Dead Pioneers - "My Spirit Animal Ate Your Spirit Animal"

Our favorite Indigenous American punk band are back with a new song! Dead Pioneers released "My Spirit Animal Ate Your Spirit Animal" the day after Thanksgiving. It's an absolutely blistering punk track that reminds me of 90's punk as some metal started leaking into the sound, along with the raw energy of the proto-punk of The Stooges. Plus, there's an amazing punk meets metal guitar solo along with vocalist Gregg Deal's fiery almost spoken word vocals. "My Spirit Animal Ate Your Spirit Animal" combines artists like Pennywise, Henry Rollins, and Suicidal Tendencies. As much as we loved Dead Pioneers' self-titled album, this single has us even more excited for the upcoming album.

Gregg Deal says of the band's new single:

"In a world chock full of both macro- and microaggressions, the overarching concept of cultural appropriation is frequently overlooked, lost in the systemic consumption and theft of culture, wares, and even religious or spiritual practices. Appropriation is frequently done in the so-called spirit of 'honor' or 'inspired by,' with no restitution for the Indigenous people these things are frequently taken from. 
 
"The song’s title highlights and demeans the concept and use of 'spirit animals' carelessly taken from Native communities. Their use is rooted in stereotype and racism. Jabbing at it in the title serves to draw you in—the song will eventually take you out.
 
“'My Spirit Animal Ate Your Spirit Animal' is scathing, funny, and, above all, honest. It covers ground, from the assertion that taking anything from Native culture without permission is thievery, to observing that one of our great Indigenous actors, Lily Gladstone, was robbed of the Best Actress Award at the 2024 Oscars. The sentiments throughout the song are a big middle finger to the dismissiveness of Native issues like existence, representation, and the continued thriving—and surviving!—of our living and breathing culture.

"There is a lot that informs the content of 'Spirit Animal'. Cultural references, of course, but the social and political reference is in place. Additionally, there are some musical influences throughout, but lyrically? There is a nice little Idles reference in there. I’ve been obsessively listening to Idles for the last 5 years. Idles is one of those bands that gives me hope for the future of music. How could I not nod in their direction?
 
"That you can somehow 'be us'—while actively ignoring your privilege, the problematic aspects of your consumption of our culture, likeness, and overall existence—is an incorrect assumption. Strange that this needs to be said out loud, but pretending to be an Indigenous person of a colonized land isn’t okay. Colonialism coming full circle is marginalized communities that managed to survive a settler colonial American Genocide only to have their identities co-opted by the very forces (or their descendants) that nearly eliminated them."

You can watch the video for "My Spirit Animal Ate Your Spirit Animal" below. PO$T AMERICAN is due out April 11 on Hassle Records. For more on Dead Pioneers, check out the band's website.