Leveling the Playing Field: ALLSZN

January 06, 2023

Fresh off their second tour across the U.S. West Coast the ALLSZN team reflects on their development over the last 3 years and the future for founders, AntoineX and Gunner Jules. ALLSZN was established in 2019 to address the lack of inclusion and representation of Native people in mainstream media and how they wanted to pave a way for other young artists and creators to follow. While ALLSZN operates publicly as a native-owned music, film and fashion label; what occurs behind the scenes is focused on uplifting young, Indigenous voices and community service.

Text by Joe Crow Shoe
Photography by Juan Fuentes
Producer & Artistic Director: Thomas Lopez Jr.
Stylist/Assistant Director: Tsering Sherpa
Artists: AntoineX, Gunner Jules, T-Dro, Tufawon, RAW402, Destroykasmin, The Real SR
Hair by Mckayla Holmes
Makeup by Thomas Lopez Jr.
Photo Assist: Cassandra Camacho

(From left to right) T-Dro, Tufawon, RAW402, AntoineX, Destroykasmin, Gunner, The Real SR

These goals come from a personal place for Antoine and Gunner, as their early development as artists shared a common struggle; accessibility. Gunner Jules a 33 year old father and singer was born and raised on the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota. A member of the Sicangu Lakota Tribe, Gunner began to record songs using a school computer on the Rosebud reservation where he grew up. He saw music as a hobby more than anything because there were no reference points close enough to him to see it as a viable career. It wasn’t until 2017 in Toronto where he met the directors of the Remix Project that things changed. It was at this time when he witnessed the effectiveness of community organizing that was leveling the playing field for young people from disadvantaged, marginalized and underserved communities. Gunner asked himself a simple question; “How do we bring this to the rez?”

ANTOINEX is wearing a vintage Pierre Cardin suit, ProClub t-shirt, Praying trucker hat, Prada sunglasses with his own shoes and jewelry; GUNNER is wearing a vintage Giorgio Armani sport coat, Dries Van Noten polo, Amiri Jeans, Moncler bucket hat, Celine sunglasses with his own shoes and jewelry

Fast forward to a show at Marty Indian School in Marty, SD where Gunner and Antoine shared a stage for the first time. Gunner realized he wasn’t alone in his struggle nor was he the only one thinking solutions. It was through this opportunity, mutual respect and genuine chemistry that the two of them began to breathe life into projects like the Dimensions and LandBack albums but more profoundly a partnership that would come to be known as ALLSZN, was birthed.

While not biological brothers, founders of ALLSZN hold a familial bond through their innate responsibility to their community, one that extends past music alone and lends itself to the vast ambitions that encompass ALLSZN. Laughter fills the air while they recall a cold plains winter morning in 2016 during the NoDAPL movement. You begin to hear a fondness in their voices that can only come from an unspoken understanding that protecting their communities is the first and foremost priority and any opportunity to do so is one to be proud of. Simply calling these men ‘warriors’ takes away from the gentleness that comes from a conversation with them. This kind of dedication to their people influences every facet of ALLSZN and keeps the two hungry and ambitious.

ANTOINEX is wearing an Amiri hoodie, Pro Club t-shirt, vintage wool slacks, and his own hat and jewelry; GUNNER is wearing vintage wool slacks with stylist's jewelry

“Our mission is to help refine the raw talents of young Indigenous people in order to help them find success as they define it on their own terms.” says AntoineX who makes reference to a time in his career when older artists didn’t know how to show love or offer guidance and mentorship. AntoineX, a 28 yo UmOnHon, Lakota Rapper and Singer says, “This is our way of giving back and providing what we, ourselves, could have benefitted from as young artists.” You can hear the balance of confidence and humility in Antoine’s voice as he affirms ALLSZN’s mission, “We envision a world where Natives are empowered through the creation and publication of high quality music and media allowing them to tell their stories and be seen in a world that otherwise systemically erases their identity.”

ANTOINEX is wearing an Amiri hoodie, Pro Club t-shirt, vintage wool slacks, and his own hat and jewelry

What was once an idea to refine the artistic talents of young Natives now carries with it a massive responsibility to give underserved communities a fair shot in the game. A responsibility that is aided by years of combined experience. By offering full service studios, artist management, and mobile youth workshops, such as the ALLSZN Youth Camps they can now give aspiring and established artists opportunities to advance their careers within the music industry.

