DJ Soul Sister’s birthday goes ‘Go Go’

6th September 2016   ·   0 Comments

By Geraldine Wyckoff
Contributing Writer

Melissa Weber, best known on the music scene for spinning rare groves as DJ Soul Sister, celebrates her 41st birthday in a big way – in her way. Renowned for her love of the late guitarist/vocalist Chuck Brown, the “Godfather of Go-Go” and the go-go style he originated in Washington, D.C., Weber invited his group, the 10-piece Chuck Brown Band to perform at her bash at Tipitina’s on Friday, September 9.

“We’re keeping it going –  we didn’t stop,” says the legend’s daughter, vocalist KK Brown. “We’ve been playing since my father died (May 12, 2012). It’s very important to me and my family and especially to the fans because they want to hear the music.”

Weber traveled to the nation’s capital a few weeks ago to hear the Chuck Brown Band for the first time minus its influential and adored leader.  “I saw enough to know that it is still the real deal – crankin’,” she states. “I whole-heartedly think the show was the bomb. It’s also got the ever-important conga player, Mighty Moe (Hagans).

“I’m proud of the band because we have a lot of great musicians who have played with a lot of other people around the world but we all stuck together and we’re still playing to keep his legacy alive,” says KK. “That’s where it started.”

Scooby (the new lead singer and guitarist Frank Sirius)  is playing a big part,” KK continues. “He came to represent my father because he really respected and  honored him. Wiley (vocalist Wiley Brown), my brother, is the one that sounds just like my father. He recently started with the band.”

Weber agrees that Wiley’s voice does remarkably resemble Chuck’s. She also gives kudos to Scooby for bringing authenticity to the sound as a long-time D.C. go-go veteran without trying to imitate the late, great leader.

KK explains the genre’s name saying, “It’s go-go because it keeps on going.” That was one of Chuck Brown’s signatures, he just didn’t like to stop. For instance, at his appearance at the 2003 Essence Festival, where he was scheduled to perform two, back-to-back superlounge shows, he asked, “Do I have to take a break?” Well, no. At that long set, tuba man Phil Frazier, trumpeter Kermit Ruffins and trombonist Stafford Agee all jumped on stage with Chuck Brown & the Soul Searches as the crowd chanted, “Wind Me Up Chuck.”

“Go-go is all types of music mixed together in one – Latin music, church music, rock, funk, pop and it uses every type of instrument,” KK offers. “It’s  music that brings people together and makes you feel good.  Anybody who heard the beat they had to tap their feet even if they didn’t know what it was. There’s always somebody who likes go-go. They’ll  say, ‘What’s that?’ and then they’ll want to hear it again.”

“There are so many things that the {go-go} culture has in common with New Orleans music like call and response, neighborhood shout outs, and heavy percussion,” says Weber, while adding that both cultures boast their own language, vocabulary and dances. “I would compare what the 6th Ward is here to what southeast (the southeast area) is to D.C.”

Weber first heard go-go in the mid-1980s, on New Orleans radio station WAIL-105 FM.  “There was a deejay by the name of Slick Leo who would play go-go music – though I don’t think at the time I knew that’s what it was. There was a particular song that he played called ‘Meet Me at the Go-Go’ by Hot Cold Sweat. I loved that song.  Slick Leo was playing D.C. go-go music on New Orleans radio. This wasn’t community radio or NPR, this was commercial urban radio. So it’s a little weird – it’s a little off.”

Naturally, she’d heard Chuck Brown & the Soul Searchers’ chart-topping 1978 hit “Bustin’ Loose,” though, she confesses she didn’t quite equate it with go-go. It was while Weber was in high school and listening to Kalamu ya Salaam’s show on WWOZ-90.7FM that she initially heard Chuck Brown. The experience was an important  link in her “connecting the dots” exploration of the musical genre.

“The thing that I’ve come to know about go-go music is that it is more translatable live. So albums aren’t really a thing. Most people get their music through what’s known as PA tapes – bootlegs that were recorded at shows. It’s a live music culture. The band (Chuck Brown Band) has 10 members but that’s not rare. Even the younger bands today will have 10, 11, 12 members. So they’re keeping live music alive in the same way as our young brass bands do.”

KK calls go-go music and its culture a “family affair.”

“Grandparents pass it on to their kids and then they pass it on to their kids and that’s how it keeps going. It doesn’t matter your age. Good music brings good people together.”

Weber, who will be spinning some platters to open the show, can’t emphasize enough how respected Brown was in the D.C. community.  “He was like the mayor of D.C. They just celebrated the 2nd annual Chuck Brown Day and there’s a Chuck Brown Memorial Park.”

KK, who started performing with her father in 2000 at age 20, has a message to those heading to Weber’s go-go birthday celebration. “Tell New Orleans to get ready for us because we’re comin’ and we can’t wait to party with them. We love New Orleans. They remind us of us because they love music.”

This article originally published in the September 5, 2016 print edition of The Louisiana Weekly newspaper.