

(04:25):
the fourth quarter. If you'reout 30 Then mercy rule. Yeah, so
our first game we played. We hadrode like we kind of combined
with another team, you know fromMontana. Yeah. got guys that we
usually play play against allthe time, but it was kind of

(04:45):
cool to kind of come togetherand play but anyways, yeah, we
ended up we scored 5055 pointsat halftime. and other team only
had six. That's. And it was kindof fun because at halftime we

(05:07):
thought, Oh, we only need onemore point, you know, like, are
they really gonna stop the game?
You know, that kind ofeverybody's talking? Yeah. So
right before it was their ballcoming out a half and one of the
other players started talking tome and he goes, Hey, let us get

(05:29):
to 10 You know, like, let us getto 10 Do you want to keep
playing but just let us get to10 and I'm like, Yeah, sure,
whatever, you know, and theirfirst shot, they missed I
rebounds. And it was just it wasjust like reaction, you know,
just to go on a fast break.
Yeah, we went on a fast breakand I pass it up to one of our
players and then he passed ityou know, it's like a it's kind

(05:52):
of a cool play it like boom,boom. And he finished like he
finished and we we 1551 pointsand that's game

you call the treaty

guy that asked like what are the other
players? He asked after we hitafter we 50.8 They called the
game he just went all but wefelt like they maybe we should
have just let them get him youknow, at least but he said

he says they felt bad but they went into backing
they're like we're still got itrose

Yeah, no, it was. It was a lot of fun, you
know, playing and, but it was itwas more it was more really
inspirational and anythingmotivational. Yeah. Cuz, you
know, like, when he when you'reyounger, you don't think 40s old
or 45 You know, like you don'tyou know? Think that's old. But

(07:03):
you know, because it was thesame week and they were having
the 50 and over the 60 and over65 and over so it was it was
quite the quite the experiencebecause it was my very first
time ever playing in the 40 andover tournament already young 40

What if

they mean Yeah.

Oh, you're a young 40

My my time doubles now. I'm gonna hit only 40 and
overs now. I'm gonna be like thenew kid at school. Everyone's
back who sky is over?

It never started.

No, it's never too late. No, Johnny I don't like
this negative. Yeah, we're gonnabuild chuck your chock full of
negativity. gonna build peopleup all right.

All right. I'm gonna build you guys up right
now. I'm gonna build you up withthis the song man you ready for
it? Here let's hear it you mightrecognize this and you might not
but you might recognize thestyle I'm curious who these

(08:31):
people are because I don't Istill don't know yet it's a I
just don't know come on for allreal to real here we go
hear that?

(09:59):
Right And what do you think? Wasthe song do you recognize?

Rock and roll? That's old school rock and
roll, right? They're

saying it to hear that one partner where they kind
of the tone kind of goes off.
Yeah, it kind of sounds like itslows down for a second. I
thought that was this like arecording. Like maybe the tape
got stretched or some what itdoes it consistently and I never
heard it like that before.

That's that's that is different.

Yeah, that's unique. Pretty unique. What kind
of song do you think that is? Imean, I think I know because
that kind of says on the on theon the real earlier, but I'm
wondering, what does that soundlike? it's quiz time. it's quiz

(10:54):
time. Quiz time.

It's a it's a blanket dance song.

Here provided the audio you just is the following
song. A, a round dance song. Bea crow hop. See? A chicken dance
song. V. either A or C. E. Noneof the above?

I'll defer to well.

I'm gonna go out on a limb and I'm gonna say
that a warm up song beforegranting treat. So

none of the above?
Yeah,

I think that's one of them songs when you're
recording. You recording andit's between sessions and you
have to record two more songsfor your
your CD your CD. Oh, yeah.
We need two more songs, guys.
Yeah, so we say we sing the oneWalt made on the way over you
got he refers to it. He refersto it as a jazzy tune to know

(12:06):
anything about jazz. Nothing.

Yeah, you got your cousin with his with his with
his MacBook on a folding tableright by the drum recording on
GarageBand

Yeti mic that he owns on Hawk nephew that wants
to be a YouTuber. That's truestory.
That's clearly that'sclearly a chicken dance song.

Right? Oh, yeah.
Pretty certain. We really

mean chicken dance songs really just come from that
greater grass dance style ofsinging? Yeah. It exhausts the
same cadence. The format. Yeah,it's all born out of that, man.

I'm not trying to pick a fight. I'm trying to be
positive here. Okay. Jenna bepositive. Don't know, attack.

I would say I would say certain tribes or certain
groups of people perfected.
Yeah. A sub genre within thegrass dance style of singing.
Yeah. And then we would callthat like, like, like who was
it? Who are we talking abouthere?

You got it. Get it?

I don't know. Like, I don't know what I'm saying.
Certain groups can sing chickenden songs better than others
because that's their thing.
Yeah, like water was sidestepsright. It's like they're saying
that's interesting. All right.
Do you concur? Well,

I concur. Okay, well, we got

Zach battle River.
Yeah, just bring up battle riverdude. But what they do like the
way they drum though, it's bad.
I some about it, dude. It's likeyeah, I know what it is. It's
pretty nuanced though. Insinging to me because if most

(14:19):
people heard high noon, and thenmost people heard about a river
they'd be like, Oh, they soundgood, but they're very
different.

Yeah. Oh, yeah.
Yeah.

Anyway, I'm sorry.
We should

yeah. It should be but no

stupid stupid talking about

No, I don't know I don't know yet. But we got we
got somebody here who's kind ofgot some experience in a lot of
things. We just learned abouthis basketball when his
basketball career spends moneyThe decades did you play
basketball in Headstart youplayed at Headstart, basketball?

(15:05):
Well,

earliest memory I can remember. And I
have to reflect on my memoryprobably like 1986 a week yeah.
So I was three years old I canremember

being negative to

s3 I can remember going to the old
Frazier high school gym. Yeah.
You know when he had tournamentsand such over there Yeah, I
remember watching my my dad andmy uncle's play.

Yeah. And then little itty bitty shorts.

And they had the they had the long spat and
that's when spandex first cameout. Oh really? Yeah.

I remember that.
shorts over spandex

Yeah cuz one of my uncle's came out in
spandex thinking that's howyou're supposed to wear he wear
shorts over the spandex and hewas warming my bad shorts over
those are really look back intothe locker No, I remember that.

(16:20):
Oh, high school gym and Fraserknee you know those old school
backwards that were they wererounded. Square. Yeah. Yeah.
Remember those? Yeah.

Yeah. It's like the look like the back of a
highchair some? Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, no.

Well, you dated yourself by even saying what
kind of the highchair like theback of it the ones are used to
slide the tray out.

Oh, yeah. Yeah.
To get the jam is finger inthere, you know, dangerous.

I was used to get myself out of the highchair
because of the buttonsunderneath.

So this is the thing.
This is what I'm curious about.
I was thinking about this andpulled some information, you
know, there's not a lot of greatinformation that you find
published about fancy dancing.
They just can't find it. Youknow, it's not something that

(17:27):
people write about, I guess. AndI found this thing it says it
suggests that the historicalrecord D marks the fancy dance
starting in the late 19thcentury. Apparently, the Wild
West shows and Oklahoma wastrying to get the Indians to

(17:51):
dance a bit more fancy. Youknow, they didn't they didn't
want to see the the old dancesof the plains is wonder. fancy
it up for the audience. Now Iknow you are have a long history
in this style of dancing. Whathave you heard about this? The

(18:13):
beginning the origin of thefancy dance?

The origin Yeah, that's a tobacco question.
A

tobacco question

we'll get we'll get an Uber Eats to get stopped
over at the 711 and smokes

Yeah, yeah.
No, the you know, when fancydancing. You know how it
evolved, you know, evolved fromwhen we did have those Wild West
shows, you know, the buffaloBuffalo Bill, Cody. There's a
lot of things that stemmed fromthose things, you know, in my

(19:11):
great, my great grandfather, youknow, Peter Ely Yeah, Ron, well,
you know, he was a trick roperin Buffalo Bill Cody's show.
Yeah. And then Iron Tail. Youknow, who's runs a Bob's runs

(19:31):
above his dad so it goes IronTail runs Bob's Peter Ely. And
then my grandpa, then my dad.
They were all a part of that.
The Wild West Show Buffalo BillCody. Fairytale. So there's a
lot a lot of the stories thatcome from the Wild West shows

(19:52):
talking about you know howbasically kind of Iron Tail was
the right hand person to BuffaloBill Cody. Yeah. He was kind of
like the first one of the firstNative liaisons, you know, like

(20:14):
how we have nowadays? Yeah.
Handling. Yeah, the handler, theexpert, you know, but they would
go, you know, to thesereservations, when they were
established their firstestablished these reservations
long time ago, and, you know,entertainment value, you know,