The ALLSZN Youth Camps are one the engaging and impactful aspects of the group’s community work. Traveling to various reservations and first nation communities the ALLSZN team offers a series of workshops where young artists are able to learn the processes of songwriting, recording, and producing music through a hands-on approach. They write, record and produce a song and shoot a music video therein learning to express themselves in their own, unique and healthy way. The artists also learn techniques for recording, live performance, overcoming stage fright, and social media marketing. Workshops center around the four elements of hip-hop and connect them to our Indigenous teachings.

DESTROYKASMIN is wearing a vintage Givenchy blazer with his own pants and shoes; GUNNER is wearing a vintage Dior coat, ProClub t-shirt, Fred Perry slacks with his own hat, sunglasses and jewelry

The group also takes a step further with morning-motivation speeches that include discussions on healthy lifestyle practices, anti-bullying, suicide prevention, education, and breaking stereotypes. “Our goal is to give each individual artist their own personal freedom to express themselves while providing support, mentorship and guidance.”

The heavy nature of what this team is doing would lead someone to believe this group is all business all the time, and while you can count on something always in the works you can also find the ALLSZN team relying on the tenants of brotherhood and healthy masculinity. This often shows itself as laughter and love.

What separates ALLSZN isn’t the packed venues or the million views on their artists’ videos. It’s the intentional and familial relationships they hold with one another. Destroykasmin (23), one of the youngest members from Ganado, AZ, speaks to how ALLSZN made an impression on him as a young Diné man. “They were the first people to actually recognize me and bring me on tour.” and throughout their fall tour Kasmin describes a feeling of safety and support. While being concerned that the artist lifestyle would pull him from his obligation to sobriety and maybe more importantly his obligation to creating great music, he found quite the opposite. “These guys can fill venues but it essentially comes down to road trips and vibes,” he says as he fondly reflects on moments of kinship and mentorship.

ANTOINEX is wearing a Givenchy X Chito t-shirt, Amiri jeans and his own jacket, jewelry and hat

The community-oriented strengths of ALLSZN not only allow for young artists to tap in and work but encourages them to truly pursue their dreams through guidance from experienced professionals. These men follow a philosophy that sounds great in theory but is truly moving when you see it exemplified in experiences such as Kasmin’s.

As for the future of ALLSZN, a spring/summer tour is being planned as well as several individual projects that can be found on their personal Instagrams or @allsznofficial. However, more impressively there is an emphasis on further building the youth camp’s curriculum and carving a permanent space to which they will build a compound for the camps to thrive. A Native owned and managed space dedicated to the enrichment and development of underserved peoples fighting for their spot in the industry.

T-Dro is wearing a Stampd cardigan, his own hat embroidered ALLSZN

It’s not easy being Native, and breaking into places such as the music industry can seem impossible. But when a door is opened for one of us it allows for barriers to be broken and the possibilities to grow. They not only grow but change the foundation of what it means to be Native in America and there lies the power to be anything we put our hearts to. The game is set, the field has been leveled, all it needs is you.

Culture

The Club Is Coming to the Stage

We enter and make our way to what is approximately front left of the DJ booth, where we’re accustomed to dancing at clubs in New York. “So is this a techno club or a dance performance?” yells an uncertain participant in my boyfriend’s ear. He laughs, bouncing along to Ben UFO, and yells back, “It’s both!” The club has long been a hot topic in European contemporary dance but it is only now making its way into New York performance venues, largely through transatlantic tours. R.O.S.E. follows recent examples like Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1 (May 2024), (LA)HORDE’s Room with a View at NYU Skirball (October 2023), and Gisèle Vienne’s Crowd at BAM (October 2022).

Do these performances compromise the club’s spirit — a space idealized for its anonymity, dark lighting, and thundering music? The notion of the club as a utopian escape is admittedly just that — an ideal — because of how its intense conditions can create barriers to entry. Still, the club remains sacred for many, a place to forge connections and embrace an alternative state of being. Looking at how performances transfer this spirit to new settings reveals what aspects of the club are essential and those that aren’t.

Sharon Eyal, R.O.S.E. 2024. Photography by Stephanie Berger, courtesy of Park Avenue Armory.

