CBUS Soul Fest lineup: Tony! Toni! Toné!, J Rawls and more set to perform
CBUS Soul Fest is returning Downtown to Genoa Park this summer, bringing with it a day of good food, good music and a whole lot of soul.
Now in its third year, the festival, hosted by the Columbus Recreation and Parks Department, is a celebration and recognition of the city's rich Black culture, history, innovation and its vibrant presence in the Greater Columbus community.
From 4-11 p.m. on Saturday, Aug. 17, the festival will have free admission and vendors to provide a variety of food and beverage options.
The Columbus Recreation and Parks Department recently announced this year's official lineup of musicians. Here is what to know about them:
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J Rawls
A familiar face to students at Ohio State University School of Music, J Rawls (or Dr. Jason Rawls to his students), is a hip-hop musician, producer, DJ and assistant professor of hip-hop at the university. With three solo albums and producing credits for artists such as Del the Funky Homosapien, Domo Genesis (Odd Future) and Beastie Boys, Rawls is no stranger to the scene and has been producing chill beats and dropping bars since the early 2000s, a prolific era for the underground hip-hop movement.
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On top of his music career, Rawls is an educator and academic whose scholarship highlights hip-hop as an asset to classrooms and youth development. Currently, he is leading a team dedicated to developing the hip-hop studies at OSU's School of Music and Department of African American and African Studies. Rawls is also the founder of Polar Entertainment, a production company which combines his expertise in both fields to produce hip-hop based educational content and music.
His forthcoming dance album, "Bump the Floor," is set to release in July and features a vibrant blend of subgenres such as Afro house, deep house, organic house and funk.
The Liquid Crystal Project
The Liquid Crystal Project is the band side project of Rawls, created in 2006 with the album release of "J Rawls Presents: The Liquid Crystal Project Vol. 1." The band gained national acclaim for their venture into the genre Rawls coined as "jazz-hop."
Though their roots are here in Columbus, the band's special sound — sleek, funky, immersive, ebbing and flowing — found a significant fanbase in Europe, which took the band on a tour around the continent in 2009.
More recently, the band released "B.L.A.M. (Black Lives Always Mattered)" in 2020, featuring tracks dedicated to and named after victims of police brutality including Henry Taylor Green, who was shot and killed by the Columbus Division of Police in 2016. Declaring the names of each of these individuals in remembrance, the band released the EP to serve as a tribute to the fallen and as a stark reminder to listeners about the preciousness of Black life.
Kindred the Family Soul
Hailing from Philadelphia, the husband-and-wife R&B and soul duo consisting of Aja Graydon and Fatin Dantzler go way back to their teenage years, when they first met at a production camp.
When the two got married, they became a creative force whose gentle melodies and passionate lyrics highlight the love shared between families and couples. As artists, they said they hope to build positive representations of Black love in the music industry.
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The couple released their first album as Kindred the Family Soul in 2003, "Surrender to Love," which received a Soul Train Award and a BET Award nomination and yielded hit love songs such as "Far Away" and "Stars." Throughout their career, they've released a total of seven albums, each an ode to the bond they share as life partners, both in the studio and as a family.
Brianna O'Dell
Brianna O'Dell is a Columbus-based singer-songwriter and nurse whose unique style incorporates several genres including jazz, hip-hop, R&B and gospel music. All throughout her life, music has been a persistent presence, from her grandparents who played in New York jazz and blues bands, singing in her church choir to her time as a jazz and vocal-studies student at Ohio State University.
Around the city, she has performed the national anthem at Columbus Clippers and Columbus Crew games.
Music played an especially crucial role for O'Dell in darker times in her life when she became the victim of domestic abuse during the pandemic. It was in these times that she wrote her debut EP "Resilience," which chronicles her journey toward healing.
Her newest single, "You," is an acoustic track entirely written and produced by herself and is a soft, reflective expression of her love for her young daughter and the legacy that she wants to leave behind for her.
O'Dell's band is to accompany her onstage for Soul Fest 2024, and she even hinted that a few special guests may be joining her.
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Tony! Toni! Toné!
This R&B and soul trio act was founded in the '80s and is comprised of brothers D'Wayne Wiggins and Raphael Saadiq and their cousin, Timothy Christian Riley. With roots in Oakland, California, Tony! Toni! Toné! made its mark in the soul and R&B scene of the 1980s and 1990s, with 12 tracks having made their way to Billboard's top 10 on R&B and hip-hop charts.
Their sophomore album, "The Revival," went platinum the next year and yielded hits such as "Feels Good" and "It Never Rains (In Southern California)." Afterward, they went on to contribute to soundtracks for the movies "House Party 2" and "Boyz N the Hood."
By the time the trio released their fourth album, "House of Music," in 1996, each of the members were beginning to build up their own prolific solo music careers, though they still made appearances together as a performing entity. Last year, the trio reunited as Tony! Toni! Toné! for their "Just Me and You" tour.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: Soul Fest 2024 brings lineup of soul, hip-hop, R&B artists to Downtown