(20:38):
they looked for the songs, theylooked for the dancing, they
looked for, like, the regalia,they looked for uniqueness, you
know, they're looking for thosethings, and then they would
invite them out, you know, theywould have these dance
competitions, and he's, youknow, they were, who had the
stamina, who, you know, whocould, who could dance dance the

(21:03):
hardest? And who had the moves,you know, a lot of different
them. And so, you know, down in,in the earlier days, you know,
for the history of fancydancing, you know, that came out
of Oklahoma area. Yeah. Youknow, the punker tribes, you

(21:25):
know, you know, the southerntribes down there, when he had,
you know, the high schoolinstitution held, it's for the
first annual fancy dancecontest, you know, and they,
they said that, whoever, whoeverwas going to win this, you know,
their tribe can claim, you know,those, that fancy dance

(21:48):
championship, they can claim itfor their own. And, you know,
Gus McDonald was one of thefirst ones or one of the, the
first ones to win that. And sothey brought that back, you
know, to the panko people. So,every year since then, you know,

(22:09):
there's, they had a trophy, theyhave world champions of dancing,
you know, down in the pocketarea. Yeah. You know, I've
always heard these stories likethis, you know, and then there's
always, you know, I've heard ofother people that I've looked up
to that, you know, at thesepowers, you know, growing up,

(22:31):
you when I, when I grew up, youknow, in the, the 80s and the
early 90s, you know, there was alot of dancers that came
through, you know, Montana area,you know, back before, like the
casinos really took off. Yeah.
Back before when, you know, the,the bigger the bigger, the now

(22:54):
you have what the Californiacircuits and all this because
circuits in search, but, youknow, back when it was
springtime college powers, andthen June came, and you know,
you had your highlight powersall that, but the year when
these big powers would come, youknow, like, the bigger powers,

(23:15):
you know, like round, say, likeNew Town area, like new town,
little show. You know, Hank Leestarted getting up there prayer
Island, like these places likethat, you know, Rocky Boy. Yeah,
I remember, we would always waituntil Rocky Boy came around,
because that's when, you know,you saw the southern dancers or

(23:37):
if you want to little shout, youknow, you saw the southern
dancers come up. Yeah. And sothen he, you know, like, the
became a fan. You know, like youbecame, you know, as you were in
awe of, a lot of these dancers.
Yeah. And so one of the thingsthat, that always stuck out was

(24:01):
the rocker, you know, they hadthe, the rocker on top, the two
feathers on top, and it justgoes to the movement of the, of
the song, you know, the speed ofthe song. And so, a lot of that
kind of all goes back tohistory, you know, the hackle

(24:22):
feathers, the eagle bustles, allof that all of that comes back
into the history of how it usedto be in in the old you know,
the Wild West shows because fromthe stories that were shared
with me from my dad to you know,his dad to his grandpa and you

(24:42):
know, a lot of these a lot ofthese people that were in a
shows, you know, they would dothese high jumps and these high
kicks, you know, in like reenacta battle or you know, those were
those kinds of stories. And soin a way you know, from where we

(25:09):
come from, you know, like onour, on my old Galala side or my
Northern Cheyenne side, youknow, there's these these dog
soldiers stories, you know, andCheyennes were pretty well known
back at those times for dogsoldiers to be a soldier. And so

(25:29):
sometimes, you know, in, youknow, like, my, some gentleman's
that they looked up that I lookup to you, you know, like, one
of them is Dwight White Buffalo.
And I just remember his, hisrocker, you know, like losing
the afterburner rocker, youknow, it just was always.
That's, that's what was cool.

(25:51):
You know, like, yeah. And so, Iremember talking to him a lot. I
remember Damon Brady wasprobably one of the first
northern dancers that I saw witha rocker because normally you
never really saw northern fancy.
There's with rockers, theyalways wear spinners. So I

(26:13):
remember, you're always an RGHarris, you know, and jobaline
t, you know, and then then I sawlate Todd red bear, have a
rocker, you know, but I neversaw I always saw, like these
other northern dancers withspinners. And so I was, my first
question was, what's thesignificance of the rocker?

(26:37):
Yeah, you know, yeah. Andthere's, you know, it's just,
it's just a way to show thespeed, your agility, you know,
your timing, you know, yourquickness. And it's just the way
you know, it's a way it's not,it helps the dancer, but it's

(26:58):
the flare from the rocker. Andhow it goes along with the song,
the rocker in the songs, theoriginal PANCA songs, there,
they intertwine they there, theygo with each other. And so that
was the first question was therocker. And so with it came all

(27:21):
this history about the punkerstories, the punker songs, you
know, not just not just there,but like the Kiowa stories, the
Kiowa songs, those a lot ofthese things like that, and, and
so and just like when he dancedto, you know, like, men's

(27:45):
traditional with a dance, youknow, in a have these songs,
these word songs are theseparticular songs and, and I hear
some stuff, you know, and I wantto saw ask, you know, when my,
when my adult had the greatestteacher, and the one of the best
singers you know, in a father,you know, my late father. So, I

(28:09):
would ask him questions aboutcertain songs, certain things
and, you know, up here in thenorthern country, we, you know,
we had necklace breakers and,and then the, you know, and then
I realized how lucky I wasbecause I had Eagle whistles,
you know, eagles, so uncles andthey would tell me all these all

(28:29):
these differentone of my uncle's like Alex
Gwynn and My other uncle lateDean Peter, Dean Fox, you know,
and then my uncle Wade Baker,but they would, they would sing
all the time, they'd sing notjust necklace breaker songs,
they would sing these foot slidesongs with words in them. They'd
sing these G's, just regularintertribal songs with words in

(28:51):
them. So it was always a, Ialways made it a point to ask,
What am I dancing to? Or whatare these? What are these words
that are in the songs? And thenthen the encouragement of like,
learning language and, you know,and, you know, not only are you
learning, you know, like, theLakota, Dakota Nakota songs, you

(29:16):
know, you're learning Hidatsasongs, you're learning Rick Ross
songs, you know, you like allthese different meanings behind
the songs. And by knowing thosethings, it makes you dance
differently.

Yeah. Yeah. It

makes it makes you move differently
because it just has that. Itadds to the it adds to what
you're trying to do, you know,adds to the to your talent they
guess. Yeah. And so with the youknow, the the our origination of

(30:02):
fancy dancing or the you knowthe beginning and how it came
about through the through thatfancy dance contest down in high
school and panko putting on allthese these championships year
after year and you go as a fancydancer you know, even though

(30:27):
it's originated down from thesouth, you know, it eventually
evolved through time and it cameup people made its way up here
to the northern countries or thenorthern country, I should say
Canada area, you know, yeah,North Dakota, Minnesota, you
know, Montana Idaho. And sothere's a lot of cool cool fancy

(30:50):
ranches that came from out ofnowhere you know and they became
idols to us younger generationsyou know, like we got to see the
late like the lead late beat thebears tail you know late Tony
Brown, late rainbow Azure Stanand Luke white man, you know,

(31:18):
Alvin, Alvin windy boy, youknow, my dad dad's fancy I never
got to see him dads but I heardheard some pretty cool stories
about how you said that downhere and lamed your area around
Montana area, you know but butwhen the southern boys would

(31:39):
come up you know, it was a sightto see because then you heard
different songs you know, youheard you heard the different
kinds of singing that's what wasreally cool because he go to
these powers any any saw youknow, RG Harris joeboy At the

(32:02):
White White Buffalo, Henry HenryMcClellan. Late Billy
McLoughlin, you know, shoots,aka boo. Norman new writer.
Cool, cool, new cool nickname,aka Whoo. What is

like a sushi roll?
I think a

lot of these dudes have so you know, had some
real cool names. And, and so youknow, he grew up idolizing these
guys. You know, becauseeveryone, everybody that I
mentioned, you know, andthere's, there's a whole lot
more that I looked up to, youknow, like, over every state, it
seemed like every state, everyreservation had had their dude,

(32:51):
you know, they had their littleguy, and, and then when he would
all come together, I remember inRocky Boy when they first had
northern fancy and southernfancy. You know, and there is a
lot of dancers, but I thinkthere's like 5040 4050 dancers.
And so I remember the northern,you know, the northern fancy

(33:15):
they get their trick songs, youknow, from, you know, either
Mandiri who whistles you know,whoever, whoever was the
northern jobs at that time.
Yeah. And then the southerndrums you know, like, like, you
heard him like the rose hillsand COEs ads and the yellow
hammers, the gray horse singersyou know, like a lot of those a
lot of those guys would come upwith a thank you brothers. And

(33:38):
so as a young kid, it wasawesome to stay up till like
three o'clock in the morning.
You know, stay up late and watchthese fancy dancers kick it out,

(33:59):
you know and dance to three orfour songs you know and they had
the big heavy bells the soundsthe sounds of the bells going to
the to the songs you know, justhear that you know, and it was
really awesome and it was I wasnever disappointed anywhere I

(34:19):
went growing up I was neverdisappointed because you saw you
know like I said the demonbreeds the Todd red bears you
know the weight keeps Eagles youknow all these these cool
northern cats and, and Iremember this one, you know,
late Phillip chi U 's nicknamewas smiley soon everybody had a
cool nickname?

