During the 1960s, the sound of Twin Cities rock ’n’ roll evolved from rockabilly to surf rock to British-influenced rock. By 1966, it was moving in yet another direction: soul music.

Many established bands were adding a few soul tunes to their sets. But some of the groups with horn sections played it full-time. Including Dave Brady and the Stars — the first overtly integrated band in Minneapolis. Previously, many Black musicians had passed as white to perform with white groups.

It was Minneapolis R&B legend Jimmy Hill who brought Dave Brady and the Stars together. The group’s core lineup of mainly high-school-aged musicians featured four Black members: singers Dave Brady, Wally Lockhart, and Jimmy Lawrence, as well as keyboard and sax player Carl Bradley.

The four remaining members were white: guitarist Bill Lubov, bassist Bill Brisley, trumpet player Mark Skok, and drummer Tom Hoth.

Dave Brady and the Stars’ first gig was at Magoo’s, a pizza place located on Nicollet Avenue just north of Lake Street. Guitarist Bill Lubov (LOO-bah’v) later said that there were only six people in the place. They played a few songs, and all those people disappeared. The band didn’t mind; they just practiced instead. They later found out that those six people had gone to tell their friends about the hot new R&B band at Magoo’s. Within 45 minutes, the place was packed.

Dave Brady and the Stars played at many of the same clubs where the white rock ’n’ roll bands played — the Marigold, the Marian, the Prom, the Barn, Someplace Else in Robbinsdale, the Prison in Burnsville — but there were clubs that wouldn’t book them. According to Lubov, “there was a very clear divide between Black clubs and white clubs. White clubs very rarely permitted any Black players at all, let alone a Black band. The Black clubs were not welcoming at all to white bands, except maybe one musician.”

As Dave Brady and the Stars toured the greater Minnesota ballroom circuit, they found appreciative crowds in some towns. The first mixed-race band actively performing in the Midwest also got escorted out of some small communities by police when they were met with hostility. As Lubov noted, “There were definitely two different communities, and R&B was the outlier.”

Dave Brady and the Stars were an innovative and forward-thinking band that didn’t let racial barriers prevent them from making music. Their fiery combination of doo-wop harmonies, rhythm and blues, and rock was foundational to what we now know as the “Minneapolis Sound.”

You can learn more by reading the chapter about Dave Brady and the Stars in Rick Shefchik’s book Everybody's Heard About the Bird: The True Story of 1960s Rock ’n’ Roll in Minnesota, published by the University of Minnesota Press. 

The Current’s 2024 Black History Month content is a collaboration with the University of Minnesota Press. For more, see Celebrate Black History Month 2024 With The Current.