Byron Bay Blues festival 2016’s Got Soul!

April 4, 2016 Australian Neo Soul

5 of the Best Soul Artist’s seen at BluesFest 2016

As Australian Soul music fans mourned the loss of the newly created festival Soulfest, that promised to cater to the largely unsatiated thirst for all things Soul on Australian shores and then plummeted to an untimely demise in it’s second year, another festival came to the rescue this march.

Blues Fest 2016, a festival that has survived the up’s and down’s of Australian music festival history for 27 years, struck at the heart of Soul music fans with this year’s epic line-up, handpicked by festival director, Peter Noble.

We had the privilege of experiencing some outstanding Soul, Funk and Jazz this year in a little town called Tyagarah, near Byron Bay NSW, where the sound quality was fantastic, the crowd were chill, the organisers and volunteers were all smiles and the music showcased many local and International Soul, Funk and Jazz musicians, which is a rare treat within our continent.

Here our our top 5 Soul artists seen at this years Blues Fest. Blues Fest’s got Soul!

D’Angelo

D’Angelo was a pioneer within the Neo soul movement in the early 90’s, his Album “Brown Sugar” released in July 1995, received rave reviews and sold over two million copies. After afourteen-year musical hiatus, D’Angelo released his third studio album, Black Messiah which peaked at number five on the US Billboard 200.

D’Angelo brought true gangster RnB presence to 2016’s Bluesfest, with his energetic and magnetic show

“When Bluesfest confirmed Kendrick Lamar we had the guy who produced the best record in Hip Hop this year, and now we have the guy who recorded the best current record in R&B: D’Angelo,” says Festival Director Peter Noble. “We now have playing at Bluesfest, on the same stage and on the same night (Thu 24th March), the two most important innovators in Rap and R&B today.”

Hiatus Kaiyote

Describing their genre as “Multi-Dimensional, Polyrhythmic Gangster Shit”, Hiatus Kaiyote brought the true magic of unique Soul driven music to the Bluesfest this year. It is really important that the best of Australian music is also showcased at such a well renowned festival, and this unique band from Melbourne certainly ‘cut the mustard’ up against some of the world’s best and most seasoned artists. We loved the outstanding harmonies, the killer rhythm section and Nai Palm’s quirky vocal style.

Allen Stone

A true dynamic and open hearted performer, Allen Stone (Seattle, USA), brings that authenticity that is aligned with soul music and transcends all pop conventionHe has been Bluesfest favourite artists for several years. His new album “Radius” [ATO Records] came out on 25th of March. We brought it at the BluesFest and its been on high rotation ever since!

Vintage Trouble

The absolutely energetic stage moves and raw soul of the band “Vintage Trouble” was one of the highlights of our Bluesfest experience. Frontman Ty Taylor and band brought the open heartedness of Soul into the energy of Rock and wowed audiences this year. This is one thing we love about Bluesfest, the epic discoveries you find as you meander around the festival from one awesome music tent to the next.

St Paul and the Broken Bones

Another highlight was the a-maz-ing vocal power of front man Paul Janeway from St. Paul and The Broken Bones (Alabama, USA). The band cooked, the energy was high, the crowd hooted and they responded with soul!