Welcome to episode 2. This one's a long one — so long I had to break it in half. This is Part 1.
My guest is Enrique "Q" Garcia Naranjo — DJ Q, poet, teacher, and co-founder of the 1202 collective. Q has been doing culture work in Tucson for 15 years. In this half, we get into Q's poetry origins, the Sin Ti show that pulled me into the Tucson scene in 2016, his run as DJ Q at Club Congress and the cumbia/El Tambo era, why Tucson has always been a crossroads, what COVID broke and what it rebuilt in him, and the only game he's willing to play with anybody: the millennium.
Part 2 drops next. Members can already watch the full uncut version on the website.
— Gregorio C.,
El Tucsonan
— ⏱️ CHAPTERS
00:00 — Hook
00:14 — Welcome & episode intro
01:38— Q introduces himself
03:11— Poetry as a pillar
05:33— How we met: Sin Ti, 2016
11:23— DJ Q at Club Congress
12:12— Cumbia across the borderlands
17:57— Tucson as a crossroads forever
20:34— SB 1070 & the shadow under the music
24:02— Sponsor: Nina Flores
27:27— Resurrecting the dance floor
34:04— Hoko Fest
39:51— How COVID hit
42:24— Losing Isaac
44:27— "King to a crumbling tower"
51:10— Being serious about play
56:09— Aimé Césaire & the millennium
1:11:17— Nature's healing
1:16:18— We're here now
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🎵 MUSIC CUES Music in this episode by Q —
"07 FAT" "bruto"
Find more of Q's music at Barrio Sounds:
barriosounds.bandcamp.com
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🔗 LINKS Q & 1202
twelvotwo.com
barriosounds.bandcamp.com
El Tucsonan eltucsonan.com
Become a supporter (full uncut episodes + early access): eltucsonan.com/supporters/sign_in
Sponsor the show: eltucsonan.com/pages/sponsor
Sponsor of this episode: Nina Flores, REALTOR® ninafloresrealty.com/en/rent-trap
Episode 1 with Rey: https://youtu.be/D4L5OEVrY4M
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📚 BOOKS & WRITERS REFERENCED IN PART 1
- Notebook of a Return to the Native Land — Aimé Césaire
-
Parable of the Sower — Octavia Butler
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🎬 NAMES MENTIONED
- Logan Phillips — Tucson Poet Laureate
- Anna Flores — who put us onto Césaire
- Gazal (DJ Zaytoon) — Q's partner
- REY — the other half of 1202
- Mike — first show with Q and REY
- Lando Chill — performed at the Sin Ti show
- Milkweed — Sin Ti cover artist, Ojala Zine Press
- KP — recurring presence
- Eva Sierra — collaborator and educator
- DJ Humble, Lioness, DJ Dirty Verbs — Sonidero Tambo crew
- Isaac — in memoriam.
This conversation lives because he taught us how to have it.
— El Tucsonan is a production of Self Media Productions LLC.
Tucson, Arizona. © 2026 Self Media Productions LLC. All rights reserved.
El Tucsonan kicks off with REY — Tucson rapper, organizer, visual artist, and co-founder of the 1202 collective. We talk about coming up in the local music scene, what it actually takes to navigate venues and bad business in a city like Tucson, and why he's been going through his hard drives trying to die empty. We also get into the AI copyright problem eating the music industry, why "Everything Is a Remix" should be required watching, the 1202 house and what it meant to the community, pinta art and ballpoint pen as a creative practice, and what's coming — including his most personal project yet, Shut up Mijo, dropping this fall. (Note: we lost about 15–20 minutes of footage to a technical issue mid-episode. We recap what we can. It won't happen again.)
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FIND REY @shutupmijo on YouTube → https://www.youtube.com/@shutupmijo
1202 → https://twelvotwo.com/rey
FIND EL TUCSONAN
Website → https://eltucsonan.com
Become a member → https://eltucsonan.com/supporters/sig...
Sponsor the show → https://eltucsonan.com/pages/sponsor
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CLIPS USED IN THIS VIDEO "Everything Is a Remix" by @KirbyFerguson → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nJPER...
Anderson .Paak on Club Shay Shay with Shannon Sharpe (@ClubShayShay) → https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZRAv...
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El Tucsonan is a production of Self Media Productions LLC.