What's your nickname?
Don't want to say it. I don'thave one in Montana.
Oh, you keep going

Oh, but anyway, wait, wait filler word,
he would dance northern fancy,he would be in a northern fancy.
And then he would exhibitionwith the southern fancy. And
Holy smokes. That was, that wasreally something to see, you

(35:20):
know, as a site, I can rememberjust going back to the camp and,
you know, just pumped up andtrying to imitate what I saw,
you know, because, because thatwas the other thing too, is
everybody had their own style,everybody had their own look,
you know, and, and they made itwork for them. And, you know, it

(35:41):
was really, it was really coolto see that. So, but Fancy Dance
wise, you know? You know, it's,it's a, it's the southern dance,
you know, and it deserves to betreated and shown with respect.

(36:03):
You know, because there's a lotof people that, you know, that
they don't they jump in thepool. Asking if the water is
cold or hot, or how deep it is,you know, or what's, what's in
it, you know, like, that's how Ikind of compare it to dancing,

(36:24):
you know, like, with my, my ownson, if he wants to know, some,
you know, I'll tell them to gocheck out or go ask certain
people if I if I see them there,you know, so like, Michael
Roberts has been reallyinfluential. Not on my not just
my own life, but with cactuses,because he's a pretty cool dude.

(36:49):
And he shares a lot of thatfancy dance wisdom, you know,
that dancing wisdom, I guess youcould say. And so one of the
cool things that I learned in myyoung life was the PANCA trip. I
started, I started paying moreattention, closer attention on

(37:12):
you know, dancing, certaindancing a certain way, using
your rocker things like that.
And, and so one of the thingsyou know, like, like, I
remember, some, like, my dadwould say, if you want to, you
know, something, or if you wantsomething done, do it yourself,
you know, that kind of a thing,you know, seek out those answers
yourself, you know, and, and so,like I said, when I started with

(37:37):
the rocker, you know, I learnedabout the rocker, I asked, you
know, you'd be like, a distantrelative, but we are related,
but the white white wolf will,you know, he asked him about his
rocker. And so he showed me howto make it. He talked to me he's
telling me about, you know, dogsoldiers stories, usually

(38:00):
sharing a lot of cool, coolthings like that, and then
telling me about different songsand you know, what certain songs
mean and how to how to go aboutdancing to them and, and how he,
how he dances and such. Yeah.
Oh, but I remember, you know, in1989 You know, I can remember

(38:27):
people's rockers I don't knowwhy just their bustles their
their their look, I can rememberthat but and then they had their
their dance whistle you know,everybody had a dance whistle.
And so with the fancy dancingpiece, you know, I asked the
White about Uncle the wire abouthis rocker and he shared with me

(38:49):
all that information. And then Iwent I took it a step further,
and I just asked him I say thatand can I you know, can I start
making these and then he said,he said Yeah, make your own rock
or if you can make your own rockor you know that you know,
that's step one, kind of a thingyou know. And then the other
questions were about the songspunkers have some some really

(39:18):
cool songs with panko words andyou know and in a lot and then
not just those those word songsbut just the straight songs
there's a lot there's a lot ofstories that come with a
straight songs and then theruffles the ruffles is is what
really is what's really coolbecause like, nowadays, like

(39:39):
when you see fancy dancers danceto a ruffle like they're running
all over the floor turns into atrack me you know

karate kicks in there too, right? Yeah, yeah. to
crank

a sleeve to karate kick along. Okay, okay, good.

How to Move.

Yeah. Okay.
All right. Okay. All by 100relay out there, jump high jump,
you know, it's just the one bigtrack. And but, you know, the
rough with the ruffling of thesong, you know, it's, you ruffle
your feathers, you're rufflingyour body, you know, like
you're, and then you're rufflingyour rocker. And then then when

(40:23):
a song takes off, then your bodygoes with that song, your rocker
goes, you know, it's, it's kindof like imitating how a horse,
when he gets up from the ground,and he shakes his shoulders, he
shakes his head, his main liftshis tail around kicks, his kind
of kicks his legs in the back,you know, because he's, he just

(40:45):
got, you know, getting off theground, if you're watching his
horses do that. And so that'skind of like, what it's
imitating is that horse and thenthat first song, the first
verse, you know, it kind of goessmooth, and that's that, that
trot of that horse, and thenruffles again, and that second
one comes in, and by the time itgets to the end, that or that

(41:08):
horse isn't full blast, youknow, like, like, ears, back and
running. So it's kind ofimitating that's the story
behind it's like the, the speedof so that was shown or shared
with me by my uncle. He took meas his relative, Henry
McClellan. He shared that heshares a lot of stuff with me,

(41:33):
and I really appreciate that.
And so, so that was the, youknow, a lot of people talk to me
about or asked me questionsabout my rocker in. And it's one
of the most important thingsthat you can, that you need when
you're dancing as a fancydancer, you know, is the rocker.

(41:55):
And, like I said, it's asouthern dance. It's a Southern,
you know, it made its way uphere. And so I learned how to
make these and that's one of themake a rocker. And so one of the
cool things was that the way thestyle that the white showed me,

(42:15):
who made his rocker was one ofthe all time Fancy Dance
champions of late BillyMcClellan. And so when I learned
how to make this rocker and I,you know, made I made so many of
them now that, you know, I can,like, you know, it's, it's
pretty, it's just like puttingon a shoe, I guess, you know,

(42:37):
it's, it's pretty easy. And, butevery time you know, I remember
when Uncle the white first toldme about, you know, the, the
ability, McClellan story and hisrocker and how he made his
rocker, you know, for Dwight inand I thought that was really
cool, because, you know, UncleHenry took me as a, as a
relative. And I told him, thatwhole story, and so I said, I'm

(43:03):
kind of making a design of BillyMcClellan rockers, you know, and
he kind of been living on likethat legacy still. And so, I
made a rocker for Uncle Henry.
And, you know, when I putfeathers on it, everything and
when I gave it to him, you know,as a as a way of a means of
giving back to that McClellanbloodline, you know, it's just

(43:28):
the respect that I have for thatbloodline, and Uncle Henry, you
know, so that was the idea. Andthen then from there, I was
always getting invited to PANCA.
And I don't know how longthough, but the last 1213 years,

(43:50):
I've been getting invited downto panko power, never had a
chance. You know, because wewere always doing sound we were
always either Indian Relaysinging for horses, or we were
always doing South mouse, youknow. And so finally, last year,
2022 We made it down, me and myson, we drove down to panko

(44:10):
together, and all the way down,we're just listening to punk
songs. You know, there's a CDthere's a recording called
excuse me, there's a recordingcalled the contest is on. And it
has all the punk songs it hasall the you know, the straights,

(44:31):
the ruffles the word songs. Andduring the during, all these
times, you know, being inviteddown here and learning about you
know, all these different songsthat they sing in PANCA these
what they mean and PANCA one ofmy favorite ones is when they
sing about synthetic liszkapunkers they, they the Seuss

(44:56):
come running up on the parkasand In the palm because we're up
on a hill soon as we're kind ofdown below and the the war the
war chief of the pocketchallenged the sue the Susan
they are calling them ShaziInglis which in in their

(45:18):
language and means little Sue,they were like teasing them
taunting them. Because they'reup on that hill, they look tiny
as they were. So they're callingthem Shazi guys. And they're
saying little Sue, you know,come up here, come up here and
send your send your previousbravest warrior sent him with
his spirit and his shield, youknow, we'll fight on this yellow

(45:41):
bluff. So the one that answeredthe call was sent a gleesh
Spotted Eagle, you know, he wantto fly and he ended up dying on
that yellow bluff, or thatyellow Hill. So they sing that
song in, you know, me being onKota, louder.

Heavier, heavier.

