David Daniels & Talkin'Roots Crew evoke West Bank rebellious spirit

David Daniels and Talkin' Roots Crew ((Issac 'Ike' Russel, Nate Stevens,
Danny Bolt, Noah Factor) perform Friday, Oct. 10, 9pm at Arcadia Cafe,
the corner of Cedar and Riverside, on the West Bank, Minneapolis. Free

David Daniels & Talkin' Roots Crew evoke West Bank state of mind in new
performance
by Lydia Howell

Spoken word is most associated with hip hop but, David Daniels—backed up
by Talkin' Roots Crew—draws on reggae/dub, acoustic blues, and 'jam
band' elements invented by the Grateful Dead and carried on by TC
groups like The Big Wu. Daniels and Talkin' Roots Crew perform a new
piece THE BIOMAGNETIC MAGIC ROADSHOW, Friday,October 10th at Arcadia
Cafe in Minneapolis.

“Many spoken word artists are influenced by jazz because of it s fluid
nature. But, I think my work is more akin to a jam band because of its
improvisation,” Daniels observes. “I see my work as collaborative with
the musicians.”

That's just his musical influences. Daniels' literary inspirations are
equally wide-ranging: the Beats like poet Allen Ginsberg, “hippie lit”
lion Richard Brautigan, 1930s labor troubadour Woodie Guthrie, reggae's
giants Marley, Winston Rodney, and Linton Kwesie Johnson. A lyrical
storyteller with a mythic sense of narrative that is more invocation
than strict plot line, Daniels' “characters” are personal, political and
even actual historical figures.

“The first spoken word I ever heard was [20th century American composer]
Aaron Copeland's 'Portrait of Lincoln' and it really moved me,” Daniels
says. His own works have referenced slain NAACP Field Secretary, Medger
Evers, Yippie anti-war activist Abbi Hoffman, the Black Panthers,
revolutionary prisoner George Jackson, Minnesota Senator, poet, 1968
Presidential candidate Eugene McCarthy and early 20th century activist
for Black self-determination Marcus Garvey. His plays “ Malcolm X Meet
Peter Tosh” and “I, Hoover” (a confrontation between the infamous FBI
Director J.Edgar Hoover and anarchist Emma Goldman) bring historical
figures into human size while losing none of their symbolic impact. .
“Kolorado:A Western Tale” delved into archetypes of a very American
mindset that veers between brashly independent and ideologically brutal.

Born and raised in Connecticut of a schoolteacher mother and physician
father (later divorced), partly raised by his grandparents, Daniels went
to an almost all-white prep school and then off to Alaska for college
and later a Christian commune.. He's lived in New York City and Denver.
In between returns to the West and trips across the country and abroad
to perform, he's called Minnesota home since 1988 and ran in 2000 for
U.S. Senator on the Grassroots Party ticket.. To pay the bills, Daniels
has worked at Barnes & Noble Bookstore, Greenpeace and currently
works for Northern Sun Distribution.

“I lived in the West a lot of years—those formative years that make a
person. The wide open spaces, rebellious sensibility are a large part of
my work,” the soft-spoken 53 year old says. “Likewise with the BIOMAGNET
MAGIC ROADSHOW show, at the Arcadia Cafe which is the site of old The
New Riverside Cafe. The Riv--was known as the “bio-magnetic center of
the universe'. A worker-owned, worker-managed vegetarian rester aunt
that was a place of political, social and cultural consciousness. This
show represents that sense that made The Riv and the West Bank.”

These days, we hear the term “maverick” relentlessly repeated to
describe a wealthy presidential candidate with more houses than he can
count and a voting record that mirrors G.W. Bush 90% of the time. It's
afar more accurate term to describe Daniels, who proudly says he's
never voted for a Democrat or a Republican and ran for Denver Mayor in
the mid-1980s (winning 5% of the vote) and for Minnesota U.S. Senator on
the Grassroots Party ticket in 2000. This year, he backed Ron Paul for
the Libertarian Party ticket.

But, Daniels' march to the beat of his own drummer goes far deeper than
just election year politics. His last solo theatrical work “Black
Hippie Chronicles”, was part American open road saga, part memoir of
growing up Black in the 1960s and '70s, telling his own unique life
story: turned on by those who dropped out, a spiritual seeker with a
keen curiosity that isn't hemmed in by racial boundaries. Whether he's
interacting with historical figures like McCarthy, an Alaska Indian or,
as in this new work, invoking “hippie”/radical activist life on
Minneapolis' West Bank, Daniels has defined himself on his own
iconoclastic terms. Rejecting his parents “Talented Tenth” middle-class
materialistic ambitions for him, he's embraced both Rastafarianism and
a multicultural/multi-racial artistic sensibility. Daniels seems to be
misunderstood and even rejected by the Black community. That's
unfortunate since he is firmly aware of his roots and history, as his
body of work and two CDs express. His gentle determination to be his own
man (including that he remained a committed father even as he's lived
the life of an artist in poverty) is a far more inspiring model than
that perpetrated by the “gangsta & bling” hip hop Top 40.

His new performance piece THE BIOMAGNETIC MAGIC ROADSHOW evokes
Minneapolis' West Bank, with older works re-invented and new works
added, to not only remember a neighborhood, a time that lasted well into
the 1990s but, a state of mind—one could even say, the core of David
Daniels' state of mind.

“Five years ago, I performed in Germany. Folks in Germany were aware of
the West Bank if for nothing else that Bob Dylan walked the West Bank
streets and clubs. If you really look at it, many folks across the
country talk about Haight-Ashberry, “Daniels remembers the San Francisco
site of the 1967 Summer of Love, often seen as the birthplace of
hippies.” Many folks would call the West Bank the Haight-Ashberry of the
Midwest. “But, the West Bank outlived Haight-Ashberry. That spirit of
experimentation , rebellious, social-political awareness remained an
active part here much longer than it did there. The Riv exemplified that
spirit. I worked for eight years at The Riv and my life as a writer was
shaped there from my first play 'Malcolm X Meet Peter Tosh'. The stage
at Arcadia is the same stage from The Riv. Doing this new show is like
coming full circle.”

David Daniels and Talkin' Roots Crew ((Issac 'Ike' Russel, Nate Stevens,
Danny Bolt, Noah Factor) perform Friday, Oct. 10, 9pm at Arcadia Cafe,
the corner of Cedar and Riverside, on the West Bank, Minneapolis. Free

Friday, Oct.10,11am, hear the full interview and music from David
Daniels and the Talkin' Roots Crew on “Catalyst”, KFAI Radio, 90.3fm
Minneapolis 106.7fm St. Paul On-line http://www.kfai.org

Lydia Howell is a Minneapolis arts reporter and journalist, winner of
the Premack Award for Public Interest Journalism. She is producer/host
of Catalyst on KFAI Radio.