Step Off! Magazine

Three years ago, after much contemplation we here at Step Off! Magazine decided to branch out from the medium of print media and made the leap into the world of podcasting with a brand new podcast series. With little more than an iPhone and a Mac, we launched our official podcast of Step Off! Radio. We made it our mission to interview artists, performers, activists, community organizers, and those who inspire others to make a difference in the world through their talent, art, and social advocacy. It was our hope that through our platform we could share music, culture, politics, and other current events relating to social justice through that of a Hip-Hop lens. Three years and twenty-six episodes later, we’re still here and still continuing to grow.

Starting a podcast was an idea that had been suggested by several friends of mine almost from the very beginning when I first started Step Off! Magazine in the fall of 2016. The idea had always intrigued me but, was intimidating due to my inexperience in recording or editing. However, after some convincing, we launched Step Off! Radio about a year and a half after we originally launched the site.

In celebration of our third anniversary we wanted to share a special episode, a remastered version of our very first pilot episode Kill the Colonizer Inside Your Mind with our inaugural guests’ underground Hip-Hop group Kozmik Force. Our pilot episode was recorded at the Justice Center San Diego, on March 26th, 2018, and was first aired on April 30th, 2018. For listeners unfamiliar, Kozmik Force is an underground Hip-Hop duo comprised of rappers Jaguar Arreola and Native Threat who hail from the Inland Empire, California. Since forming in 2017, Kozmik Force has actively confronted the web of lies and misinformation that have been woven into the fabric of U.S. mythology perpetuated under past settler-colonialism. The duo’s ethics are rooted in fostering pan-Indigenous unity across the American diaspora, promoting pro-Chicano philosophy, militant decolonization, and the vested interest in dismantling white supremacy through their music and activism. Over the years Kozmik Force has amassed a loyal following and is at forefront of Indigenous resistance through their music in the face of neo-colonialism in the 21st century.

This episode is a remastered version of our first interview with Kozmik Force. It was recorded several months after they had dropped their first mixtape War Cry, and released prior to the release of their sophomore effort Untamed Unchained in the summer of 2018. During our interview, Jag and Threat discuss the origins of Kozmik Force, their activism through music, their debut mixtape War Cry, decolonization & Indigenous resistance/liberation in the age of Trump. It’s important to note that this episode did originally air in 2018, so some portions of the interview might be somewhat date. However, three years later much of our conversation has remained very relevant. In this episode you’ll hear new music, added special effects, as well as portions from our interview that were omitted from the original episode. Over the past three years, we’ve grown tremendously in our craft and felt it was only right to give our inaugural episode the treatment it deserves. With that said we here at Step Off! Radio want to thank you all for your support over these past three years and hope you all enjoy our remastered cut of Kill The Colonizer Inside Your Mind with Kozmik Force. 

Featured below is our full remastered interview with Kozmik Force, available through our official SoundCloud page. You can listen and subscribe to Step Off! Radio on your preferred podcast streaming service by visiting our new Podcast page. You can listen to Kozmik Force’s latest EP Sound of a Weapon which is out now on all major streaming platforms. Please be sure to rate and review the show!