But, you know, that's one of my favorite
songs to dance to. And then theyhave the other word songs, but
see, like, we have songs aboutthem, too. You know, like these
about them? He's necklacebreakers. Yeah. And so you learn
all these different songs, andit just has a deeper meaning to

(46:30):
dancing. Yeah. And you have adeeper understanding a deeper
appreciation, you know, for the,for the knowledge to sing,
because a lot of these songsthey come from that 19th
century, you know, the Yeah,from a long time ago, so. And
then, then on the northern side,you know, with these necklace
breakers that eagle whistlesmade famous, you know? Yeah. The

(46:56):
lot of those songs come fromthat June 25 1876 fight, you
know, like Moto, a lot of that.
And then from that era, youknow, and so it's kind of cool
to see and hear the songs stillbeing sung today. Yeah, and so,
what when we made it down toPANCA I was so excited to be

(47:17):
there. First time, first timeeverywhere my my whole life and
you know, as a dancer, you know,I dance at Rocky Boy are you
dancing red bottom, BrocktonCrow Fair? Are Lee, you know,

(47:38):
land your mandri little shallyou dance at these places like
this, where people or people,committee members take care of
the arena, you know, that, thatcommunity that takes care of
that arena. As a dancer, you'relike, I don't know how it is

(48:01):
with other dancers or singers orwhat you know, I don't know, if
they look at it as Oh, I'm justgoing to this I'm going to, I'm
going to afford all of thedance, you know, that kind of a
thing. But for me, every timelike if we're going to a power,
I always think about the powerthat is resonated that resonates

(48:22):
from that floor. And it in whenit's when it's woken up when
that dancing ground when it'swoken up. It brings another
energy, you know to do my soul.
I mean, that's what I look for.
And then then the songs coursethe singers, they bring their

(48:44):
songs and then the the bowels ofthe dancers, you know, the
laughter The talking of people,you know, jingle dresses, the
sounds, you know, it just bringsit all together. You know, I
felt some some of my favoriteplaces to debts, you know, as
always, has always been redbottom lane deer in crow fare.

(49:05):
Because of the power that comesfrom that dance floor. And
that's, that's what I that'swhat I cherish is every year
it's addicting. You know, like,you want to dance because you
want to dance on that floorbecause of what's on that floor.

(49:27):
What's what's there, you know,and so, I thought I would never
feel like that kind of feeling.
But when we got to PANCA me andmy son, we weren't even we
didn't know like the protocol, Iguess, you know, like, because

(49:49):
down here, it's different. Sodifferent, you know, they don't
have like Grand Entries. Theyjust have those calling songs
and then everybody booms youknow, and I think that's
awesome. You know? Ah, cuznowadays everybody needs a grand
entry to get going

celebrate anything with a grand entry these days is

in so that down there, you know, like they
just have these calling songsand people come to the come to
the arena, the scene where theysing their songs, they sing
them, you know, like four songsat a time, then a break, they do
whatever, you know contest oryou know whatever they have
their they dance in the eveningtime but they do their gourd

(50:36):
dancing, they do all theirgiveaways on all that during the
day. And then nighttime is justdancing and it's it's kind of a
cool setup Polly habit. And but,but when we stepped foot on that
when he when he first drive init has a picture of Gus McDonald
you know, a world champion,fancy dancer. Oh, yeah, move

(50:58):
PANCA punk world of dancing.
And, man, it's like, that gaveme goosebumps when I saw that.
And so, you know, we we gotready. You know, we went to the
hotel first kind of a rookiemistake, but we went to the

(51:20):
hotel. And we took all of ourstuff off and like all it was
just cool. Check out the powerfor the night. You know, check
it out. And, and when we getover there, we've seen man they
had the fancy dancers on theoutside. You know, we saw the we
saw Pete Moore, Jr. I do believeit was we saw him he is that he

(51:42):
uses dancing stationary andoutside. And then you saw Greg
Victor's who was 2021 I dobelieve World Champion fancy
dancer. And then these otherfancy dancers do stand out and
outside. And cactus had a coolanalogy metaphor about what he
saw is like, man, these guys arelike samurais just standing

(52:03):
standing there. Revered and um,you know, yeah. So when they
came off, you know, it's kind ofearly in the evening to and Pete
Cena says hey, you guys made itdown. I'm like yep, one of the
guys that always invited me topunker where's your stuff at?
That's at the hotel he's day goget it you know I had to go all

(52:24):
the way to the hotel grab theirstuff came back and you know got
ready really fast and and man wegot out there. You know we were
dancing. And holy smokes thatthat feeling of stepping onto
that dance floor that feeling isvery much

(52:50):
indescribable. Lots of juicelots of power. Man, it was just
it felt so good. I've neverdanced
you know other other places youdance that you find the potholes
or you find the gopher holes,you know? Yeah. But over there

(53:11):
it was. It was smooth. There wasno holes there's no nothing and

flat. Flat. No Hill

is perfect.

No popcorn No, no all napkins or fry bread Lin.

But yeah, it was it was really my first
experience. My first impressionof that dance floor was like
Holy smokes. It just blew meaway. And so you know, I reached
I remember reaching down just totouch it to see if it was real.
And so because we danced orinner tribe or inner tribals we
danced and then we weren't saton the benches that are just

(53:56):
right at the edge of the dancefloor. Yeah. So one cool thing
that really happened was we weresitting there and I met up with
Uncle Henry McLoughlin, youknow, he was sitting there with
me and we're visiting, you know,man, I'm glad you made it down
if you you know, talking likethat. And he, the announcer

(54:23):
started talking, you know, hesaid we we have some visitors
from Montana, you know, kind oftalking out to the people and
talking about the they've cometo learn our style of dancing
the fancy dance and and then hewent off into the history of it.
And talking about the history offancy dance and he goes in and

(54:45):
he's a but we'll get into that.
We'll get into more of that onSunday. He was but right now he
goes in he says over here and heintroduced Greg Victor's who was
the previous years Fancy Dancechampion. And it was Like, he
was like, he was introducing usto him, acknowledge him like
that. And then he calls on thesenator drum. He says, Senator

(55:06):
Joe, give it to them. Then Idid, you know, started drumming
like that, and he startedsinging that song and, and
Michael Roberts was with us andhe just popped his whistle.
Like, he just blew his whistle,he just popped it. And I was
like, boom, you know, everyeverything, everything I could

(55:29):
ask for in a dance in a song,you know, in my, in my regalia,
you know, experiencing that forthe first time with my son, you
know, and my son being 19 Youknow, and that's how long it

(55:50):
took me to get down there, youknow, soon. Then we went on, you
know, went through the weekend,and we've, I was really lucky.
Really fortunate and luckybecause just enjoying this the
songs. That's it was the realdeal. You know, like the real
the real stuff. And it wasn't athrow together group. Singing

(56:14):
old standby fancy that song likewhat we get up here, northern
country, you know, real stuffand, and so on Sunday, you know,
I was really lucky. I was reallylucky to I got third. And what I
liked about it, I guess, youknow, the only southern dancer

(56:36):
that that was there that got inthe top four, you know, was
Michael Roberts. My younger myyounger brother, Mitch Baker. He
got second and then my nephew.
Narnia would be like a cousin, Iguess. But my little nephew.

(56:57):
Silas White Wolf blue, which ishis dad is the white. So he's
half from down there. And Silasgrew up in Minnesota. Oh, yeah,
there was a lot of talk thatnorthern boys came down and
first time in the history ofpunker. One, two and three, I
guess northern northern boyswere in. That's what was being

(57:18):
shared with me. But

I do control feedback.

Yeah. Like I was telling everybody I was I
could really care less aboutLacey. It was just the fact that
I made it to the solo rounds.
And the fact that we're justdancing in PANCA on that panko
floor, you know? Yeah. And thepeople that that I danced for,

(57:42):
you know, like Uncle HenryMcClellan. You know, Pete Moore
you know, Pat Pacheco, you know,Edmund our koi a lot of these
and then and then Norman newwriter aku. was, it was, it was
very, very satisfying. Yeah, soafter everything. After after it

(58:08):
all after it was all said anddone. I think we stayed there.
After the power was over, thedance is over. We stayed there
late, like, probably about 233o'clock in the morning, we were
parked right next to my nephewSilas, you know, it was it was
it was really cool to watch himgo through his emotions, you

(58:31):
know, it was really it waspretty surreal moment for him.
You know, and for myself, youknow, like it was kind of cool
is to see that and just torelate like that. So, all of
that everything I just talkedabout is leads up to that fancy
that's stories. Yeah. Like that.

(58:56):
So if you're going to be a fancydancer, or just a dancer in
general, just you know, like Ialways encourage people to learn
the history of it. Learn thehistories of it because many
histories you know there's a lotof histories that come with
every song every dance, youknow, every movement you know a

lot to it. Man you've shared with us a lot holy
cow. That was really cool. Verygood to know. There's a few
things I want to kind of walkback just to get some
clarification on just for forthe listeners to know the songs
that you call the necklacebreaker. Describe what that is.

(59:45):
So people can kind of get anunderstanding what that is.

