Soul

A trio of tasty troubadours for your 2nd June Sunday sesh for free in the Tote front bar. A solo set each from alt-country amoré Sidney Rex, soul screamer Ebi Nori, and blues bastardiser Kier Stevens.

MOTOR CITY SOUNDS pay tribute to the classic era of Motown and Soul music. Packing dance floors wherever they play, MCS bring an energy that can only be created by a live 10-piece band. Performing songs from artists such as Stevie Wonder, Jackson 5, The Supremes, Martha & The Vandellas, The Temptations, Aretha Franklin, Marvin Gaye and Otis Redding. Not just another cover band, "Motor City Sounds" recreates the sound and atmosphere of Motown and Soul from the 60s and early 70s, with authentic arrangements and instrumentation.

​Featuring top-class musicians from around Victoria, including an X-Factor finalist, a former member of the John Butler Trio, and sessions with top Australian artists such as Geoff Achison, John McNamara, Brett Garsed and Neil Murray.
Available to perform a purely Motown tribute or a full night of Soul hits from many a favourite artist.

Motown music was forged from the idea that African-American artists could and should be heard on the same radio stations as any other musical act. The label and the music brought black and white together. Motown played an important role in the racial integration of popular music as an African American-owned record label that achieved significant crossover success.

"...I recognised the bridges that we crossed, the racial problems and the barriers that we broke down with music. I recognised that because I lived it. I would come to the South in the early days of Motown and the audiences would be segregated. Then they started to get the Motown music and we would go back and the audiences were integrated and the kids were dancing together and holding hands..." Smokey Robinson - Motown artist.

Ms. Nickki, you already know her a little, even without having heard her. She, her sister, her grandmother, had been shaking the stage of black vaudeville theaters for decades when they cut the first blues in the 1920s. their voices of bronze the great orchestras of Kansas City and the pianos of the slaps of New Orleans. Rhythm’n’blues, with Big Mama, the Chicago Blues, with Koko, soul above all have consecrated them. At the end of the 1980s, their little cousin from the Bronx imposed the same freedom, the same sincerity, in macho and flashy hip-hop. Even more, when the intoxication of Saturday gives way to the joy of Sunday, you have heard them thundering in the temple the announcement of happy days. They are still there, if you listen to them.

Ms. Nickki, it’s a simple story, which you’ll recognize from all those other women. Childhood in Holly Springs, in these rural hills of North Mississippi, bastion which gave us Fred McDowell, the Burnsides, the Kimbroughs, where the Reverend John Wilkins preaches . The Sunday temple, where the whole community bursts into gospel songs and dances, and where, like so many other singers, she takes the lead as a child for her favorite hymn, her program of life: “This little light that I ai, I’m going to let her shine ”. Then adulthood, and the rural exodus to Memphis, for work.

Dërty Bërd is a local 7-piece soulful, funky-reggae syndicate comprised of mellifluous vocalists, earthy-toned brass players and a rhythm section that thrives on a dance-floor atmosphere. Dërty Bërd borrows elements from pop, rock, funk, soul and jazz and weaves them into one, in the hopes of attaining a sound akin to a love-child of Fat Freddy’s Drop, Prince Fatty and Jorja Smith.
So come share an enchanting musical journey with them as they return to the vivacious Open Studio.
IMPORTANT NOTICE BEFORE BOOKING YOUR TICKET
Please book shows carefully as the venue has a no-refund or exchange policy if you change your mind. If an event is cancelled tickets are refunded in full.