I attended the 2016 WMNF Tropical Heatwave festival in Ybor City. I saw 12 of the 50 bands and when I heard the station had put together a Heatwave Faves concert at Skipper’s Smokehouse in Tampa, I wanted to be first in line to get in. WMNF chose three of the 50 bands from Heatwave based on their feedback from a WMNF survey on their website. Station Manager Randy Wind said WMNF selected artists based on how many people chose them as their favorite band of the festival. Some venues were larger than others, so a percentage was taken into consideration as well as, “a cohesion of styles”, according to Wind.
I’d seen jazzy-blues sensation Vanessa Collier at Heatwave and was delighted she was the second act. I hadn’t seen either The War and Treaty (first act) or Trae Pierce and the T-Stones Band (last act) so I was stoked to get my first look and listen to them.
The War and Treaty kicked off the night. Husband and wife combo Michael Trotter Jr. and Tanya Blount-Trotter set up with Michael stepping out in a suit vest, behind a Yamaha keyboard. Tanya stepped out in a Prohibition-Era flapper dress with wrist-length, black, lace gloves. Cellist Thillman Benham was added to the group after the Trotters spotted him at an open mic night.
The Maryland-based trio jumped right into their gospel-revival vibes and almost haunting lyrical tunes. Both Trotters possess incredible range and are acutely aware of each other vocally. Their deep, soulful wails give the impression of a come-to-Jesus moment in church, only The War and Treaty are more socially than religiously driven. Trotter Jr. is quick to promote the group’s social message in-between songs and the songs reflect that consciousness.
“It’s powerful what music can do,” Trotter Jr. said.
Tanya Trotter has some serious vocal chops and can hold a note so long, you’d swear she had a third lung she was drawing from. Their offering, ‘Love Like There’s No Tomorrow’ really epitomized the group’s message and put their talents on full display. I would have liked to hear a more notable contribution from Benham and a brass horn and percussionist would add a lot to round out the their sound but it was a stirring, moving, evocative and passionate set.
Next up was one of my biggest up-and-coming favorites, Vanessa Collier. Collier blew away the audience at Heatwave, and I have since become a fan. I recognize her songs now and even know most of the lyrics but Collier played them out in fresh ways that kept me guessing and the on-hand crowd on the tips of their toes. Original compositions, ‘Tongue Tied’ and ‘I’m Gonna Learn How to Love You’ were complemented by covers of Bonnie Raitt’s ‘Love Me Like a Man’ and BB King’s ‘When Love Comes to Town’. Collier has a great, bluesy voice for her music and can wail like nobody’s business on the sax. She attacks the sax solos with abandon; the balmy, July night forming beads of sweat all over her body, even dripping off the end of her chin. Collier and company performed with such verve it was hard to believe that Friday’s show was their 17th in 25 days. Absent was keyboardist Amos Ang but a couple songs into the set, I hardly noticed.
With all of Collier’s charisma and tenacity, she’s fine stepping back to let guitar prodigy Noe Socha wail on his hollow-body Heritage.
“I think it gives great energy when it’s not just me; it’s a team effort,” Collier said. “It’s what I’ve always wanted to be about.”
Socha, who also plays a slashing harmonica, has a very unorthodox picking style. I only found out after the second time watching him play that he’s legally blind.
Collier continued her all-out assault on her alto saxophone and jumped into the audience, making it almost to the back of the venue as fans swooned around her. Somehow she made it back to the stage in time to finish the number. She finished her set and the peaked audience was not ready to let go and thus she capped the set with one of her original and award-winning numbers, ‘Bad News Bears’.
The peak of the crowd was in the wane after Collier’s set, but Trae Pierce and the T-Stones Band were not about to let the night slip away quietly. Quite the opposite. Pierce, son Rae Pierce and a whole ensemble took the stage next looking like The Village People set in a Mad Max film. Trae Piece stepping out with a pair of sunglasses studded with two-inch metal spikes. Every member of the T-Stones Band simply bursts with energy and the group’s antics are wildly entertaining. The intimate setting at Skipper’s gave the audience a chance to really feel the heat from this group.
They hit a minor technical glitch as they started one of their original numbers, ‘PSD’ but went full-throttle the rest of the night. Trae Pierce and the T-Stones Band is a cornucopia of showmanship. Trae and Rae take the lead and are masterful with warming up and egging on the audience, using their familial rivalry to ramp up the already boiling intensity. Their Rock/Hip-Hop/Funk fusion vibe comes clear when they play for 15 minutes moving through several cover songs like Backstreet’s ‘No Diggity’, Led Zeppelin’s ‘Whole Lotta Love’, even shuffling in mixes from Rage Against the Machine and The Sugar Hill Gang. Trae Pierce uses a voice modifier to great effect, even using it to tip off Tupac and Dr. Dre’s ‘California Love’ but switching the catch line to, “Tampa, Florida-No Doubt About It”.
Pierce and company wrapped the set with a few strokes left before midnight and jumped back onstage for an encore that took a tour through Rock Master Scott’s, ‘The Roof is on Fire’, banked hard into The Ohio Players’ ‘Fire’ and shifted again into James Brown’s, ‘Sex Machine’.
Funk fusion is alive and well in Florida and Trae Pierce and the T-Stones Band are the flag-bearers.
This article appears in Jul 28 – Aug 4, 2016.