The seasoned Grand Rapids blues outfit outpolled four other West Michigan bands to take home the top prize in Sunday’s competition hosted by the West Michigan Blues Society at Billy’s Lounge.
Winning Ways: Rochelle & The Spoilers are headed to Memphis after winning the Billy’s Lounge competition. (Photo/Steve Salter)
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In the end, it was the most seasoned of the competing bands to take home the top prize.
Grand Rapids’ Rochelle & The Spoilers won Sunday’s Blues Challenge hosted by the West Michigan Blues Society at Billy’s Lounge, topping four other competitors and qualifying for a trip to Memphis for the Blues Foundation’s International Blues Challenge in January.
“We were so thrilled to win and we are honored to represent West Michigan blues in Memphis,” said lead singer Rochelle Sund Lutz of Rochelle & The Spoilers, which was formed more than a decade ago. “It was a high-energy crowd, packed from start to finish (at Billy’s Lounge).”
The Runners-Up: Left Handed Rollers (Photo/Steve Salter)
Holland’s Left Handed Rollers, a five-piece band formed in 2019, was named the runner-up in the competition, which also featured sets by Whitehall’s North Grove Killers and Grand Rapids’ Mojo Indigo and Beer City Blues Band.
Jim Marcusse, of the West Michigan Blues Society, noted that Rochelle & The Spoilers impressed the packed house with a “killer version of Bonnie Raitt’s ‘Love Sneakin’ Up on You.'”
The winning band will now join more than 200 other acts at the international competition taking place in late January on Beale Street in Memphis.
In addition, Rochelle & The Spoilers will open the West Michigan Blues Society’s Dec. 4 “Holiday Party” at Billy’s Lounge, an event headlined by blues guitarist Amanda Fish from Kansas City. The Grand Rapids band will also get a chance to play a date at Billy’s Lounge to help cover its trip expenses to Memphis.
PHOTO GALLERY: Blues Challenge at Billy’s Lounge
Photos by Steve Salter
