Starr’s career
As we read in the article Like Nellie McKay? Then Check Out Kinnie Starr (August 2006) from starpulse.com, the unique combination of Kinnie Starr music and performances “earned her a well-deserved and devoted fan base, a record contract with Mercury/Island/DefJam (1996-1999), and an immediate connection with critics and consumers alike. Shortly after signing to MapleMusic, Starr was actually singing for Zumanity, Cirque du Soleil’s controversial cabaret production.”
As we read in Starr’s blog on myspace.com, “billboard magazine wrote in 2004: ‘female MC’s in general are few and far between in hip-hop today. So those who are willing to bend the genre and craft their own sound are even rarer. This is precisely what makes Kinnie Starr such a standout’.”
In the article Kinnie Starr lost in race we can also learn about some of the problems that Starr encountered with her record contract. “Mercury fell victim to the merger that created the mega-giant Universal Music label. Starr felt victimized by reps wanting to reshape her music; thus, a 1998 album, Mended, never did see the light of day. (However, hop-hop label Infiniti Records, as well as Jeepster in the U.K., plan to release the ‘lost’ disc.)”
We can read more about it in the article New Starr of hip-hop. “The album, entitled Mending, will be released through Infiniti Records in Japan and England's Jeepster Records. It's available only on import. ‘These are labels that need their artists because they’re small,’ says Starr, who keeps herself insanely occupied by studying languages, math, Buddhism, inter-racial politics and yoga in addition to her performing duties. ‘As soon as you get into an area of record labels that are financed by corporations, there's so much money passing hands that it becomes a priority … All they need is one cash cow on the roster for the year and everyone else is unnecessary … It turned me off music for a bit, but then I just realized that it doesn’t really matter if I have the support of a major label … I still do what I do’.”
Starr’s roots
Another unique aspect of Kinnie Starr music is her roots and a lot of her songs are inspired by her family. As she said in AfterEllen interview, “I was realizing that today on stage how all I must think about is my family. Yeah, I write a lot about my relationships that are meaningful in my life. Before I started doing music I was a pretty sad person. I think I’ve processed a lot of my feelings about the world through music. So that’s why it always ends up being about things close to my heart.”
Further in the same interview Starr elaborated a little more on her family and her roots when she was talking about her Native American, Native Canadian, Native North American backgrounds. “I sometimes get to do work outside of the music world and when I do I like … to perform to native people. It helps to alleviate a lot of the stress of feeling like a bit of an outsider or the topics I’m covering are not important. Because I feel that a lot of people are not that interested in native history or native people. Obviously it’s a personal subject. My dad is mixed-blood Mohawk. As a result I have quite a lot of heated fury, specifically around the way natives are represented in the media. It makes me really sad and it’s very discouraging for everybody because it’s misinformation … It’s one of the reasons why I like to bring up that I am part native. A lot of people are like ‘What! I thought you were Greek or Italian or I thought you were part whatever.’ People lack information about how many natives there really are around us right now … even to the point of mixed blood people who don’t know they are native or mixed blood people that don’t talk about being native. So those are some of the things that get me going.”
Starr was also talking about it in the article Kinnie Starr lost in race, “I’m in the early stages of a first manuscript for a book called Half-Breed Sitting on the Fence … My father’s part Native and my mother’s Irish-English. And I’ve had a really hard time figuring out what it means to be Native in this country when you’re not a full-blooded Indian. Who is your community? How do you define yourself? I’m interviewing other people who are of mixed blood, specifically other Metis people, just to find out how everyone feels. This new generation that I’m a part of … a lot of us are mixed. A lot of us don’t know where we fit on a racial metre’.”
Starr’s latest album
Kinnie Starr’s new album Anything is described on her Official Website as “…her stock answer to a question that she hears all the time: ‘So, uh, what does your music sound like?’ (For the record: hip hop, rock, folk, R&B, electronica... anything)” and the website also quotes several praises from New Yorker that called the new album “edgy … enchanting”, “an artistic, feminist, angry, well-articulated rant of the highest order” as described by allmusic.com or even “raw, funny and definitely an original” as it called by the Globe and Mail.
In the article Some Great New Kinnie Starr Tunes by Trent (June 2006) Starr’s new album is also discussed in the following terms, “brand new record coming out. Combining elements of hip-hop, verbal slam poetry, and quite a bit of feminist wit; Starr has put together one heck of a good album here. The record is called Anything.”
There are several songs that Starr recorded for her latest album that make it an extraordinary work. As we read in the article Anything by Sandra Barrera (August 2006), “There are a couple more scattered along the way in the form of the hypnotic electronica of ‘Sex in the Prairies,’ and the sentimental ‘Wind In Your Sail,’ but they're no match for ‘La Le La La’ (featuring Tegan Quin of Tegan & Sara). That song alone makes this album worth having.”
The article Like Nellie McKay? Then Check Out Kinnie Starr also says, “Her effortless smoky vocals sound more original and unorthodox as ever. Raw ballads and optimistic jams showcase Starr’s seductive voice, creating a broader poppy palette on this new album out on MapleMusic Records.
… With Anything, nothing is taboo. Her brilliant, beat-driven songs are imaginative and fun, coming from a songwriter who can blend folk with gold chains.”
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