Conversation With An Artist in Lockdown: Young Dene
Photo by Mariah Eli @routheday
Interview by Hollie McGowan
Originally hailing from TULÍT'A in the Sahtu region of the Dene homelands, Young Dene, AKA, Eugene Boulanger is an active member of the West Coast Canadian electronic music scene. Performing both as a solo artist and as a member of the newly emerging collective, Low Pass Kult, Young Dene continues to consistently push the boundaries while honing his craft. Known for his unique blend of new electronic genres with northern and ancestral elements, creating a unique sound rooted in West Coast bass music, Young Dene is one to watch out for.
Over the past few months, as the experience of the COVID-19 pandemic continues to unfold and send ripple effects throughout the world, we have been reminded of other types of pandemics that persist within our societies such as systemic racism and the opioid crisis. Citrus recently met up with Young Dene to chat about these crucial topics in our culture, how they continue to negatively impact POC and Indigenous communities, and what we can do to change it.
Citrus: As we are slowly emerging from self-isolation, how are you feeling after these last few months of living through a pandemic?
Young Dene: I’m feeling good. I’m feeling like we made it through, kind of a collective, “We’re making it! We’re doing it.” But I am also weary to think about it that way because I know that globally the virus again is on the rise as certain places in the world open up their economies. (They) are maybe not managing the crisis so responsibly and are contributing to that, so I don’t see us as being out of the woods yet.
C: Ya, it's scary. We’re all going through something we’ve never experienced before. It’s just so surreal. But the flip side of that has been such a frenzy of online performances within the global dance community. I wanted to ask you a bit more about the Virtual Pow Wow and your involvement in that. How did that all come together?
Y: So, originally before all the pandemic stuff, I had been invited to play. In Calgary, it is Drum Beat Entertainment’s first bass music night. Until then they had only really been focusing on house music events. So, when the pandemic hit, that booking obviously fell through, and the promoter of the event, Richard, reached out to me on facebook and said, ‘Hey man, I’m just going to have to say at this point it doesn’t really look like it’s going to happen. But we’d love to get you out here in the future.” And I was like, “Hey, no problem. Have you heard of Twitch?” And he was like, “What is that?” And I was like, “Well, why don’t we just do a show together on Twitch?” And he said, “That sounds like a good idea actually. Why don’t you reach out to a few homies?” And that first night I think it was him, myself, Sean Beaver, Creeasian, a few others, and we had a great time. We played and 25 people tuned in. We had such a good time that we were like, “We need to do this again.” That’s how it started happening. The interest was there. The feedback that we were getting was really positive. One person reached out and said, “Thank you so much for that! It actually made it feel like a normal weekend.”
C: It was definitely crucial for a few weeks there. We needed that. Can you tell me a bit more about Drum Beat Entertainment?
Y: Ya, Drum Beat is my friend Richard’s company. It's based out of Calgary, Alberta. I believe the company is about two years old.
C: Cool, ya I had never heard of them before. As (Canadians have) been watching what is going down in the States with BLM and a focus on systemic racism there, (we have) been reflecting on what that looks like in Canada with POC and our First Nations. Part of our work here in Canada is to shine a light on POC and First Nations communities and individuals, and highlight the talent and voices within these communities (as a way to dismantle systemic racism in Canada). But as a white Canadian and a writer, I’m like, “Ok, who do I know (out of the artists in Canada that are First Nations, Inuit, Metis, POC)?” Obviously I know Tribe Called Red. But when we talk about (this issue) as journalists, or even just everyday people, while trying to uplift those that have been targeted by systemic racism in our own country, who are these artists that I don’t know about that deserve more recognition? I want to know more. There was so much talent involved in the Virtual Pow Wow. So many artists I’d never heard of before.
Y: Yes! I was also so blown away. The second weekend we had double (the amount of artists), and then by the third weekend we had 28 DJs or something (like that). There’s also a facebook group chat of all the past and present performers. There’s upwards of 50 DJs in there. Like, who are some of these people? I’ve never heard of some of these people, you know? And some of them I had heard of before but I hadn’t had the chance to check them out. Like Neon Nativez, for example, I had heard the name Neon Nativez before, but I had never really checked them out. (The Virtual Pow Wow) really gave me the opportunity to be blown away by, like you said, so much talent and from so far away. It’s just all over the place! Like, look at this huge stacked line-up all of these amazing Indigenous people. Here you go North American promoters. Here’s a list of people that are super capable of rocking a set at one of your shows for one of your headliners.