So these necklace breakers the songs you
know that we have our for versefor verse songs, you know But it
goes with the beat the way thebeat goes with the song. And
there's, from what my dad has,and I have a lot of his old

(01:00:13):
tapes. I have a tape where he'sgetting all these information
from, like Howard bad hand, youknow, another well known senior.
But getting the information oflike, where it comes from and
the dialect, you know, what'sbeing said in the song and all

(01:00:36):
these necklace breakers werethey're pretty much known for
trick songs, you know, just totry to trick you but you know,
not not a not a deliberate madeup stop. But it was, you know,
it was just, it was just thestyle. Back then, you know, with

(01:00:56):
Eagle whistles, it was just astyle here, there's their their
style of singing. And so whenthey would sing, they would sing
their necklace breaker stops youknow, they would stop in the
middle of the song. And thenthey stop at the end in the
second at the end of the secondverse and at the end of the
fourth verse, so they startedcalling them to win for you

(01:01:18):
know, Nicholas breaker stops so

Shandin Pete (01:01:24):
what was the what did the term necklace breaker
like? What does that mean?

Walter Runs Above (01:01:29):
Um, so uncle Dean Fox late deem you crazy
crazy when you're when you'rearound, you're when you're
around your bros, you know, yourbrothers in coal either whoever
you whatever you deem your broyour brother, you know, these

(01:01:49):
these crazy that the crazinessof it, you know? Yeah. And,
anyways, one of the stories thatI heard, you know, that kind of,
kind of came from Uncle DeanFox, you know, because, like I
said, back in the 80s, you know,they sing all the songs, they
sing all these word songs likethat. Yeah. And, anyways, the

(01:02:13):
when that they were teasing eachother, that, you know, because
they were, they were, they werea drum group of dancers as well.
You know, Uncle Wade, and, youknow, Uncle Murphy, Uncle
Seymour. You know, they all hadthey were all fancy dancers and
grass dancers, you know, and sowhen they would sing these

(01:02:35):
songs, they were teasing,because uncle Dean said that he
was always teasing everybody isalways he's quite quite the the
jokester, but yeah, he wasteasing Murphy that he was
wearing what you call a choker.
Yeah. And they rocked him youknow that too and further

(01:02:59):
comment like that. Yeah. Theythey hit while they the first
they hit at that fourth thatfourth verse, they hit they
stopped short. And he you know,he went and it was just perfect
timing or like the right momentor you know, it had it was that
kind of a thing where uncleMurphy's choker like he stopped

(01:03:23):
short in his his choker comeflying off you know, back in
those days, anything falls off,they pick it up and walk off the
floor, you know? Yeah. So, UncleDean got a hold of that and he
started started calling it youknow, necklace breaker. He

(01:03:45):
started teasing. And your yournecklace broke? Well, rock,
rocky neck was broke, you know?
And so that's kind of likethat's what I was told, you
know? Yeah, that's true. AlexGlynn? You know

that's a good one.
Well, what about goose there?
Hey, Goose You got anyquestions?

Yeah, Goose is pretty quiet.

I know goose what your goose

Aaron Brien (01:04:15):
had to confess something I bit my tongue
yesterday man

you dt in or what was going on?

It's a long story I've been I'm in. I'm in
Bismarck, North Dakota. In ahotel room or something. I could
take it anymore. No, no. So it'smaking me every time I talk it
hits my tongue. Hurt hurts. Ithink it's a sign that I need to

(01:04:57):
shut up. Shut up, Eric. No, Iliked it. It was good. Yeah,
takes. You're making ourpodcasts pretty easy for us
today.

Unknown (01:05:15):
Yeah.

It's nice. It's cool. Because, you know, I was
never a fancy dancer, but youhear like, parts of stuff all
the time. Yeah. So it's kind ofcool to like, just the biggest
thing I got out of it was howimportant origin is, you know?
Yeah, sometimes we sometimes wemess with things or we do things

(01:05:38):
and it's important to go to likethe origin of it. Yeah, ground
yourself. Yeah, that densebelongs to the punk because like
you're saying like, she went toMecca, man. I mean,

yeah. Touch the stone. You touched Stone Man.

You walk around that thing?

Yeah.

It's important.
Yeah, it's good. It to me, it'sa part of like, acknowledging
something, you know? Like, I'm abig fan of citation. If you use
something you cite where itcomes from. Yeah. So I'm not
against borrowing things and howtribes use things and all that.
I'm not against that. But I'm,if you're gonna do that, you

(01:06:23):
have to cite it. You know, whereit comes from? And so yeah, it's
cool. Because if anyone knowsWalt, we were teasing about
basketball, but I knew him moreas a fancy dancer. Yeah. I think
there's a whole nother likebasketball world that people
know him as but I never nevereven met Walt the basketball

player. Yeah. I don't know that guy too much
either. I

don't even know. I don't even want to know. I want
to know him. Yeah. Like heborrows money.

Well, the basketball player, he owes me a
lot of money.

Things he was a hawk things to me all the time.

I got this AC unit. need one?

I gotta I gotta I got a little story I gotta say
about well, he bailed me out ofsomething recently that he
probably doesn't even know. Hebailed me out of. Oh, yeah. So I
don't know. This is gonna be alittle like self reflective.
Okay. Okay, me. Okay, wait,let's get in the mood. I don't,

I don't, I'm not unemployed.

Okay, I'm ready.

So I don't drink anymore. And it's been a few
years. Since I'm drink. It's,it's really important to me,
okay. But every once in a while,you gotta like manage, I gotta
manage, like my own selfawareness and where I'm at, and
kind of what the vibe is. And ifI know that that vibe can lead
to certain things. I'll bail onit. You know, I'll just pick

(01:08:07):
Alright, I'm gonna take off.
Well, we're at, we're at arounddance. And it just so happened
that the group of people thatwere there are some of the same
people I used to kind of cataround with, you know? And so,
we're sitting there and it'sfine. It's fun and games. I
mean, shit. We're laughing ourasses off and then, but then the
vibe for me changed because Icould see and kind of feel

(01:08:31):
people like planning the night.
Oh, yeah. What are we going todo after? And it was pretty
tempting to me. Like I was like,that feeling of kind of that.
Yeah. You know? Why? You knowthat feeling? Shawn Dean. I know
you. And why you never drink,right?

No. Yeah.

So never had the horns that break the skin.

No, no, that's good. That's it? Yeah.

I've had the horns breaking out. Yeah, break the
skin. Yeah.

So I I just like, I'm gonna bail on
this. But I knew if I grabbed mydrum and walked out, it would be
like a thing. Where are yougoing? So I just had my agenda.
I told her, I'm gonna go I'mgonna go use the bathroom. But
I'm taking you remember metelling you I'm taking off?

(01:09:22):
Yeah. And then I said, Can youjust take my drum with you? And
so I did. I just walked out andI didn't go back. And a couple
of days later, he met up withme, but just that little bit of
like, knowing it was like, Okay,if I tell these guys down here,
it's not gonna go over the sameway. I tell these guys down
here. It's not gonna go the sameway. Walston right next to me.

(01:09:46):
We're talking shit all night.
It's awesome. Just like I didn'teven really have to say
anything. I don't think Iexplained it did I know. I just
said I'm gonna take off But I'mgonna leave my gym here. And
then I just left. I just likesnuck off. And I got my gym
later, not knowing that that wasa pretty big favor to me. So

(01:10:10):
thank you. Yeah.

Did you Hawk it at the hockey's drum.

He texted me the next day. And he, he said,
bring my drum over here andwe'll be here at our brother's
house and

I'm passed out over here.

Say hi. Just wanted to drum.

Your years how that drum sounded.

I was like, that's a good job.

You know who made that drum? Sean DNP, right.

Oh, yeah. Yeah.

It's challenging drum. It's a sweet sounding drum
because it's still

holding up the Oh, yeah. It's nice.
Storage, a lot of relationships.

Broken ones are what?

Both all sides are destroyed and mended. Yeah.
Myself included.

It's the knife and the band aid BOTH Yeah,

yeah. So anyway, thank you. Well, I value my
sobriety a lot, and I'm selfishwith it. So you made it pretty
easy to just sneak off andbecause if if I didn't if
someone wasn't there that Itrusted my gym with? Man. I'm
not saying it would have gotthat far. But if it really had

(01:11:42):
that feeling of like, Man, thisis like the feeling that feeling
that?
Oh, yeah. So yeah,but I knew well, it wasn't gonna
end up at Western pawn. Well,the fancy dancer Well, the
basketball player that oh, yeah,suck is gone.