Eyal’s dancers make their entrance. The lighting shifts from roving blue to yellow spotlights as Ben UFO’s tracks transition to more melodic beats. Clad in deconstructed lace Dior lingerie with dark red tears painted on their faces, the dancers move cautiously in a tightly maintained pack, slicing paths through the horde with hoof-like steps and jerky leg extensions. After around ten minutes of this controlled choreography, the dancers vanish as the lighting shifts back to blue and Ben UFO picks up his dubby beats. The club, as we knew it, resumes. This cycle of tightly executed movements and free-flowing club-goers repeats several times, each time emboldening the dancers to plunge further into the crowd.

Clubbing in a building once built for the U.S. Army National Guard on Manhattan’s Upper East Side turns out to be surprisingly successful — at least for the audience. What starts as an awkward, scattered group searching for their non existent seats gradually gels into an engaged, bouncing crowd that erupts in cheers each time the dancers enter and exit. Performance patrons who might never step foot in a club find themselves swept up in its potential for communion, moving in unison with fellow ticket holders. But it isn’t until the very end of R.O.S.E. that the dancers finally break free from Eyal’s choreography and join the fired-up audience in a brief moment of improvisatory movement with the music. By keeping her dancers at arm’s length, Eyal seems more interested in the club as a backdrop for her signature movement style than wholly as a space with meaningful stories to be told.

Michele Rizzo, HIGHER xtn. 2024. Photography by Cameron Kelly courtesy of MoMA PS1.

Back in May, I attended Wire Festival, a multiday electronic music event at Knockdown Center that had no shortage of organically united dancefloors. It attracted a crowd of seasoned ravers who were eager to celebrate the start of spring as they danced alongside DJs who played well into the daylight. I left Wire in an afternoon daze to see Michele Rizzo’s HIGHER xtn. at MoMA PS1. My sleepless euphoria only deepened as the performance unfolded, starting with a lone dancer who looked plucked out of the festival.

The dancer, dressed in sneakers, baggy jeans, and a tight tank top, shuffled slowly into the gallery, perfectly in sync with the looping bars of an understated electronic melody. Soon, other dancers, clad in the same staple rave uniform, joined him — each having traveled from Europe for the U.S. museum debut of HIGHER xtn., which premiered at the Stedelijk in Amsterdam in 2018 and quickly became a fixture at kunsthalles and festivals across the continent. As the score’s tempo climbed, the choreography locked into a 16-count sequence, which the dancers executed with precise synchrony. They remained intensely focused, never making eye contact with each other, as they sought release in the endless repetition of synthesized beats. Once the dancers reached their limit, they stopped the sequence and exited the gallery, one by one.

HIGHER xtn. used the focused daylight of the gallery to highlight the meditative release found in the repetitive movements that dominate dark dancefloors. The performance’s restraint brought more consistency and intentionality than Eyal’s all-encompassing club construction in R.O.S.E. Yet both performances offer enticing entry points into club culture for those who may not frequent raves. Rizzo’s ecstatic, hypnotic repetitions reveal how the club can mirror other meditative practices, while Eyal’s interpolation of performance and clubbing helped hesitant audience members blossom by the end. Still, both works overlook one of the most underappreciated aspects of clubbing — its potential for individual expression. HIGHER xtn.’s pristine uniformity especially risks promoting the outdated techno trope that there’s a “right” way to dance to electronic music.

Maybe this shortcoming is, in fact, a benefit. For habitual ravers jaded by one too many sunrise sets, it’s a reminder to return to the club with more intention. If you pause and peer through the darkness, you’ll see hundreds of people moving to the same beat, each with their own subtle variations. This collective choreography is a ready-made spectacle that doesn’t need validation in a theater or museum. And when the music shifts slightly, you can watch the ripple effect sweep through the crowd while feeling the new beat in your body. Maybe this small bit of magic is best left on the dance floor.

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Shop Psyche Organic at Happier Grocery and Dimes. Coming soon to @citarellagourmetmarket @unionmarket @gourmetgarage @deciccos @fairwaymarket plus many more.