C: Ya, totally! If you need any local talent to open (the night) up, there you go. And especially if we really are trying to move in that direction. This brings me to another one of my questions for you. I’m always concerned that a lot of (involvement) in these movements is just because they are also fads. (The movements and their messages) are things that I totally agree with, like the #metoo movement for example being a woman myself. But the thing that always worries me is people jumping onboard because other people are doing it. How do you feel about Indigenous Peoples’ Day? I went to our government’s website yesterday and it (had a heading that said) “topics”, and brought up the topic of “reconciliation”. Do you think that white people (in Canada both in government and in our communities) are really waking up?
Y: I don’t feel too deflated about it anymore because I’m just so accustomed to feeling underwhelmed. It is such a performative day. Ya, ok, let's all go out and flex out culture and be proud. We should be proud like that and flexing our cultures every day, you know? And then who is the federal government to give us one day to commemorate us? And it's not even a stat holiday! And furthermore, on that topic of performative anything, I think that I would rather have people educate themselves. I would rather have them show up to things. I would rather have people donate or support Brown, Indigenous, and Black businesses, and really come together to understand history and take responsibility and to really be able to move forward. What we’re talking about essentially is we’re working towards the issue of white supremacy and it's just so pervasive in every aspect of our society.
C: Ya, we can’t even see it (fully). We’re just sort of starting to see, but it’s just so deep.
Y: Well, the way I see it, I do think that more and more white people are seeing it for what it is. I think there’s more white people than ever in history that are sympathetic to our cause.
C: I’m always still cautious that they are sympathetic because it's trendy. But maybe, do you think in a way, even if it's a trend that we’re still moving in the right direction?
Y: Well, the learning, all the deprogramming, and all the stuff, this is also violent. It’s not pleasant. If it were easy, people would have done it already. Confronting these things, there’s clashes. I absolutely detest violence. I can’t stand it. I really wish people would try to find other solutions than to be violent with one another. We’re living in a system that incentivizes violence. Physical violence, state violence. I’ve been trying to prepare myself to comment or provide some kind of commentary on this issue of white supremacy and how pervasive it is, you know, how its present in the music industry, present in social services, present in the police force, present in the school system, every system in this country. It gets tiring as a person of colour just appealing to people for your humanity. I think that honestly, all the streaming of the music, the DJ sets and stuff like that during the quarantine, it really helped people feel connected. What I heard in terms of feedback was that a lot of people were talking about the importance of relationships, and how fragile our economy and our society is when it's built on this superficial material accumulation, this capitalist endeavor. (In addition to) all the frustration and the anxiety that the news cycle had been giving me watching the unfolding of our new white supremacist’s threats in our neighbouring country and around the world. It’s just like, really? In the middle of a pandemic? This is a time when people really need to be able to come together and work together. I can’t write off the whole global community because there are places where people cooperate, where people are really kind with one another. There are responses where we can be really proud of the level of sophistication and leadership.
C: What places do you have in mind when you think of these examples?
Y: The Yukon and the Northwest Territories. They had a really good response to the pandemic. I think the public governments there really respected the importance of our elders in the community and they really took seriously the historical context of pandemics on Indigenous communities. They were sensitive to that. So, in the Northwest Territories, Yellowknife is a highly international travel traffic area because of global tourism. (In Yellowknife) there were five reported cases, and then zero cases of community transmission! It's like, well done!
C: That’s awesome! I noticed on social media discussions regarding the names of MMIW in light of the BLM. Some people are saying, “What about the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women in Canada?” Others are saying, “Now is not the time to talk about it. We are focusing on Black Lives Matter.” Do you think it's ok to speak about these things at the same time?