The Hawk shop or it's on the kitchen floor with
the Kool Aid spilt on it. Whileit was like

it Okay, so you got the fog, California power
circuit, or you got the springIndian basketball tournament.
We're in the fall. He was inMontana. I knew he wasn't in
California. He wasn't going. Soit was like, Well, I'm good. I'm
saying it's a safe bet. Eitherway. It's a safe bet. If it was
tournament time don't know

that that minivan needs a new carburetor

to move fuzzy, well, yeah,

well, it's one of them. Well, it's one of them
guys that says he won them whenhe plays basketball. They're
just jealous because I won themgot back from Oklahoma, he said,

(01:13:03):
Man, I almost wonder

pretty good.
No man. But this, this was theperfect example right here of
like Aaron said, like citation.
This is a good example of like,you know, what these indigenous
academics call indigenousresearch, you know, it's this
deep is this deep understandingof something that can be

(01:13:40):
recited, you know, you got thedates, you got the people, you
got the context, you got all inone. And then you don't need to
write a paper about it. Youdon't need to publish a book, it
serves it serves a differentpurpose. And a couple of those
purposes, you sort of mentionedthere, and everyone really,

(01:14:01):
really important one that Aaronreflected on too. And that's
this idea, you know, thisauthority of the things that we
do, rests in reallyunderstanding that deep, the
deep meaning of those things, Iwould always tell my kids, you
know, they wanted to dance, theywant to dance jingle. And so now
it's not really our way, youknow, and if you do want to seek

(01:14:24):
somebody out and ask them aboutit that knows, so you can sort
of gain an authority about it.
So you're not just throwing onan outfit because you think it's
trendy and cool or looks nice,you know, that and I think
that's really kind of what turnsme off a bit about some of the

(01:14:44):
power I've seen is that is thatsort of, and I don't I wouldn't
point the finger at anybody butyou know, it's just this sort of
unauthentic feel that that youcan you can get when you see
people adopting a differentstyle. without really
understanding or knowing aboutit, and like I said, the
nobody's fault. You know, it'sjust my own feeling about it, I

(01:15:07):
get it. I kind of feel like Idon't want to I don't want to be
part of that, because it doesn'tfeel right. You know,

I think you're right. I think you're right, in
the sense that like, I thinkpower is its own thing. And
there is certain allowances withpower, right? It's allowed
certain freedom, but at the sametime, because of social media,
like, it's a lot easier forpeople to borrow, where like,

(01:15:34):
Walt and I are the same age, wecome from a time still where you
had to, like walk up to somebodyand ask them, like, how do you
do that? And that goes foranything you want to use a
hammer, someone's gonna showyou, you know, you, there wasn't
no YouTube video on how to mopup house or floor. Don't be
mopping houses. Are you good?
But so like, it's timing to someof its timing, you know? And

(01:15:59):
it's still coming from a timewhere you had to ask people
things, but also, yeah, well,it's been pretty modest here.
He's also the son of one of themost respected power men ever.
So it's not like he's just a guyjust kind of like trying to get
into dancing. He comes fromsomeone rooted in the traditions
of power. So he's groundedhimself. So then he's not gonna

(01:16:23):
raise this kid to be a beggarand a borrower. And yeah, he's
gonna do it. Right. You know?

Yeah. Yeah.

What she did what she did.

Yeah. Another interesting one, too, that kind
of I have, I feel I feelcriticism of is, like the
singing, you know, I've beensort of turned off about
singing. And I'm really stingyabout who I'll decide to sing
with. Same for sort of that sortof reason. And I, and it's not I
like I said, I don't want tofault nobody. But it's just,

(01:16:56):
it's just me. I want to feellike I'm gaining something in a
way, or that I feel like I'mnot. I don't know, I got this
weird thing that I don't want todamage myself by engaging in
something that maybe it's notquite in, in sort of a way that
would benefit. I don't know propprogress, or it's like it. I

(01:17:19):
don't know how to describe it,but

Well, I would think, would you, you're you're,
you're literally a busy guy. Solike your time that you can
allocate to things. And as I'veknown you now for over 20 years,
or about Yeah, 20 years,probably 21 years anniversary.

Is it? Is it is it the crystal Tarbert

it's our beige I would say that you you're always
about progression. Yeah. Justknowing it's always about
progression progressionprogressive progression, even
your recreation was progression.
Right everything everythingbecause they seen you mess with
horses STD mister singingceremony like, everything,

(01:18:07):
language, everything, right?
Academics, it's all progression.
Everything's progression. So Ican see how somebody like you
would say, okay, if I'm gonna gosing, there's gotta be some
level of progression and yeah,some level. Yeah, I don't think
that it's sometimes it's like avast amount. But it's got to be.
There's got to be a profitmargin. You can't just be like,

(01:18:30):
a throw away weekend. Right,right. Well, I'm a little more
I'm a little more willing tothrow away a weekend as long as
it's fun with the right people.
I'm, it's for me. It's moreabout if I'm going to sit at
that gym for 12 hours a day. 10hours a day. It's got to be cool
people, man. I can't I can't Ijust can't do it, man. Yeah,

(01:18:54):
yeah, I almost don't singanymore. Like like it's well
don't call me he's never calledme. Not Not even for an honor
song in Billings. It's like comeon, dude.

But to get to the Cakewalk call.

I used to around dance Cakewalk King Kong welcome
Cole he's psyched to BillingsIndian in he's billings is
medicine man. And then now thatStan Stanley pretty paid moved

(01:19:34):
to Billings these two there'sthere's a spiritual battle
happening. Those of us who knowwe back off, right yeah. Get
caught. Crossfire. No. Bothfancy dancers. So and they were
both he was a ballplayer. A lotof parallels there. Yeah. So

(01:19:59):
besides Besides, my kid tries towalk by he

don't go around them close either will go away.

You get shine out boy and you go around them. I
mean, this is a guy who namedhis son cactus because you don't
want no one to touch himI do I do got to say some ago

(01:20:29):
about walking. Well is probablyour first guest, who's also a
fan of the podcast. Oh, yeah.
He's a loyal fan of the podcastand you back. Get a call last
year on his way back fromOklahoma. Right. Yep.

Trip to to Durant and back. Yeah. Yeah.

He listened to our podcasts the whole way down, or
better. What was it?

We got to was it? Episode 21. And I think we
came back and I think we're onepisode 40.

So I get a call.
I'm at Denver University in themiddle of like this neck pro
meeting that I'm at. Like, I'mgonna answer it. So

I just use it anytime risky of you to answer.
Well, you called me. You called

like the night before, then you called like,
the next day or some? Yeah, Iwas like, I better answer this.
Not knowing he's been driving,like all night or whatever. So
it was awesome. It was kind ofcool. Because you don't often
hear from people who, like,listen to your podcasts or have
comments. Yeah. constructivecomments about your podcast.

(01:21:48):
Yeah, that was cool. Oh,

yeah. Yeah, there was a I think we were
coming through Nebraska, justoutside of Nebraska. Coming into
Kansas was when I first calledthat first time. And then Aaron,
call me back. When we were inOklahoma. Just just outside of

(01:22:15):
ADA, somewhere on there. And wewere going through. We were in a
tornado.

But she had me on speaker and you're talking. And
Cassie was like, he was like,What was I saying? What was I
saying that she would tell youlike you're saying this? There's
some and it was cool. It waslike we had a little break down
session. Well, you tried to callhim didn't you? You tried to
call Chandi Ashanti never

answers.

progression.
progression. Yeah, yes. Yeah.

We're on to the next thing.

But he referred to you as Walter.

Mr. Walter runs a book Yeah, that was pretty cool.
Yeah, thanks for that. Man. Thatwas awesome. So many things that
I didn't know. But fancy dance.
And I could just appreciate theone comment you said about the

(01:23:19):
singing, you know, you know how,you know when you dance. It's,
there's just those songs, thoseone songs, just, you can't help
it, you can't help it, you couldjust feel the need to want to
dance to it. And there's somesongs that sound good. But, you
know, you've just got nointerest in it. You're just not

(01:23:40):
you don't feel it? And I see Isee. Well, I don't know. I don't
I shouldn't say I see a lot ofthat today. But I'm what I'm
curious of, is really like this.
And you talked about some verydeep meaning of the songs and
the connection to the past andthe language that's in them that
tells the stories and and I'msure it goes way deeper than

(01:24:02):
that. Do you see that a lot ofthat change today from the music
you hear or is it just it has itevolved? But still has sort of
the same feel?

