Not quite Ras Trent level of parody, I think they are being serious in their way. Plenty of these kind of dudes around coming from a dancehall/hiphop kind of angle. Saw they were from the Okanogan which is a region a few hours from here but looks like they are from the American side to the south which is similarly named, kind of a rural, sparsely populated, economically challenged area of north central Washington state between Seattle and Spokane.
I worked in that area for a few years in the late '70's for the state game department & the group looks like the youngest kids of the hippies that flocked to the Okanogon in the late '60's & later. I think they believe what they're doing. The river in the vid is the Columbia & they're heading north.
Here's probably more than you care to know about Essential I, the lead in the vid. From a cdbaby write up on their website, it seems like his heart & head are into it: http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/essentiali