Hey DC, I Know You Got Soul

The other night I stumbled across a website that took me on a historical journey and set me in a musical trance. The website is called DC Soul Recordings, and what it consist of are pictures. Tons and tons of pictures of bands, events and memorabilia from the DC metropolitan area dating all the way back to the 60s. It also includes information on the many different local records labels this distributed the recordings of many of these artists. I’m talking about the true and REAL roots of Go-Go music. I’m talking about bands such as The Matadors, Apollo Brothers, Brute, Osiris, BlackByrds, Soul Searchers, Experience Unlimited, and hundreds more.

Just to let it be known, in 1975, I was only 10 years old myself. And even though there are some bands on this site that I do remember, have heard of, and/or personally know many of the musicians (mainly because of the areas I grew up in), there are many that I had no clue about. And to me, that’s a personal travesty.

Created by Kevin Coombe, the purpose of DC Soul Recordings is to catalog and preserve the rich history of Washington D.C. & Maryland’s Funk, Soul, and R&B music. And without a doubt in my mind, this website serves as a very important bridge for websites such as TMOTTGoGo and TMOTTRadio. The historical information that it contains actually chains historical connections to the Go-Go music culture that we know of today. For example, in the picture of The Matadors, you see a very young Keith Holmes, who later became an important mentoring source and music director behind such bands as Little Benny and The Masters. There’s a picture of the Busy’s Soul Blenders, which consist of a very young George Busy who later became one of the main driving forces behind the Pump Blenders. There is even a picture of the Los Latinos, who Chuck Brown has mentioned on several occasions has being one of the first bands he played with, as well as an inspiration for the sound we all know today as go-go music. A very old school picture of Experience Unlimited featuring a very young Sugar Bear sporting an afro. And so much, much more.

Furthermore, what this website also serves is justification that regardless of what form it finds itself in, Go-Go is never going anywhere. For as long as I can remember (and that’s pretty far back there), this culture has always been a musical live band culture… and always will be.

Bottom line… there is no way in the world that any artist in the Go-Go culture should not know the history and roots behind the music and culture that they proclaim to love. And now thanks to Kevin Coombe and the DC Soul Recordings website, there’s even no excuse.

Oh… and by the way, recordings from many of these groups can be heard on a daily basis every week night on TMOTTRadio.com starting at 12:00am. The program is entitled, Jazz Funk Soul Fest.

Check out some of the images below. And then, check them all out at DC Soul Recordings.