You know, you know, growing up in the era that
I grew up in dancing, singingwith the singers, you know, the
you know, like, Eagle whistles,the Mandarin Badlands you know,
porcupine you know, there's alot of these the songs that they

(01:24:38):
have, you know, a lot of thesetrick songs or you know,
anything like that, you know,they it was really cool to dance
to that. And I think like moremodern modern day now. I can
remember northern Cree when theyfirst I think it was back in

(01:24:58):
2004 or somewhere around there.
But I can remember they werethey put out an album. And they
paid homage to Eagle whistlesingers. The necklace breaker
style of song. Yeah. And theythey mentioned that it was Leroy
that made that song. And hetalked about seen my dad and

(01:25:20):
late uncle Merle Seymour, Wade,Uncle Wade, you know, that
Bismarck, and he referred tothis recording that was put out
by Featherstone and that was theyear that eagle whistles one

(01:25:42):
United Tribes where he talkedabout these these particular
songs. And so that's how hemakes his trick songs are his,
you know, his his tricky ones isnorthern Korea, that's how he
makes them was, you know,keeping was keeping the necklace
breaker and Eagle whistles inmind, you know. And so I

(01:26:05):
remember that, and I remembershowing my dad, you know, when
he was alive, I remember showinghim that CD. And inside that
pamphlet, I had him. I had himread that. And, you know, he
liked that he thought that wascool, you know, the way Leroy
described them? Was that when itcaught on unquote, you know,

(01:26:31):
they, they were like gods, tome, that was kind of like, that
was kind of like, in me, notreally understanding, like the
significance of that, you know,just the way they portrayed them
as singers or the way theyportrayed their singing ability.
Yeah. So, I mean, that's, Ialways have, like, with Northern

(01:26:52):
Cree, you know, they it's kindof like the same, the same set
of the same style, the tune thefour are the straight through
and the stop at the end, youknow, and so nowadays, you know,
like, you go to you go todifferent powers, you know, go
to different regions, regions,and, you know, there's a lot of

(01:27:15):
these newer songs, and I guessthis, you know, this newer
generation, they like thesenewer songs where there's about,
you know, hypothetically,there's, there's about 20 stops
in one verse, you know, it'slike, how can you dance to

(01:27:37):
something like that, you know?
Because, you know, the oldcliche of, it's between the
dancer and the drum, you know,that kind of a thing. Yeah. But
when really, you know, that,that drum spirit, you know, like
he, you if, you know, if youstudy up on your songs, and you

(01:28:02):
study up on all these tricks,songs and whatnot, you know, you
come to find out pretty quickthat you like, what your style
is, or what you prefer, youknow, like, what you prefer to
dance to? what your strengthsare, what your weaknesses are.
Yeah. So, modern day times youlike Like, like, I tried to

(01:28:22):
share some stuff with my soncactus and try to share with him
seeing him songs and listen forthis listen for that kind of a
thing. You know, because now thejunior man's fancy I mean,
senior men's fancy, but becauseit seems like the older we're
getting, it seems like the we'regetting like the standby songs.

(01:28:48):
Like, Oh, these are seniorfancy, or these are old and new.
Yeah. That's, that's the why asarena directed to you, because
I'm not just a fancy dancer, butwhen I run to your arena, I
always give our golden agers orthe senior dancers I was given
some rockin songs you know, itwas wanted because I want them
to feel that you know, to

give them the honor song.
Yeah, I don't dothat Death March.

We did that one time. I did that before. I know
exactly what you mean. Likedude, I did it. I just assumed
older old we should sing slower.
Do it No, it was opposite. It'seasier for them to dance to a
fat like a high beat like kindof a constant.
Yeah, you're just torturing themwith the death march. This horse

(01:29:38):
shit

I remember this one time I was I was
running in the arena at thispower. And they there was these
golden age women dancers therewas traditional. There is a
fancy Scholler there's a Jingluyou know and and they got a
release slow song and that's theother thing too I try to baby up

(01:30:03):
our golden ages and they're tinytots like I'll try to get them
done right away after grandentry you know so they can they
can do whatever afterwards butanyways this golden age women
category was dancing to a reallyslow song you know it was just
the slow and of course you knowthe announcer everybody all rise

(01:30:27):
please rise so everybodyoffering you know

for the next 10 minutes

yeah holy smokes you know that really
Olson then at the end there'sthe tail so we had to

another two minutes and we got to tell

it so these women these women these old
women were coming to the to getjudged and I remember I was
lining them up like that youknow good dancing lady show your
numbers you know I went to theside and that one lady she said
Hey, give us a better song we'redead yet she said apart from

(01:31:16):
that that time on to giveeverybody a rockin song you know
something yeah yeah I'm tuningin enjoy and and and I think
that's that's what when it comesto the dancing piece I think
that's what's missing is ouryounger generation there's just
so you know they tunnel visionby that money aspect of it

(01:31:40):
rather than you know and I hearthis quite a bit you know, I I
dance for I dance for my eldersI dance for the people that get
dancing where I hear that youknow yeah, when and I don't ever
hear I dance for myself becauseI enjoy it you know no one ever

(01:32:02):
hear that kind of an explanationand it's all it's always you
know dance for those that thatpassed on you know that kind of
thing and not saying that's badthat's good you know that's
good. That's the way they weretaught you know, but you're the
one dancing you know like you'reyou're the one that's out there

(01:32:25):
and one of the dishes like it

it should like yeah no, I don't like it I'm
just dancing for all these otherpeople

out here. I got I got I got $5,000 beadwork
on you know all these wickedblack and whites on and and but
yet they're sitting in the carwhile inner troubles are
happening. But the AC

going yeah,

he's starting to sound like that guy now. Back in
my day

to the MCS then I got something to say.

I'll defend this younger generation or you don't
have to dance to the drums theyhave to the skin come from a
different time where it's like,quality like quality thinking
like I just thought ofsomething. While it was saying I
want to give everyone a rockinsong. What if you're the next

(01:33:31):
drum group? You're the nextgroup. And here comes Walt say
tell him the mic guy doing thisto the announcer hear that joke?
Like damn, well just he justslapped us we just got slapped
we got skipped. He doesn't thinkwe can single foot slide.

We can he's

probably right.
He's probably right. That's theonly thing I thought of that's
where my mind went in your inyour very sincere monologue. I
went straight to Oh Damn, dude,that Jungle Scout passed again,
again. We don't get second songsto them. We don't get second

(01:34:19):
songs.

can make it out of tiny. Oh Just kidding

that's a whole thing though. Right? Yeah, cuz
you know, we're soft. Whilepeople were hard, brittle. Were
soft and brittle. You know?

I can't take criticism. Well, you're right. I
came into the game late likethis the power of late I didn't
come from it. It just wassomething I wanted to do. And it
was fun and I but I learnedright away from some good
people. Partly I was raised bystrict Add to so I knew how to
get in trouble. Like I knew howto do it. But people were strict

(01:35:04):
and you saying the wrong song,they would tell you like they
would stop you even. Yeah, likeyou're singing, you're drunk,
you're singing, they would comeover and they cut you off. Like
now they just everyone's gotfeelings and no one can take
criticism. And it's like, yeah,I get that. We gotta we gotta
support each other, but at thesame time to like, if you're
doing something wrong. You gottabe told it. Yeah. And if you

(01:35:27):
can't take it, then you're inthe wrong game, man. Yeah,

I remember needs to do that. And Rocky Boy, maybe
elsewhere too. But if they kindof got a rugged song, they just
tell the dancers to take thecircle, you know? Let them
finish their song. I rememberthat. Yeah, I always thought
that was kind of rude. But then,you know, as I got older, I
thought what kind of makessense? You know? It, you know?
It can be motivator? What? Yeah,it can be a motivator for that.

(01:35:54):
That drum say okay, yeah, maybewe don't sound that great. Maybe
we need to practice. Or it givesme a demotivator. And I say,
well, it's just quit because Iguess we're no good.

But if singing is something you take serious,
yeah. Your your your pout, forsure. Because that's what we do.
We guarantee you're gonna go andyou're gonna learn the right
stuff to sing. Yeah, the rightmoment. Yeah. Yeah. Well, your
limitations do man. Yes. Peoplelearn, you know? Yeah. And it

(01:36:25):
wasn't

disrespectful.
Furthermore, okay.
But it was not disrespectful,you know, that nobody come over
and just took your drum away,or, you know, told you guys you
know, good, you know, made youstop singing it just circle
circle up dancers and let thedrum finish their song and then

(01:36:48):
go to the next. I don't know.
Yeah, as I get older, I get it.

Sometimes you hear when you're dancing. You
know, like, if you're, if youdon't have a very good song or
whatever, and you're, you'retrying you're trying to dance
and such, but sometimes you'llhear the announcer come over the
PA saying, you know, so and sostandby got so you know. So
you're like, Oh, we're gettinganother song. So? Yeah, it's

(01:37:15):
gonna slow down.

Yeah, yeah, save your energy a bit. Yeah,

I've been. I've been at Powerwalls where I've
seen dancers make a drum grouplook good. Yeah, they make it my
God, that junk group didn't dothem guys. any favors, man.

