All year long, we welcome nationally and globally touring artists to our stage for Studio Milwaukee Sessions, sponsored by Ellenbecker Investment Group. If you want to be in the live audience for these VIP experiences, become a member today.
Saturday noontime Studio Milwaukee Sessions are a rarity at our Walker’s Point studios, but deviating from the normal schedule isn’t a tough decision when two absurdly talented acts offer to stop by — on consecutive Saturdays, no less.
Seven days after Bartees Strange visited, we opened the doors for Tarriona "Tank" Ball and Norman Spence II of Tank & The Bangas just a few hours before they headlined A La Carte at the Zoo. And it wasn’t long into their set that it became clear our two most recent Studio Milwaukee guests had more in common besides the day of their performance.
Like Strange, the duo from Tank & The Bangas represented a stripped-down version of their full capabilities as a band. But, also like Strange, Ball and Spence pulled off the musical voodoo of making the space feel sonically full throughout their set.
With Spence on a fairly standard keyboard and Ball relying on a voice capable of conveying joy and playfulness and deep emotion — sometimes all at the same time — they rolled through a career-spanning performance that started with the first song they ever wrote and continued with a pair of selections from new album The Last Balloon.
After Tank & The Bangas superfan Jon Adler recovered from the first two songs, he talked with Ball and Spence about the band’s “Balloon” trilogy of records, how New Orleans finds its way into all of their projects (regardless of where they’re recorded), the weird but fun reality of touring and which zoo animals would dig their music the most.
Enjoy the full broadcast performance using the player at the top of the page, and get your name on the guest list for all of our future Studio Milwaukee Sessions by joining the Radio Milwaukee family.
Studio MKE: Tank & The Bangas set list
- “Boxes & Squares”
- “Move”
- “Don’t Count Yourself Out”
