- Yeah, like people, when they find out I'm Native, they'll, like, apologize.

- Huh?

(Wolf laughs) - And one time I had a guy recently, actually, came up to me and he was like, he was like, "Thank you for your land."

(Sergio and Wolf laugh) He's like, "I just want you to know I really do appreciate it.

I really want you to know that I appreciate the land-" - Ooh.

"And I want to thank you for the land."

- Oh, my goodness.

- And I'm just like, "Wow.

Okay."

- [Sergio] Okay.

(Wolf laughs) Now, how do you feel about that?

- I just kinda laughed and- - [Sergio] Yeah.

- Like, I don't know what to say.

Like, it's just weird, and.

(Sergio laughs) - Okay, so what other weird stuff have people said to you when they realize you're Native?

- Well, one that just pops in my head I can think of was, one time I was approached by an Army recruiter.

- Mmm.

- And I was like, 18 or 19 and- - [Sergio] Yeah.

- You know, he's doing the Army recruiter thing, like, "Hey, son."

Like, "You wanna get free college, or?"

(Sergio and Wolf chuckle) I told him that I felt kind of weird fighting for the government and- - Yeah.

- You know, I was Native American.

And then he made some comment, you know, how Native people were warriors, so, that, even more of a reason for me to fulfill my Native destiny by joining the Army.

(Sergio and Wolf laugh) So it was like, "No."

- [Sergio] Hmm.

- Not gonna sell me on that.

(Wolf chuckles) My great uncles taught me well.

(Wolf and Sergio laugh) - So, does that characterization of Native people being warriors, does that show up a lot?

- Yeah, for sure.

Like, that's one of the things people try to make an excuse for, about like, the whole mascot thing.

- [Sergio] Oh!

- [Wolf] Like, oh, Native people were proud warriors and they're just trying to represent that.

- [Sergio] Hmm.

- First off, not everybody was a warrior.

- Mmm hmm.

- And second off, like, let us do that.

- Yeah, right.

- 'Cause sometimes people- - [Sergio] Yeah.

- They just have like this, premeditative, like, fantasy in their head about- - Hmm.

- [Wolf] What we're going through or how we feel.

- [Sergio] Yeah.

- Oh, they must be this way or that way.

- Mmm.

Mmm hmm.

Instead of what?

What would be better?

- Instead of just coming at it like, you're just simply asking questions.

Which I can respect that, you know?

- Yeah.

Just ask questions if you don't know, right?

Okay, so let's back up a little bit.

Tell me about your background.

- I grew up in Duluth.

- Mmm.

- I went to middle school and high school there, so.

- Okay.

- Northern Minnesota, like the Iron Range.

- Yeah.

- I started playing music in high school.

- Oh!

- Actually middle school, but.

- What kind of music do you play?

- Heavy metal.

- Heavy metal?

- Pop rock, heavy metal.

- Heavy metal?

Awesome!

(Wolf chuckles) - So.

- Wow, a metalhead in Duluth?

Did you ever get into country music?

- No, and that's why Duluth sucked.

But, people would come to our shows and there'd be like, 120 kids inside of a tiny little- - Wow.

- [Wolf] Record store space.

- Is your whole band Native?

- Nope.

Got guys with last names like Lutz and Lefton.

(Sergio laughs) - They're strong Norwegian names.

(Sergio and Wolf laugh) But they, you know, they're all cool.

They come from South Dakota and Western Minnesota, which is, historically a bad area.

- What do you mean?

- Because the Plains tribes were historically like the, they were the bad asses.

And so, the US government did everything they could to pummel them.

- Oh.

- And they did a good job, but, I feel like they hate Native people more than they do black people.

- Wow!

Like, today?

- In the Plains areas.

- Really?

(Wolf chuckles) - You think that's tied to the history of them- - Fighting back.

- [Sergio] Fighting back.

- You know, 'cause that's what they did.

They tried to take their land back, which, can you blame 'em?

(Sergio chuckles) - No.

Okay, so how about here?

Do you think there's racism in Minneapolis?

- Oh, yeah.

- [Sergio] Okay.

- Of course.

- [Sergio] Tell me about it.

- There's a ton of like, Native people living under the Cedar Franklin Bridge right now.

It's kind of ironic that, Native Americans are homeless in America.

- [Sergio] Yeah.

Not only that, but the other irony is that every meeting that I'm in these days, starts off with a land acknowledgement.

Like, expressing the fact that we are on Native land.

And like, 10 years ago, you had never heard of that, right?

- That's never happened before.

- [Sergio] Yeah.

- Like that's a new thing and it just seemed like nobody ever cared about Native issues- - Mmm.

- Or like, what we were going through.

- [Sergio] Yeah.

- Even though we've been like, screaming (Wolf laughs) since the 1700s about our issues.

And, finally it feels like (children clamor) people are seeing and hearing us.

- Yeah.

Yep.

Yeah, but now, it seems like a lot of tribes are actually getting their land back, right?

- I've seen like, Mille Lacs, they just got back 300- - Whoa.

- Million acres or something.

Oklahoma also got like, 600 million acres.

- Wow.

- There's probably some old fracking area that some companies were done with and they're like, "Okay, we'll give it back to you."

(Sergio laughs) The land is the most important thing to us, in general, so.

- Yeah.

- And, whatever way or fashion to get land back, I think is a good thing, so.

- Yeah.

- I'm all for it.

- [Sergio] Awesome.

- I mean, I'm, honestly, I'm really liking that Native people are (sound cuts out) at the forefront of-