Yeah, I'll say with you one of my favorite,
one of my favorite experiences.
We were in Bozeman power coupleof years ago. And you know, as a
dancer, you know, like you youcan kind of pick up on the the
rotation going on the drumcircle going, right? You know,
you're going to pick or youknow, who you're going to get

(01:37:54):
and all that, you know, well,I'm every I think the boys were
host drum that year. And theywere getting every second song.
And then they were going toevery first song they were going
around the drum wheel. Right?
Well I remember one of theanother older fancy dancer, you

(01:38:20):
know, he's, he's well knownaround from Wyoming. He's well
known from, you know, aroundPowell country. But anyways, um,
we're sitting here gettingready, you know, getting
stretched out, you know, goingthrough all these different
things and, and the fancymatches just kind of come
together, like, Who do you thinkwe can get for first song, you
know, and it was, it was rightat the beginning of the drum

(01:38:42):
rotation again, you know, goingaround the wheel. And pretty
soon, you know, they were theywere saying, I think we're gonna
get this drum group. I thinkwe're gonna get this drum group.
And we walk out there. Alright,men's fancy coming out to come
on out to the arena that youknow, we get invited out to get

(01:39:03):
out there. And I kid you not. Itwas Louie. Louie walks over
eggs. And a well known singer.
Lead singer, you know, he does alot of Elvis impersonations, you
know, he, he knows a lot of theold 49 songs, you know, and all

(01:39:25):
he had was his hand drum. Andthe announcer said, you know,
you want to Louis you want totake this song for the men's
fancy. And in my mind, soon as Iheard them invite him to sing
for men's fan, this is duringfinals of the power this is, you

(01:39:46):
know, this is the finals. Assoon as I heard them invite that
my mind went right back to theoriginal Nighthawks singers.
That all fancy that song thatthey used to sing And I was mad.
I hope they I hope they singthat I hope he sings that song.
I hope he kept saying that,because it was a fun song to
dance to. So here, he says, Yes,you know, he shakes his head

(01:40:13):
Yes, like that. And he gets hishand drum boom, and then they
put it to them, they put a micon his handle, and then they put
a mic on him. He was the onlysinger. And he was sitting
there, right, right by the boys.
He was sitting there. And he hithis drum, like that. And he
starts singing that song. And hestarted singing that song, and I

(01:40:34):
was thinking about him. And Iwas like, Whoa, I was happening.
I was blown away, because thisdude, he led, and he second him
himself. And he's, for fourstars. He did that for stars.
And his beat was perfect,perfect northern fancy song. And

(01:40:54):
I was loving it. When we got oursecond song, you know, from the
boys and such, and between thetwo, you know, in my opinion, it
was like, that was a real song.
You know, that was the real dealkind of a thing that was, you
know, from, from what I grew updancing to. And so I really
appreciated that. And I went upto him afterwards, and I gave

(01:41:18):
him I gave him some money. Andas a man, I was just blown away.
He's like, man, thank you forsinging that song. You know,
that was awesome. You know, andI think I gave him like 50
bucks. I think I had in mywallet at that time, but But I
enjoyed it, you know? And it waskind of crazy after we were
after we were lined up. Therewas everybody was hollering for

(01:41:44):
one more. One more, one more.
Verse, we got one more, wealways get one more. But after
we were all done dancinganywhere. You know, a lot of the
dancers that were out there,they were complaining about that
first song I was like, that's,that's your neighborhood. Like,

(01:42:06):
count your Count your manyblessings because that's, you
know, your heart. Maybehopefully you will dance to that
kind of song again, you know?
Yeah. That was I reallyappreciated that. So yeah,
that's, that's kind of off.

From a Hall of Famer. Yep. Yeah. Who is a Hall
of Famer man, like us there.
He's on the wall. Yeah.

And that was that was probably out of all the
years. I've been dancing inBozeman. That's my favorite
song, every dance to you know,going dancing in that pot. You
know?

Pretty good. And Louis,

for those that don't know, also claims to have
a close relationship with CoachBobby Knight.

Oh, yeah, I heard that too. Yeah. Yeah. And

I think he's that one time. It was true. Like I
think he really did kind of havea friendship with Coach Bobby
Knight. Like you would end upthere in Indiana. Hoosiers game
it's just so random. Like it'sreal random plays that you can
play the harmonica he can playthe guitar he can He sounds just

(01:43:18):
like Elvis like you know. Hey,for people who don't know that
remember that? Oh, documentary?
The hand game documentary? Yeah.
When they go to crow he's theguy singing he's the guy they
follow around he's wearing thecrow guys wearing like the
basketball jerseys and stuff. Ohyeah. YouTube it just crow head

(01:43:40):
game so documentary comes up.
You see him you'll see him yeah,he's the guy even plays music on

there wearing a bulls jersey or his dad

is one of the most respected singers ever. Who
walks over to Cedric walks ons.
Mountain Ciao. Hum. Naga is whatthey call him or thumbnail.
Yeah, but Nighthawk singers wasway back way back.

Man pretty cool.
Well, this was a lot, man. Thisis a lot. This is a two hours
worth of material here. Man,that's gonna be sweet. So two
packs of smokes. Give you twovapes. Do vapes

now remember, last time we saw Walt on the screen
with us for tribal researchspecialist. Yeah. It was it was
him and his wife and in. We wereteasing him about his Spaghetti.
Spaghetti was it like a pot ofsomething on the stove?

In the background,

Indians Indians, wrestlers only cook spaghetti.
Pork chops, hamburgers arebreakfast for dinner

tacos, tacos Oh yeah, gotta get the tacos in
there. Yeah, anything that youhave to boil

boil Kansas short rate of whatever this game is
spaghetti night is getting

going in doing it you could see it picking up the
spaghetti

hand on her hip she had her hand on crappy

yeah that, you know just don't go in there the
living room or something.

Just the way they set posit slam stuff.

I know.

Yeah. Love it.
Yeah. Yeah, well, yeah, I haveto tell her we said hi.

Yeah. Yeah.
So you'll probably see she sheworks this she works from home.
This is her workstation righthere. And so she's always
listening to the podcast, youknow, and

nice. Nice, awesome.
Good deal. Oh, man. We ought tohave her on next or some point
and get another goodconversation going on. But yeah,
you know, there's a lot here tothink about. I think there's man
so much, man. My mind is blownon how little I knew of the

(01:46:56):
fancy dance, you know, you know,a little bit grown up, but if
you don't do it, if you're notimmersed in the right way, with
the right people. Yeah, you onlyget bits, pieces of information,
but I think some of the motionfrom

our time. You just don't punch a Brady. That's that
song.

Yeah.
Memorializing. Yeah, that's allwe know.
But thanks for that, man. That'sgood. And I think like you said,
the take home message there isyou know, you can't just jump
into something. What was how didyou say you can't just jump in
without knowing what's in there?
I can't remember.

Yeah, just don't just jump into the pool
without knowing how hard it ishow cold it is that how deep it
is. Or what you know. Yeah.

Yeah. That's good advice for anything. Any young
young man young woman trying toget into back into dancing or
you know, or even into italready. Now. Some to reflect on
the way you the way you do yourthings is. It'll help us all out
to to advance what we're doing.
You know,

your fancy dancer go to punk. The jingle Just
Dancer. Go to the Great Lakes.
Yeah. Chicken Dance go to standup. Yeah. Yeah, I guess we
should probably put standoff. Wecould settle on stand.

You can start a fight, man. Yeah, that's
unsettled. That's unsettledbusiness. unsettled.

Oh, yeah. No, you Okay, round Busto. If you're
Rambis. You gotta go to hardlyno no open it was Oh, no.

Yeah, there you go. Yeah. No, not No, not even
well open it. You gotta go tolab.

Did you say that way? Lap

way? No, I don't know. Oh, that's unsettled
business not and just. Thanks.
Thanks, partner.

I tried to start fights back not

too late. The fight is on. Now. I don't know
you there. I don't know. Butnone of these things. I just
talked about him. But thanks,partner. We'll be back in touch
man. I got I have a bad list of20 questions. I wanted to ask
you based on what you said. Sowe'll follow up, man. Yeah,
definitely. Yeah,

for the record. We always say we're gonna follow up
with people who've never doneit.

Yeah. Yeah, just note that okay. You'll never
appear on another episode.
That's the kind of courtesy tosay that. You bang your breath.
No, seriously though. This is agood one. Good one likes taken
our partner. Thanks again. Andwe'll see you soon.

Yeah, thanks for having me on fellas. It's a
good thing you guys are doingwith this tribal research
project, the podcast it's it'sbeneficial for a lot Have people
you know, both native and nonnative have both in in the
trench trenches and out of thetrenches, you know, that's
really good information youknow, so I, I appreciate what
you guys do and you know keepkeep it going, keep rockin and

(01:50:14):
rollin

okay thank you for tuning in to this episode. I'm
going to take a second here torecognize some of our sponsors,
in particular, Travis Davis.
Thank you Travis Davis forpitching in and continuing to
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you for continuing to supportthe work that we do. In

(01:50:59):
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#44 - Indian Basketball, Fancy Dancing and Indigenous Citation with Guest: Walter RunsAbove

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.css-14f5ked{margin:0;word-break:break-word;display:-webkit-box;-webkit-box-orient:vertical;box-orient:vertical;-webkit-line-clamp:2;overflow:hidden;}#44 - Indian Basketball, Fancy Dancing and Indigenous Citation with Guest: Walter RunsAbove