Black Belt Eagle Scout’s forthcoming album, The Land, The Water, The Sky, is out February 10th on Saddle Creek.
As previewed in lead single “My Blood Runs Through This Land,” the album is a love letter to indigenous strength and healing, and a story of hope, as it details the joy of returning.
Today, Black Belt Eagle Scout presents a new single/video, “Nobody,” which is a song about representation. Thrumming percussion gives way to swelling licks of electric guitar, and in the more mellow moments, Katherine Paul’s voice resonates: “Nobody sang it for me like I wanna sing it to you.”
“When I was growing up, I didn’t have very many Native role models to look to on TV or the radio. It was within my own community that I found inspiring role models through our elders and our community leaders. With Native representation in music and television slowly growing, I often ask myself where I stand within representation in music and how I want to be seen. This song is about the relationship I have with my own representation in music.” – Katherine Paul
In Paul’s words, “I created The Land, The Water, The Sky to record and reflect upon my journey back to my homelands and the challenges and the happiness it brought.” Paul found herself far from her ancestral lands during a time of collective trauma, when the world was wounded and in need of healing. In 2020 she made the journey from Portland back to the Swinomish Indian Tribal Community. There is a throughline of story in every song on The Land, The Water, The Sky, a remembrance of knowledge and teachings, a gratitude of wisdom passed down and carried. There are moments of frustration over a world wrought with colonial violence and pain, and the presence of joy, a fierce blissfulness that comes with walking the trails along the river, feeling the sand and the stones beneath her feet. It is the pride and the certainty that comes with knowing her ancestors walked along the same land, dipped their hands into the water, and ran their fingertips along the same bark of cedar trees.
The power of this land is woven throughout The Land, The Water, The Sky. Even in its most melancholy moments it is never despairing. That is the beauty of returning home. When you stand on ancestral lands it is impossible to be alone – the arms and hands hold you up, unwilling to let you fall into sorrow or abandonment. In The Land, The Water, The Sky, Katherine Paul has channeled that feeling of being held.
Black Belt Eagle Scout Tour Dates
Fri. Feb. 10 – Portland, OR @ Aladdin Theater
Sat. Feb. 11 – Eugene, OR @ Soreng Theater
Wed. Feb. 15 – Seattle, WA @ Neumos
Fri. Feb. 24 – Manchester, UK @ Night & Day
Sat. Feb. 25 – London, UK @ Moth Club
Mon. Feb. 27 – Paris, FR @ Le Pop Up
Tue. Feb. 28 – Brussels, BE @ Botanique – Witloof Bar
Wed. March 1 – Amsterdam, NL @ Paradiso Upstairs
Thu. March 2 – Copenhagen, DK @ Stengade
Sat. March 4 – Rotterdam, NL @ Rotown
Sun. March 5 – Berlin, DE @ Badehaus
