On Monday evening, Lido Pimienta’s La Papessa took home the Polaris Prize for the best Canadian album of the year, beating out much higher profile nominees like Leonard Cohen and Feist. Since its inception in 2006, the jury-nominated award (with an ever-increasing cash prize, currently $50,000) has not only underscored changing perceptions of what’s important in Canadian music but has become a stage for those perceptions to materialize in real time. After Montreal-based, French-speaking indie rockers Karkwa took home the award in 2010, the polarizing debate over francophone representation on the Polaris stage was momentarily silenced. When Inuk throat singer Tanya Tagaq was awarded the prize in 2014, her win signaled the stunning breakthrough of an indigenous artist, amid national efforts towards reconciliation. And last year’s Polaris for 99.9%, Kaytranada’s impeccable house-music odyssey, showed that international success for rising artists can translate to the same recognition at home.
This year’s win for the Colombian-born, under-the-radar electronic musician points a national spotlight on Latinx representation and raises the question of what it means to acknowledge the best “Canadian” album. The fact that La Papessa is sung entirely in Spanish—a first among Polaris winners—adds a new element to the outdated assumption that language-based cultural divisions in Canada occur primarily between English and French speakers. Within a country that postures on the international stage as the pinnacle of multicultural inclusivity, the day-to-day reality for many non-white artists involves navigating casual racism that can’t be solved by mere legislation. “I hope that the Aryan specimen who told me to go back to my own country two weeks after I arrived in London, Ontario, Canada is watching this,” Pimienta said in a powerful acceptance speech, where she also thanked her mom for enduring years of white supremacy in Canada.
Those familiar with Pimienta found that speech characteristic of her music, where she makes listeners grapple with the complexities of her experiences. Born in Barranquilla, Colombia, and identifying as Afro-Colombian with indigenous Wayuu heritage on her mother’s side, Pimienta grew up amidst regional turmoil, ultimately informing her politicized approach. By age 11, she was voicing dissent towards conservative Colombian president Andrés Arango as the singer in a metal band. After arriving in Canada as a teenager in the mid-2000s, she was drawn to Toronto’s thriving art-rock scene, eventually becoming a fixture of the DIY contingent. Since her earliest shows, Pimienta has been an outspoken champion for BIPOC (black, indigenous, and people of color) artists, often advocating for an overhaul of the power dynamics within underground music scenes.
Pimienta’s first record in Canada was 2010’s Color, wherein she reimagined the confines of traditional folk music through celestial IDM and vocal loops. After the album’s release, Pimienta separated from her husband and musical collaborator, Michael Ramey, and built up her production skills ahead of her follow-up, spawning La Papessa six years later. Conceived as a battle plan for “a war, with love,” the album uses lust, determination, loyalty, and single motherhood to show how love’s many manifestations can offer strength in moments of vulnerability. Translating to “high priestess,” La Papessa channels its creator’s warrior-like mentality in topics as seemingly disparate as the shortcomings of heteronormative patriarchy and the tension between desire and restraint. It features Colombian singers Andrea Echeverri and Diana Pereira (the former a legend of Latin alternative music), indigenous Anishinaabe multi-instrumentalist Melody McKiver, and Dominican folk duo Las Acevedo, who all fit in around a driving force of danceable synths. Pimienta’s soprano voice anchors technicolor basslines, baroque strings, and militaristic snares, as she comes to realize that self-efficacy is the armor needed to combat tribulations both public and private.
Pimienta not only self-produced La Papessa but self-released it as well, financing the project with help from the Ontario Arts Council. (To date, there are no physical copies of the record.) Leading up to and directly following the album’s release, Pimienta became the face of a new wave of artists pushing social activism to the forefront of Canada’s musical conversation. Last year, she appeared on the cover of Toronto’s free weekly newspaper, NOW Magazine, as part of a 10-artist series on racism in the city’s music scene. A few months later, she headlined a multimedia show at the Art Gallery of Ontario; inspired by several of the show’s performers, who were born and raised in countries that pedestalize the virgin, Pimienta showcased the cross-cultural role of the Virgin Mary.
Though La Papessa was largely an independent labor of love, collaboration has served Pimienta well as she’s evolved. She has worked on “at least 100 songs with different people all over the universe,” most notably “The Light” and “For You (The Light Pt. 2),” from the Polaris-shortlisted album We Are The Halluci Nation from indigenous DJ group A Tribe Called Red. On the track, her vocals capture the complexities of retribution, grinding down the lyrics “I do it all again for you/All the hardships we’ve been through” until they disintegrate and warp, before taking on an air of resilience.
Perhaps the most striking aspect of Pimienta’s self-made Polaris victory this week is that it feels collective in some way. It’s for all of the women of color who have ever been the “only one” in an underground music scene—proof that it’s not only possible to disrupt these spaces but to lead them. For marginalized artists, there will be barriers to entry and forces that impede individual progress, but Lido Pimienta’s big win proves that an unapologetic hustle eventually can pry open doors and set the stage for a new generation of Canadian musicians.