Culture

Porsche SCOPES Brings Art, Music, and Design to Toronto

The festival was a full immersion into Toronto’s dynamic creative energy. Day one set the tone with DJ collective Living Room, followed by an experimental performance by Claire Rousay that captivated the crowd. Jewelry designer Steff Eleoff unveiled her Porsche Taycan 4S art car installation—a bold fusion of automotive and wearable art inspired by her Sedona ring—while OVO Sound’s Naomi Sharon and DVSN wrapped up the night with powerful, genre-defying performances.

We witnessed SCOPES Toronto bridging underground and mainstream with day two’s lineup. DJ Korea Town Acid’s set paved the way for Angelphroot and Dameer’s debut of BASSMATI, a track blending South Asian influences with bass-driven sounds. Chippy Nonstop’s return to Toronto and Richie Hawtin’s extended set were milestones of the evening, proving that the city’s underground scene has a global resonance.

The final day featured standout performances from local pianist Harrison, Indigenous artist Tia Wood, and hip-hop visionary Sean Leon, who elevated his set with a live choir. Moonshine Collective’s film and musical performance explored themes of African utopia, showcasing art’s power to bridge culture and technology. Rising Toronto star SadBoi, who paused her tour to perform at SCOPES, further underscored the festival’s commitment to nurturing local talent.

Throughout the weekend, we experienced installations from artists like Mitsu Mitsu and culinary creations from Bar Mordecai, capturing the multifaceted creativity Porsche SCOPES brought to Toronto. This milestone 10th edition, open to all, allowed Toronto’s vibrant arts scene to thrive, underscoring SCOPES’ mission to celebrate local talent while connecting it to a global audience.

office had the chance to connect with rising star SadBoi ahead of the event. In our conversation, she shared insights into her creative journey and reflected on what performing and growing up in Toronto means to her and her work.

How are you, and where are you at right now? You told me you were traveling.

Um, I’m good, I’m feeling really good right now. I’m traveling back to Salt Lake City. I had a show yesterday in Seattle. I’m on tour right now with Coco and Claire.

How is touring life treating you? Do you like it?

I love being on the road. To be honest, I feel like I don’t know—like I’ve had good experiences and bad ones—but this time it’s really fun, especially with the people I’m surrounded by. It’s also the longest tour I’ve been on; I have about four more weeks to go. I’m trying not to think about how many days I have left.

Do you feel homesick?

Yes, because when I start thinking about how many days are left, I start to miss my dogs. I’ve just been trying to stay in the moment—I don’t even know what day of the week it is, to be honest with you.

Oh, sweet! What are your dogs’ names?

Jillian and Winston. I know, they’re crazy names.

You’ll be performing at SCOPES in Toronto, which is where you grew up. Do you feel like the crowd is different when you perform in Toronto compared to other cities?

Yes, I mean, Toronto just feels different because it’s home. Every time I come back to perform, something in my career has changed. The last time I performed in Toronto, people just wanted to have a good time, and I’m excited to perform back home again to see everyone’s reactions. I know it’s going to be different from the last time. It’s exciting to see your own growth. Toronto is a tough crowd, though. If we’re with you, we’re really with you.

So, they’re super picky? You have to gain their respect, or what is it?

I think Toronto people are in their own world, but when something really connects with them, they’ll lose themselves in the moment. But it takes something to bring them out of that. Toronto crowds are tough because even if they like you, they won’t show it outright until they’re really vibing with you.

It’s like a vibe check, right?

Exactly. They’ll enjoy your performance, but it’s hard to explain. When people visit Toronto, they often say, “Oh, you guys are so nice,” and I’m like, “I don’t think we’re that nice, we’re just polite.” Like, you can walk down the street, and no one will say anything, but it’s just our mannerisms.

You mentioned Toronto can have a moody energy, especially at night, and that the underground night scene there really inspires you. Can you talk more about what makes Toronto's nightlife so influential for you?

Absolutely, Toronto has this unique energy that comes alive at night. Similar to New York, there are the popular clubs everyone knows, but you need to find your niche—the people who know where the real parties are. I remember going to raves in high school yards, sneaking in because I wasn’t old enough. Events like Baby, Jerk!, and Yes Yes Y’all were pivotal, exposing me to DJs blending dancehall with EDM—something I hadn’t seen before. Toronto nightlife is moody and intense, but when everyone’s out, it’s like the whole city is alive.