"Stairway to Heaven" is a song about the ozone layer, right?

Earth Day is one of the best holidays of spring and who better to discuss the environment than Native Americans? (Don’t say “Al Gore.” He isn’t even a contender until he beats Winona LaDuke in an arm wrestling contest...which he won't, because everyone knows you just don't mess with a strong Ojibwe woman on a mission.)  We're celebrating with music about the Earth, Mother Nature, and an incredible stretch of logic regarding basic semantics ("Poison Ivy" is a type of plant, you know).

Earth Day Playlist

• “Mountain Song,” Star Nayea, Primeaux & Mike [Sacred Ground]
• “Mother Rain,” Walela, Joanne Shenandoah [Sacred Ground]
• “Land of Emergence,” R. Carlos Nakai [Desert Dance]
• “Earth Song,” Elizabeth Hill [Peacemaker’s Lullaby]
• “Natural,” Shelley Morningsong [Out of the Ashes]
• “Above the Mother Earth,” Mary Young Blood [Beneath the Raven Moon]
• “Quiet Season,” Robert Mirabel [Taos Tales]
• “Tappin’ the Earth’s Backbone,” Jack Gladstone [Tappin’ the Earth’s Backbone]
• “Color Nature Gone,” XIT [Silent Warrior]
• “Poison Ivy,” Redbone [Greatest Songs]
• “Earth Walk,” Spirit Nation [Spirit Nation]
• “I Am Water,” Spirit Nation [Spirit Nation]
• “Sacred Ground,” Bill Miller [Sacred Ground]
• “Earth Children,” Walela [Walela]
• “The Land is Your Mother,” Floyd Red Crow Westerman [The Land is Your Mother]

If, to paraphrase “Smoke Signals,” all the hippies were trying to be Indians anyway, than what could possibly be better than an Indian hippie? That’s right; nothing.*

Listen to the Earth Day NS-NV on the livestream during the follow times on
Wed 4/22 (Earth Day, of course): 8am, 2pm and 8pm ET
Fri 4/24 (Arbor Day ... it's a Nebraska thing ... don't ask me, I'm from South Dakota): 11am, 5pm, 11pm ET

Check out the next blog for a recap of our Waila show (Listen live at 10am ET on Thu 4/23). You read that correctly, we've got Native Americans playing polka. You don’t have to understand it, but check it out and you just may like it.

Stay tuned!

Sina Bear Eagle NS-NV co-host

*I reserve the right to refute this statement if Robert Plant, Paul McCartney, Eric Clapton, and David Bowie suddenly go on a worldwide super tour together, playing all their old hits and co-writing new ones, under the group name “Khan’s Revenge.” That could very possibly be better.