The Soulicitors

I’d heard tell that Clapping Monkeys tap dance, so I couldn’t miss their show, March 19 at the Slice.

You never quite know what to expect with this band as they can play everything from indie pop, to ’90s style Blind Melonesqe rock.


I arrived just in time for the foot stomping Celtic part of the show. The band set the beat as frontman Brock Jellison kicked off his sneakers, donned tap shoes and launched into a freewheeling tap dance on a microphoned board set on the stage that would make Fred Astaire proud, or at least raise his eyebrows and ask what the hell was going on.

Guitarist Cornelius Cole showed his chops and a variety of up tempo styles on the guitar
THE SOULICITORS KELLY CALLIN BLOWS SOME SAXOPHONE, MARCH 19 AT THE SLICE. PHOTO BY RICHARD AMERY

throughout and Dan Espelien was playing some cool bass. If you missed the tapping monkeys, er Clapping Monkeys, catch them at the Owl Acoustic Lounge, March 25.


The main event of the night made me want to form a band. That was because Edmonton’s Soulicitors had a room full of pretty girls dancing in front of the stage, eventually joining the band on stage to dance.

They played upbeat, friendly and oddly familiar sounding reggae pop music that was equal parts Bob Marley and Karl Wolf with a quite a bit of Sublime.


THE SOULICITORS WELCOMED THEIR FANS ON STAGE TO DANCE. PHOTO BY RICHARD AMERY

While the songs had an air of sameness about them, they had an unstoppable groove and addictive vocals melodies and even added the odd saxophone to a couple numbers.

They wanted to party as the djembe player leaped into the crowd with his drum and played among them.


They began their second set with an a cappella version of a Sublime song, built up the energy again for the rest of the band to join them and before anyone knew it , it was already past 1 a.m. and time to end the show much to the disappointment of the cheering crowd.

— By Richard Amery, L.A. Beat Editor - L.A.Beat

The Soulicitors
Feeling irie: Soulicitors keep it laid back

Bryan Birtles / bryan@vueweekly.com

For Sonic Band of the Month the Soulicitors, music ought to be kept simple. There's no real need for diminished-fourth chords when the goal is getting people to dance. In fact, there's no real need for more than three or four chords at all.

"Our main priority is to have a good time, to get people out and get people dancing and to spread the word," explains guitarist and vocalist Kelly Callin. "Our songs are pretty simple—we go more for melody and hooks and stuff like that as opposed to any deeper side of it. We're a reggae band, y'know, so we want melody and we wanna stick in your head."

The prairies aren't exactly a breeding ground for reggae music, but Callin explains that he and his bandmates discovered the laid-back rhythms through ska bands and especially the Clash.

"I grew up a punk rock kid and my first real introduction to reggae was a band like the Clash—bunch of white guys that had some Jamaican influence from Brixton or whatever," he laughs. "That was a gateway for me and I know a lot of the guys in the band were involved in skate-punk culture so you get some of the ska and the reggae from that as well."

The group's laid-back attitude even extended into the recording of its new CD, entitled What You Need. Recorded live off the floor at Sound Extractor studios with Stew Kirkwood, the band wasn't too worried about making mistakes, just finding the groove.

"I think so—we play very simple music, so unless there's a glaring mistake we'll try and keep what we've got. To us, we're not a technical band and although we played to a click we're not 100-percent-perfect time over the whole album," Callin says. "We're more about having a good time and if it feels good we'll keep it." - Vue weekly