Just announced: on Friday, November 6, I’ll be performing at the U of MN Coffman Union’s Whole Music Club at 8pm along with Tish Jones, members of the Be Heard MN Youth Poetry Slam team, plus a couple of special guests TBA. 7:30pm doors, all ages, free. (Facebook event page).

I’ve visited more than a dozen colleges just this Fall, and have had the opportunity to both perform for and build with students, staff, and faculty all over the country. Using art as a jumping off point to have deeper discussions about issues of power, identity, activism and more, it’s been a great time, and this capstone event will be yet another chance to explore how art can respond to injustice in concrete, meaningful ways.

While I’ll be performing a mix of poetry and music at the event, I thought I’d make a quick playlist of some of my favorite “political” songs of mine, all available for free download (though you do have to click through on the individual track you want to download to get to the link) for anyone interested:

“I don’t believe that the song/ is all we have to offer; I believe the singers are strong.”

That line captures a lot of what I think when people ask me about the role of artists in social movements. It’s all part of this brand new track from Jared Paul’s new album featuring both me and Ceschi Ramos (I’m the second verse). Pre-order his album here via Sole’s Black Box Tapes label. Jared and Ceschi have both been real leaders when it comes to radical, DIY poetry and hip hop, so it’s cool that we got this chance to do a song together.

More new music soon; if you missed it, here’s a link to “White People on Twitter,” the first track from the upcoming Guante & Katrah-Quey project.