Soul Kitchen first formed in March of 1998 from members Al Michaud (Drums), Steve Grey (Guitar), Tim Merman (Bass), and Doreen Robideaux (Vocals). The band's first gig was later that summer in downtown Monroe. Kelly's Bar in Monroe was their first bar venue. We call this the "Steve Grey" era of the band on our Song List. Much of the "baseline" style and pre-"Jeff" music was chosen during this era, with Jonny Lang and many Motown favorites making their distinction.
When Steve's job took him to Boston with the Christian Science Monitor later that year, Denny Harrigan took over for him on guitar. This began the "Denny" era. Denny's influence was in more technical guitar tunes from Stevie Ray Vaughn and Eric Clapton, reflecting his earlier years playing rock/pop tunes with Tim.
On January 15, 1999, the band asked Jeff Kopmanis to bring a sax coloring to the band's successful sound. Jeff's first gig was a very cold February birthday with an "island theme". Ask about the white jeans. With a sax on board, the band was able to add more
Motown hits, grunty and gritty blues tunes and a wider selection of funk tunes to its repetoire. With Jeff's entry, it marks the beginning of the "Jeff" era on our song list, and when things starting coming together for the band, performing at better venues and even some festivals. In the Winter of 2002, the band decided to put together a collection of original blues tunes to record a CD, and on October 9, 2002, "It's In The Can" was released for sale under the band name "Doreen Robideaux & her Soul Kitchen". The initial run of 1000 CDs is largely sold as of this writing, but it's now for sale
electronically on CD Baby and at the Apple iTunes Music Store. The Fall of 2002 also marked the band's entry into the International Blues Competition, the first round held at Mona's Riverfront Lounge in Toledo. Soul Kitchen won that first round and proceeded to be runner-up in the second round in Bowling Green, Ohio. It was a distinctive run, because SK decided to run with only their original tunes--something no other band had attempted (that year?). In the end, it became a contest of whether the judges liked the original tunes with tenor and baritone saxes or more traditional tunes with a Hammond B3 Organ. Sax vs. B3: B3 tends to win (boo!).
In 2004, Tim Merman was wooed away by the creative sirens of the Third Power Band of Donny Powers, Ed "Budda" Malone to join up, bringing his reggae bass chops to the band. The "Budda" era of the band is pretty clear, because we added a number of reggae tunes to our song list as well as some non-Blues tunes that went over very well with the audiences. Ed's style was much different than Tim's so he had a distinctive effect on the band's sound. During the "Budda" era, the band played many festival gigs, some in the northern portion of Michigan, getting good exposure every time. It was great fun!
In July of 2007, Ed was forced to stop playing for medical reasons, and Doreen decided to move on to another
band after almost 10 years with Soul Kitchen. Tim Merman came back to the band to fill the vacancy on bass. This was the end of a very long and uninterrupted period of Soul Kitchen's gigs. For years, other bands had remarked how we'd managed to stay together for so long. Doreen came back in May of 2008 to fill in on vocals for a gig at Tony Packo's At The Ballpark, but she's now moved on for good. This begins a year-long era we mark simply as "interim", while we searched for a singer that was able to sing with the group and rehearse on a weekly basis. Even though singerless, Soul Kitchen continued to work on tunes, so there are a few additions to the book during this period, mostly due to candidates' suggestions for their auditions.
In September of 2008, we found our new singer, Sue Nordman of Ann Arbor, through an add in the Detroit Blues Society email list. Sue spent time doing acoustic blues and filling in on open mike nights, building her blues chops and her reputation. This marks the beginning of the "Sue" era for the band, and she and Tim have already made their distinctive touches to the band's song list. As Sue got up to speed, the economy tanked and gigs were few and far between, but we managed to get in what we could. At the end of July of 2009, Sue informed us that wasn't able to continue with the band--changes in her time commitments in other bands and in her personal situation made it unfair to the band to continue. Soul Kitchen wishes her all the best in her acoustic groups and in her personal life...it was great fun, Sue!
After only a few weeks of searching and tryouts, on August 14, 2009, we hit a home run off of Craig's
List and asked Stephanie Williams of Toledo to join the group as our new vocalist and keyboard player. Her former performances were mostly solo piano and vocalist, so Stephanie comes to us confident and eager to broaden her horizons. Stephanie's keyboard skills will bring a new color and an additional chording instrument to the band, easing the load on Denny and Tim for backgrounds during the new "Stephanie" era of the band. After a couple of initial gigs, we've found that she does what we do: ham it up in front of a crowd!
Last Modified: January 24, 2010 (jjk)
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