Y: I don't think one really precludes the other. I think that the Black Lives Matter movement and the Missing and Murdered Indigenous Women and Girls, Two-Spirit, Queer relatives movements, they’re interlinked. Those struggles are mutual struggles. They’re struggles against white supremacy and domination. When I was growing up in highschool and we were learning about the Nazi’s, it seemed like such a horror concept. I never thought in my life I would have to contend with the Nazi’s. Like, how did the Nazi’s come back? They’re the most vile organization I’ve ever heard of. How does the villain come back?! Do we have to go through this all again? I’m trying to search for meaning and I try to remember not to let the terrorism work as much as possible, to try to just remember where I come from, who I come from, and try to be that way. I try really hard to invoke my ancestors, and I try really hard to remember that it's not about the colour of your skin. All this fighting and all this division, it's about “haves” and “have nots”. It’s about the billionaires club and the rest of us. It’s about people with real power to make real big changes who instead prefer to maintain the current capitalist hegemony that we all live in. And what was so brilliant and so ironic, not to suggest that there’s anything good about COVID cause my heart goes out to all the people that were negatively impacted and who lost loved ones and lost their lives, all the frontline workers. But it really showed people. Our society is so frail and we depend on these bus drivers and on grocery store employees. So when I hear in the media that big companies like Loblaws wanting to roll back on the extra supplement that they’re paying the grocery store employees. Like, ‘Wait, you want to start paying them less again?’ And the global pandemic is not even over? What the fuck is that? No! So I think people kind of saw for a second, there was a glimpse of the machine. Like the veil had fallen and everybody saw, ‘Oh this is how our society works.’ We’re all just making money for other people and our environment is being devastated as a result. I’ve heard people posit some suggestions that this pandemic didn't really target us. It more or less targeted our way of life. Airline travel (for example), there’s been a global reduction of emissions of 17%. That’s almost a fifth of global reduction. And probably a huge down turn in urban commuting, like people taking their cars to work and stuff like that. But then there’s still all these other industries that are not accounted for. Some people kind of don’t want to get off the CERB because it means that they have to go back to slogging away at some shit they don’t like at some job that doesn’t make them happy and that is not really useful. I think, on some level, when you’re doing something like that, when you know that your job is not really useful and you don't feel fulfilled. It will do something to you over time. People need to feel like they are expanding, like they are developing. I think that’s really beautiful about people. That’s a good example of what’s happening in the United States right now. All those people who are protesting, they can protest right now because their economy is in such a state that they don’t have any work, they have nothing to lose. Maybe that’s been a problem for us in Canada is we’ve been too comfortable to do anything about it. But then last month in May we had 170 people die in British Columbia from drug related overdose.
C: Ya, that’s around the same number as COVID.
Y: Yes, and these things are interlinked. They’re connected in the struggle. It all comes back to this dominating force and it's time to leave that behavior behind.
C: Ya, I hope. But don’t we always go through this? It’s like, “Wow. Ya, change!” But then we go back to the same old shit. I guess that brings me back to what I said before, that I’m afraid that it's a trend.
Y: I have hope that people will start to really put some of these things in place. The thing is, I refuse to lose hope because that is the key essential ingredient for struggle. If you don't have hope, there’s no point in struggling. So I try to just remain hopeful, cautiously optimistic, I remember to focus on myself and what I can do. What I’m in control of, (to) focus on the things that I can change, and then try to radiate that out as much as possible and hope for the best.
C: I really like the way you say that, that hope is an essential aspect of struggle. Even though we’re not going to be having festivals this summer, can we look forward to more (virtual) Young Dene shows?
Y: Ya, I’m really excited about (my latest endeavor which is) a music collaboration for a project. I am also going to be performing for the Nelson Mural Festival in August, and that will be on a live stream as well. I’ve recently started a new music collective with some of my friends, they are some very special people to me. We’re called Low Pass Kult. You can find us on Instagram. I am also looking forward to releasing some of my music over the summer. Also Low Pass Kult are planning a release for the end of the summer, our first EP. It’s interesting launching something like that in the middle of a quarantine. But I think it's also important to stay busy and to stay sharp and to work on your skills, develop your projects and keep your head up. Like I said, try to remain hopeful.
C: Absolutely. We have this time to reflect, hone our craft, and look deep within. Well, it’s been a pleasure having the chance to talk to you about some of these things and hearing what you have to say.
Y: Thanks Hollie for the opportunity. I appreciate it.