Soul is in My Soul

I grew up on an eclectic mix of music. In the early days, it was whatever my parents or baby sitters liked–bee-bop, Connie Francis, John Denver, and Gordon Lightfoot’s The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald. My tweens and teens rolled into movie soundtracks, anything Olivia Newton-John, The Beatles, and the buttery voice of 1980’s Casey Kasem Top 40. Along the way I sampled a whole lot of other music–whatever my friends or boyfriends were listening to, and whatever was interesting and cheap at a garage sale on 8-track or vinyl. In my 20’s I moved near the grunge capital of the world, Seattle, and so dutifully listened to 107.7 FM The End in its beginnings. My favorite then was 4 Non Blondes. In my 30’s I found local music and played my loves over and over, discovering that what I connected with most were tunes I could sing along with. When I reached the age to be making a bucket list, and dabble in public performance, garage band floated near the top. But what songs would I sing? I went to karaoke and tried on a few for size. Each time I caught myself singing along with a song with abandon, I wrote it down on a silly yellow post-it and tossed it in my desk drawer. When I finally cleaned my desk, I noticed most of those songs were classic soul by Otis Redding, Aretha Franklin, Bill Withers, and Etta James. That realization led me to those influenced by them, like Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings, Amy Winehouse, and James Morrison. When I started looking around my own neighborhood for a soul cover band to obsess over, it took me only 15 minutes to find the amazing Supergroup, Baby Cakes. Turns out, they are already playing half my song list, with a lot more in their future line up. I was delighted to get to know them for this WhatcomTalk.com article. All of their future performances are now on my calendar because they play my favorite songs with their full heart and soul, and I can feel that power in my own.