I won’t go over much of the history behind Buffy Sainte-Marie, instead I’m just going to focus on her last album of the ‘70’s, the self-produced Sweet America.

From the start, it’s a bittersweet goodbye to her adoptive homeland, before she would eventually move back to her birthland, Canada. After years of feeling neglected by the general public and censored by American authorities of the time (Vietnam era), she gave us this album of reluctant heartbreak, finding her coming close to the popularized Native American roots music she would come to define/create in the ‘90’s and on.

Her disappointment with America, it’s politics and treatment of Native Americans, come out clearly from the beginning in the title song.

Well I think it’s time I’m leaving Oklahoma/ There’s 49 more ways to live my life/ America you showed that I don’t know you/ and I do believe your worth another try

Turning a bit more political, in America My Home Buffy betrays her infatuated crush on an abusive overbearing country/lover.

It’s not all harsh rhetoric, though. Her voice finds wonderful, soulfull expression on tracks like, Honey Can You Hang Around where she does some crazy, sexy Pow Wow scat that gets echoed by an electric guitar near the end. It’s a great use of her unique voice and production work.

As a matter of fact, the whole of side 2 takes on a very aboriginal-rock feel, with buffy performing Pow Wow vocals on many of the songs, creating a sort of Sweet America Suite. It all comes to a head in Qu’Appelle Valley, Saskatchewan a longing song for her birthplace in the deep Canadian interior. The repeated verse goes:

Wrap me in your blanket/ Dance me around/ Take me back to where my heart belongs/ Qu’Appelle Valley, Saskatchewan.

And the Pow Wow singing follows through until the last song of the album Starwalker, a beautiful song to all her native past, present and future.

Lightning Woman Thunderchild/ Star soldiers one and all oh/ Sisters, Brothers all together/ Aim straight Stand tall/ Starwalker he’s a friend of mine/ You’ve seen him looking fine he’s a/ straight talker/ He’s a Starwalker don’t drink no wine/ ay way hey o hey…

The lyrics may seem trite, but at the time, Buffy was really the only performer talking about Native American life, culture and politics. So while they might be deemed an affectation now, I give her a break for being a real groundbreaker.

At this time in her life Buffy was working on Sesame Street teaching children about Native American culture and art. But alas, at least according to this article in Indian Country Today from last year, Buffy was not only being thwarted by the Government, her career was actively being quashed and she was being blacklisted for her anti-government beliefs.

I wish I could say this album found Buffy looking back on happier times, but it would take her nearly two decades to create an album more positive than Sweet America’s gloomy and doomed prognosis. A piece of history for sure, but, Sweet Americas beauty is still evident.

Check out Buffy’s own website here.
For samples from the album go to my blog here.