Staff Reviews

Alanis Obomsawin - Bush Lady

Review by Bekki Bemrose

Sounds as radical as it must have done on its release over 30 years ago»

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A re-issue of the rare, legendary and long out-of-print album recorded by First Nations and Canadian cultural icon Alanis Obomsawin in the mid-1980s. Remastered from the original analog tapes, now on CD for the first time. Bush Lady is the only record ever made by Obomsawin, rising to cult status in recent years, while Obomsawin has meanwhile received Canada’s highest accolades for her 50-year career as an activist documentary fillmmaker, including the Order Of Canada. Before establishing herself as a filmmaker, Obomsawin began her artistic life as a singer-songwriter in the 1960s, as Indigenous artists from across North America were rallying in new assertions of cultural identity, consciousness and political rights, calling for reckonings with oppressive colonial history. She was invited by Folkways to perform at Town Hall in New York City in the early 1960s and spent most of that decade primarily identifying as a musician and social activist, channeling traditional First Nations songs hand-in-hand with modern composition and arrangements. Obomsawin kept her musical output percolating alongside her burgeoning documentary film career, with performances at the legendary Mariposa Folk Festival among others. In the mid-1980s Canada’s national broadcaster (CBC Radio) invited Obomsawin to record an album; unsatisfied with these recordings, she reclaimedt he master tapes, remixed the material, re-recorded the title track from scratch, and issued the ensuing Bush Lady album on her own private press in 1988 complete with her own artwork and liner notes. Lacking formal distribution –and with Obomsawin focused primarily on her documentary film career –only a portion of this pressing was sold at the time, the remainder occupying a closet in her Montréal home. The album has grown to become an increasingly legendary rarity ever since. Bush Lady is a unique and magical record by any definition. It’s an invaluable example of contemporary First Nations music that blends traditional folkways with avant-garde composition. For fans of Joni Mitchell, Meredith Monk, Tim Buckley, Laurie Anderson, Judy Collins, Nico and Buffy St Marie.
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