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Just like Robert Stroud, the “Birdman of Alcatraz,” poet, songwriter and Native American activist John Trudell discovered his true vocation on the infamous prison island. But unlike Stroud, Trudell went to Alcatraz voluntarily, as a member of The Indians of All Tribes that stormed the island in November 1969, occupying it for 18 months. Trudell, who was born on a Santee Sioux reservation in Nebraska in 1946, quickly emerged as the protesters’ spokesman. The dramatic seizure won America’s indigenous people worldwide sympathy and support. But for Trudell, what really counted was “what it accomplished for us as Native People. It did something for our own consciousness that we needed to have. It sparked the spirit, showed that despite 400 years of murder and oppression, we still hadn’t surrendered.”
After the occupation, Trudell went on to become chairman of the American Indian Movement, organizing dozens of protests and rallies, cumulating in a march on FBI headquarters in 1979. But the deaths of his wife and three infant children in an arson attack on his home the morning after the march left him shattered, and he immediately withdrew from the political arena. That was, after all, the intention of the crime.
The tragedy sent him into what he calls “his madness.” “I said ‘nothing counts now, there is no right or wrong, no morality, none of that.’ Because after what had happened, I didn’t want to hear anything from anyone about what is right or wrong. I knew whatever I was going to learn about that, I’d have to learn all over again, so I just went with the madness, wherever it took me.” Where it took him was poetry. Six months after the murders, he started writing for the first time in his life. “I was in so many realities, and I was looking for something to hang on to because I needed to stay in this reality, whether I wanted to be here or not. I didn’t want to get into killing people. Not that I wasn’t capable of killing, but I couldn’t get at the people who needed killing. Maybe it’s better I went this other route...”
One person who gave him sanctuary at the time was singer-songwriter Jackson Browne. Trudell spent long periods at Browne’s place, sheltered from the outside world while being exposed to another world, that of music. One day a guitarist and Kiowa Indian, Jesse Ed Davis, who had recorded with people like Bob Dylan, John Lennon and Eric Clapton, approached Trudell out of the blue and said, “I can put music to your words.” There was an instant rapport between them, and by 1986 they had recorded, “AKA Graffiti Man,” distributing it on cassette in the reservations. “Part of it was I wanted to stay visible to the community but didn’t want to be a political activist.” Soon the tape was being played by Bob Dylan on the PA system during his tour with the Grateful Dead in 1987. By the following year, Trudell’s band was opening for Midnight Oil on their world tour. An auxiliary career began as an actor, most noticeably in the Robert De Niro/Jane Rosenthal-produced film, “Thunderheart” starring Val Kilmer, and the Sundance-award-winning “Smoke Signals.”
Seven records later and Trudell is in Paris for the Sons d’Hiver Festival, where he’s launching his new CD, “Blue Indians,” (Fargo) produced by Jackson Browne. It features Trudell’s distinctive style: country rock, Texas blues and elements of traditional Indian chants and drums all fusing into a musical landscape for Trudell, who speaks his own words à la Lou Reed. The text is sometimes incendiary, sometimes sardonic. And a collection of his poetry, “Indigo Rouges,” has just been published by Encres et Plumes in a French-English edition. Just before he read to a packed house at the Village Voice bookstore, I asked him what had most changed in the US government’s attitude to Native Americans since the Alcatraz protest. “You have to face reality. South Africa’s Apartheid regime borrowed a great many of its ideas from America. Yet South Africa changed. America’s not going to.”





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John Trudell ©Fargo		Spotlight by Tim Baker John Trudell’s Indian Blues Just like Robert Stroud, the “Birdman of Alcatraz,” poet, songwriter and Native American activist John Trudell discovered his true vocation on the infamous prison island. But unlike Stroud, Trudell went to Alcatraz voluntarily, as a member of The Indians of All Tribes that stormed the island in November 1969, occupying it for 18 months. Trudell, who was born on a Santee Sioux reservation in Nebraska in 1946, quickly emerged as the protesters’ spokesman. The dramatic seizure won America’s indigenous people worldwide sympathy and support. But for Trudell, what really counted was “what it accomplished for us as Native People. It did something for our own consciousness that we needed to have. It sparked the spirit, showed that despite 400 years of murder and oppression, we still hadn’t surrendered.” After the occupation, Trudell went on to become chairman of the American Indian Movement, organizing dozens of protests and rallies, cumulating in a march on FBI headquarters in 1979. But the deaths of his wife and three infant children in an arson attack on his home the morning after the march left him shattered, and he immediately withdrew from the political arena. That was, after all, the intention of the crime. The tragedy sent him into what he calls “his madness.” “I said ‘nothing counts now, there is no right or wrong, no morality, none of that.’ Because after what had happened, I didn’t want to hear anything from anyone about what is right or wrong. I knew whatever I was going to learn about that, I’d have to learn all over again, so I just went with the madness, wherever it took me.” Where it took him was poetry. Six months after the murders, he started writing for the first time in his life. “I was in so many realities, and I was looking for something to hang on to because I needed to stay in this reality, whether I wanted to be here or not. I didn’t want to get into killing people. Not that I wasn’t capable of killing, but I couldn’t get at the people who needed killing. Maybe it’s better I went this other route...” One person who gave him sanctuary at the time was singer-songwriter Jackson Browne. Trudell spent long periods at Browne’s place, sheltered from the outside world while being exposed to another world, that of music. One day a guitarist and Kiowa Indian, Jesse Ed Davis, who had recorded with people like Bob Dylan, John Lennon and Eric Clapton, approached Trudell out of the blue and said, “I can put music to your words.” There was an instant rapport between them, and by 1986 they had recorded, “AKA Graffiti Man,” distributing it on cassette in the reservations. “Part of it was I wanted to stay visible to the community but didn’t want to be a political activist.” Soon the tape was being played by Bob Dylan on the PA system during his tour with the Grateful Dead in 1987. By the following year, Trudell’s band was opening for Midnight Oil on their world tour. An auxiliary career began as an actor, most noticeably in the Robert De Niro/Jane Rosenthal-produced film, “Thunderheart” starring Val Kilmer, and the Sundance-award-winning “Smoke Signals.” Seven records later and Trudell is in Paris for the Sons d’Hiver Festival, where he’s launching his new CD, “Blue Indians,” (Fargo) produced by Jackson Browne. It features Trudell’s distinctive style: country rock, Texas blues and elements of traditional Indian chants and drums all fusing into a musical landscape for Trudell, who speaks his own words à la Lou Reed. The text is sometimes incendiary, sometimes sardonic. And a collection of his poetry, “Indigo Rouges,” has just been published by Encres et Plumes in a French-English edition. Just before he read to a packed house at the Village Voice bookstore, I asked him what had most changed in the US government’s attitude to Native Americans since the Alcatraz protest. “You have to face reality. South Africa’s Apartheid regime borrowed a great many of its ideas from America. Yet South Africa changed. America’s not going to.”