De La Soul

Friday night I was in the mood for some toe-tapping music, and the tiny bar/cafe called Holy Oak at Bloor/Lansdowne was hosting a cover band called A Soul. One of my favourite local singers Maylee Todd was on deck. I was curious how they were going to fill a drummer (who continued his beatific beaming from the last time I saw him with the Eric Cheneux Electric Trio), percussionist, pianist, bassist, guitarist, and Maylee into that space. It was a tight squeeze with the band taking up almost 1/3 of the space.

It was 2 fun sets with the band playing some classic soul. Even if I didn't recognize most of the songs, I couldn't keep my feet still with all that awesome groove. There were only 3 things that would have made the night even better. One, there were lots of bopping heads but not many dancers. Two, whenever someone stood right in front of the relatively modest speakers, the singer's voice came through underpowered and muffled. Finally, everybody wanted to hear more Maylee, who took the lead on 3-4 songs. The two male singers were adequate, with the bassist having a nice loose drawl, but Maylee was born to sing soul.

Just to end this post on a soulful note (ha!), here are two original soul numbers, Hieroglyphic Love Letter and Aerobics In Space,  from Maylee during CMW at Supermarket. I was there and it sounded even better live. And here she is belting another original scorcher at UBC. I'm anxiously awaiting her new CD.