Tucson, meet KP.
He's a DJ and producer, an Army veteran who came home from Afghanistan, and the engine behind Soon Spins — Tucson's own internet radio station. But this conversation is really about a feeling: that somewhere after 2020, our city stopped smiling. KP came here from South Dallas and felt the culture shock — a place where strangers scowl instead of smile — and he's spent ten years trying to figure out why, and what it would take to bring the joy back. We get into the dance culture we lost, the grief under the surface, the people who quietly built something real, and why he believes Tucson already has everything it needs. It's fiery, it's tender, and it's a love letter to a city still deciding what it wants to be.
If this resonates, the best thing you can do is watch, drop a comment about something specific he said, and share it with a Tucsonan who needs to hear it.
— Gregorio C., El Tucsonan
⏱ CHAPTERS
0:00 — "We lost it" (cold open)
2:02 — Who is KP: DJ, producer & Soon Spins
3:51 — "Here, people scowl instead of smile": Tucson's melancholy
5:35 — A city unsure what it wants to be (transplants & development)
9:09 — Mountains, not high-rises
11:56 — Earth Day for the Hood & the TCE cancer story
14:42 — The Army, Afghanistan & coming home
21:16 — Finding music: the saxophone
23:06 — Debbie, the Dunbar & "let me be your intern"
32:36 — South Dallas to North Dallas: two worlds
34:38 — "Tucson was popping… and we lost it"
36:08 — Losing Isaac & the night COVID hit
39:34 — Power, complacency & who's really in the room
41:59 — What "not complacent" actually looks like
47:16 — Soon Spins: the dream & the mission
51:48 — George Floyd, walking out & starting over
56:34 — Bringing the dance culture back (El Tambor)
1:01:01 — DJing in Europe, paying artists & the end of the "American dream"
1:06:40 — On rap, Texas roots & Kendrick
1:13:50 — Teaching kids: Soon Spins in the schools
1:18:47 — Reagan took the instruments out of schools
1:24:23 — "Life starts right now": KP the mentor
1:29:57 — Last words & shout-outs
🎵 MUSIC & RELEASES (KP)
• No Titles No Masters — KP's album
• KPMADMAN — the "melancholy town" release
• "The Devil Wears a Suit and a Tie" — single
• Collaborations with Q (1202 / THEM&i)
• Live mixes & sessions on Soon Spins
(All linked below.)
🔗 LINKS
Watch ad-free + full episodes / support the show → https://eltucsonan.com/supporters/sign_in
Sponsor an episode → https://eltucsonan.com/pages/sponsor
KP → Instagram @kpmadman · https://kpmadman.bandcamp.com · https://soonspins.com
El Tucsonan → Instagram @eltucsonan · TikTok @el.tucsonan · Subscribe on YouTube ↑
📚 BOOKS, WRITERS & IDEAS REFERENCED
H. Rap Brown · The Last Poets · Patrice Lumumba · "critical regionalism" — the idea of making something rooted in where you actually are, instead of importing another city's identity.
🎬 NAMES & PLACES MENTIONED
In loving memory of Isaac — a cultural bearer in Tucson's scene.
People: Debbie (KP's OG at the Dunbar) · Q · Tim (built the Soon Spins site) · Ms. Sanders · Duke · the guest DJs who've spun on Soon Spins.
Places: Soon Spins · KXCI 91.3 · Dunbar Pavilion · Hotel Congress · El Tambor · the Sonoran Room · Utterback Middle School · Davis Elementary's mariachi program.
—
This episode is a production of Self Media Productions LLC. Views expressed are the guest's own. Where on-screen text references a public event, it cites published news reporting.
© 2026 Self Media Productions LLC. All rights reserved.
Welcome back to Episode 2. This is Part 2 — the back half of my conversation with Enrique "Q" Garcia Naranjo (DJ Q, poet, teacher, co-founder of 1202). If Part 1 was the history, this is the dissertation.
In this half: what a decade of teaching — from a ski-resort town in Colorado to a Tucson juvenile detention center — taught Q about play, failure, and how the safest place some kids have is a cell. Then we go deep into the book he's spent six years on, Que Viva La Raza, Que No: where the phrase "Viva la Raza" actually comes from, the complicated man who coined it, and why Q thinks our inherited ideas of identity are an antidote that was dosed wrong. We get into the Santa Cruz, the monuments Tucson keeps and the ones it takes down, and the line they want to live by: "a warrior in a garden, not a gardener at war."
Members can already watch the full uncut conversation (Parts 1 + 2) on the website.
— Gregorio C., El Tucsonan
🎵 MUSIC CUES
Music in this episode by Q.
"bruto" and "07 FAT"
Find more of Q's music at Barrio Sounds: barriosounds.bandcamp.com
🔗 LINKS
Q & 1202 — @themi7298 · twelvotwo.com · barriosounds.bandcamp.com
El Tucsonan — eltucsonan.com
Become a supporter (full uncut + early access): eltucsonan.com/supporters/sign_in
Sponsor the show: eltucsonan.com/pages/sponsor
Episode 1 with Rey: https://youtu.be/D4L5OEVrY4M
Episode 2 with Q — Part 1: https://youtu.be/XZUkSfR43T0
📚 BOOKS & WRITERS REFERENCED
- La Raza Cósmica (1925) — José Vasconcelos
- Borderlands / La Frontera: The New Mestiza — Gloria Anzaldúa
- Octavia Butler (on knowing history to read the future)
- "Latinidad Is Anti-Black" — [confirm author; Q couldn't recall the last name on tape]
- Ariana Brown · Wendy Treviño (poets/sources for the Vasconcelos research)
- Q's own work: Turtle Boy Says (Ojala Zine Press) · Descend a Dissident · forthcoming Que Viva La Raza, Que No (via 1202 + Half Breed Press, Tijuana)
🎬 NAMES MENTIONED
Logan Phillips (Tucson Poet Laureate — opened the Colorado teaching door) · Eva Sierra (educator) · KP (live phone-in) · Gazal / DJ Zaytoon (Q's partner) · Rey (1202) · Diego & the writer homies · Mario & Maria Miranda (Half Breed Press, Tijuana) · Max Milkweed (Ojala Zine Press) · José Vasconcelos · 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.
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
—
🎵 MUSIC CUES Music in this episode by Q —
"07 FAT" "bruto"
Find more of Q's music at Barrio Sounds:
barriosounds.bandcamp.com
—
🔗 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
—
📚 BOOKS & WRITERS REFERENCED IN PART 1
- Notebook of a Return to the Native Land — Aimé Césaire
-
Parable of the Sower — Octavia Butler
—
🎬 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.)
—
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
—
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...
—
El Tucsonan is a production of Self Media Productions LLC.
