Touring behind a brand new album, “The Last Balloon,” Tank & The Bangas open tonight for Trombone Shorty at Meijer Gardens. The Local Spins Q&A with this electrifying, eclectic band.
‘Music is the Poetry, The Poetry is the Music’: Tank of Tank & The Bangas (Photo/Derek Ketchum)
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In the city of New Orleans, the music clings to your clothes just like the humidity. At all hours of the day, in the streets and in the bars, the spontaneous sounds of jazz, blues and soul collide with one another.
It’s along the historic corridors of The French Quarter where much of this occurs. Brass bands march down the middle of the street; a jazz trio can be seen through the smokey windows of a small club; a lone wolf saxophone player lets it rip from a busy corner.
But not all the music is spontaneous or off the cuff. For Tank & The Bangas, it took years of planning, practice and refining their craft.
In 2017, that hard work culminated in winning the NPR Tiny Desk Contest, a feat that catapulted the New Orleans band to national recognition and sold out shows across the country.
Nearly 10 years later, they’ve kept up the momentum, recording and touring steadily behind each new record. This summer finds Tank & The Bangas on the road with another New Orleans mainstay, Trombone Shorty & Orleans Avenue.
The tour makes its stop tonight (June 15) in West Michigan at Frederik Meijer Gardens & Sculpture Park. The show begins at 6:30 p.m. and tickets are still available to non-members for $85 online here.
The band performs at Meijer Gardens after playing a headlining show Friday at Bell’s Brewery in Kalamazoo. (Scroll down for a photo gallery.)
Ahead of the Grand Rapids tour stop, Local Spins conducted a Q&A with two founding members of Tank & The Bangas, Tarriona “Tank” Ball and Norman Spence, about their 15-year journey as a band, the city of New Orleans and making a living on the road.
Local Spins: You’re from New Orleans, a city rebound for its vibrant music landscape, food and culture. I’m wondering what makes it unique to you?
Tarriona “Tank” Ball: In the United States, that’s definitely what makes it special. And there are so many people that came in and out of it to make it special before it was even considered New Orleans. I think at one point it was even called the City of Tongues, because so many different dialects and people traveled through. Because it was such a big place of trade in that crescent. So the fact that so many people have come through makes it very special. With the Native Americans and the French and the Spanish and the Haitians, the African people. It’s very island-y, surrounded by water, it’s got different customs and different dances, different foods. So when you’re there, you know, it feels like Spain, it feels like Paris. You know, it just feels like these places because all of those people were there and made it special. You can’t even change a doorknob in certain neighborhoods without getting the city’s permission. Because it’s just so, the architecture, all of it, it’s just so special. It’s so special that honestly they need to do more to protect the whole country because it’s older than you. So they need to do more to protect it.
The Band at Bell’s: And playing Meijer Gardens Monday night. (Photo/Derek Ketchum)
Local Spins: What are some of the ways you feel the city has evolved over the years?
Tank: It changes a lot. In some ways, that storm, hurricane Katrina changed it a lot. Things literally haven’t been the same since then. Buildings, houses, certain things look like a storm hit it last week. In other ways, you get new bands, new sounds coming together, new people with different ideas, you know. They can be a lot of bad and good going on in a lot of cities. They try to keep their resilience alive through the people, for sure, through the second-line culture, through the black masking. You know, they try to keep a lot of tradition and love alive through the culture.
Local Spins: How about your band? In what ways has it evolved?
Tank: Well, it would be mostly a whole different band. That’s it, but really no regrets, you know. I love that each person that I ever work with always brings a new sound, a new feeling, a new creative input, which also always helps the output. Just doing what I always told myself, you know, just to always keep moving forward. Keep moving forward. And to, I guess, believe in yourself more and probably even read more books on leadership, probably. I doubt that would help, you know. I’m looking at myself from where I was to where I am now. And definitely, you know, proud because a lot of what happened for us, I didn’t expect to happen for us.
Local Spins: After winning the 2017 Tiny Desk Contest, your profile and audience grew substantially. What was going on in your head during that time?
Tank: When it started to grow, it felt like everybody was catching on to what we had been already previously doing for years. It felt amazing to see all these dates sold out. You know, everything was sold out constantly. And it was just like, wow, this is amazing. I think we even got used to it. And then ever since COVID, it’s harder to sell out things because I honestly believe that when everybody was stuck inside and watching verses and watching concerts on their phone, that they began to think that that was the way to enjoy a concert period. And they started to become even more addicted to their phones because it’s all we had and you didn’t want to come out as much. So that definitely changed the dynamics because it felt like once we got back on the road again, that it was harder to garner. And what was before, because everything had changed. People’s minds had changed, you know.
Local Spins: What has your experience been like on the road so far this tour..what are some of the highs and lows thus far?
Norman: It’s been a good time. It’s fun creating the new set with the new music and mixing in little pieces of the old and literally watching the fans. They just light up when we do something old and they also light up just as bright when we do something new because they’ve been loving the new music. And they’re always very interested to see how we’re going to present it to them live because it’s never the same as the records. Or never the same as the last show. So it’s been a good time.
Local Spins: There’s often poetry infused in your music, whether it be the lyrics or the cadence. Why is it important that your songs have this element?
Tank: Because it was just easy, so easy to write my feelings, you know, it’s easier to write my feelings than to create a melody, you know, at times. You know, I always encourage people to do it. It won’t judge you back. Its opinion literally is its own reflective work. And, you know, that’s why it’s so important. I love that the band always knows that that’s important to me and to incorporate it. You know, the music is the poetry, the poetry is the music, you know, if I have a poem, I can literally make it a poem or a song. It’s whatever it chooses to be at that moment. I’ve been writing since I was 12, writing poetry. If they put it to a cadence and a rhyme, it’ll stick in your mind a little better. It’s like you get the message when it’s presented in a melodic or poetic way.
VIDEO: Tank & The Bangas, “Ain’t That Deep” (from 2026’s “The Last Balloon”)
PHOTO GALLERY: Tank & The Bangas, Ariel J. at Bell’s Beer Garden
