Portugal. the Man, and ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic have teamed up to release a brand new track in honour of Indigenous Peoples Day. This is ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic’s first-ever non-comedic release.

The song is called “Who’s Gonna Stop Me”, and also features the Last Artful, Dodgr. It was co-written by Paul Williams, who’s worked with David Bowie, and produced by Jeff Bhasker who’s won multiple Grammy Awards.

“This song is about fences and what they represent,” Portugal. The Man’s frontman John Gourley told Rolling Stone. “They say barbed wire was the death of the cowboy. The end of the open range and pastures. Colonists came and sectioned up the land and we, along with their ancestors, continued to do that. We need to break down these walls. Music and art have always been a connector for us. We spent the past few years doing land acknowledgments on four different continents and we made a lot of friends. People with amazing perspective and talent. With the lyrical content, it just made sense to call and ask for their help.”

With the release of this song, Portugal. The Man’s PTM Foundation has also announced their fundraiser for DigDeep’s Indigenous-led Navajo Water Project.

The video description talks about the genocide of the indigenous peoples and how “mother earth is reacting to the past few hundred years of neglect”.

It goes on to say:

“The PTM Foundation is a platform for artistic collaboration between materialist culture, the arts, and indigenous paradigms. For the video for “Who’s Gonna Stop Me” we created a collaboration between indigenous artists, friends, artistic collaborators, ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic, and Indigenous organizations to explore the possibilities of collaboration in this new time. To us ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic has always been a figure of playful boundary-breaking. His work makes us take less seriously, the things that we take so seriously, like what’s cool, or what’s trendy. ‘Weird Al’ Yankovic has been an inspiration for Portugal The Man since their inception until now. In the tradition of the indigenous cultures of the western North American territories, the Coyote represents the trickster and the maker of new worlds. The trickster is an archetype that can be found in nearly all indigenous and ancient cultures; the trickster not only is playful and a comedian but through their playfulness, they connect people. PTM Foundation sees music and art as a similar tool to make new connections and we consider this video to be the beginning of a campaign of many collaborations to come. PTM Foundation strives to forge bridges between the materialist contemporary culture in which we are immersed and the indigenous stewards to whom we strive to give a larger voice.”

You can watch the video below!

 

Filed under: Discover New Music, New Music Discovery, POrtugal. The Man, Weird Al Yankovic