Navajo Hum

To honor those businesspeople, Sing for Me contained "Hey Boss," about a young Navajo lady who runs a construction company out of the Four Corners area, and this collaboration with the Cremains follows up with "Truck Stop Chii." "Chii' means grandpa' in Navajo," says Bilagody.

Bilagody maintains chiis and older fans don't have any trouble with the heavy stuff and doesn't anticipate any Bilagody-goes-electric brouhaha when the two play an entire set together at some Native American outdoor festivals this summer. "I've had 80-year-old people come up to me and tell me they love the album," he says. "There have always been quite a few heavy rock Native bands, but it's never been played in the mainstream. There's a lot of musicians out there, musicians who played in the '60s, '70s, '80s, who tried to get into the music business but just hit the wall and now they're beginning to put their bands together."

From Tuba City to Phoenix metal: James Bilagody fuses Navajo into the Cremains.

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More About

• Kris Cremain
• James Bilagody
• Tuba City
• Robbie Robertson
• Native American Issues

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As for the Native American music scene here in the Valley, Cremain admits it's still a small and intimate scene where everyone knows each other. "I don't think it's ever been where I want it to be, the Native music scene," he says. "I think if we get a good number of albums that are more like what I think I like about this, I think there's a good chance that the national and international market will really pick up on it. It's real easy to like this type of music. It's got a little English in there. The whole thing's not straight Navajo and it's not much different from what's going on today."

"That's one of my dreams," says Bilagody. "That one day it won't matter that it's in Navajo. The music's so good that people will buy it because it makes them feel good."