In The Groove: Celebrate 313 Day with a Motor City music mix

It’s not possible to cover the entire Detroit musical universe in a three-hour set, but I tried to pull from every galaxy to present the 313 Day Motor City Mix 2024 with all Detroit musicians. There are no songs about Detroit here — just the bounty of creativity from the greatest music city on earth.

The mix starts at an important place — the Black church — which is the ultimate foundation of music for Detroit and many other cities. The amount of musicians who grew up in church, learned their basics there, and went on to create some of the greatest songs of all time is staggering, and needs to be recognized right at the top with the Clark Sisters. Without the Black church, Detroit would not be the music city that it is.

There’s also plenty of nods to jazz legends like Marcus Belgrave and Donald Byrd, who used their music and mentorship to fundamentally change the sonic landscape of America and make sure the next generation was ready to do the same. Passing the torch is something the electronic scene of the city picked up too, with innovators-turned-teachers such as Carl Craig, Underground Resistance, Jon Dixon and Moodymann carving out space on the playlist.

And there’s no doubt plenty of distortion, big guitars and drums from the rock scene, with the Stooges, Dirtbombs, Gories and Death bringing the heat.

An incomplete list to be sure, but a playlist that aims to touch every corner of Detroit and represent each scene.

In The Groove playlist for March 13, 2024

• “Ha-ya (Eternal Life)” – The Clark Sisters & Mattie Moss Clark
• “Boogie Chillen” – John Lee Hooker
• “Your Southern Can Is Mine” – White Stripes
• “Can You Get To That” – Funkadelic
• “2 + 2 = ?” – Bob Seger System
• “Lyk U Use 2 (feat. Andres)” – Moodymann
• “It’s A Desperate Situation” – Marvin Gaye
• “Cristo Redentor” – Donald Byrd
• “Day Dreaming” – Aretha Franklin
• “Baby Girl” – Eddie Logix
• “Want it (Jon’s 6 Mile Edit)” – Jon Dixon, Amp Fiddler, Dames Brown
• “Detroit Is It” – Luckywood
• “Light It” – J Dilla
• “The New” – J Dilla
• “Stop” – J Dilla
• “Keep On Knocking” – Death
• “I Wanna Be Your Dog” – The Stooges
• “Thunderbird ESQ” – The Gories
• “Save Their Souls” – Bohannon
• “Let The Moon Get Into It” – Soft Location
• “Change (Mike Huckaby remix)” – Norm Talley
• “You Gonna Make Me Love Somebody Else” – The Jones Girls
• “Sweet Love” – Anita Baker
• “Can’t Take It” – Dwele & Recloose
• “Abandoned Car Seat” – Kevin Reynolds
• “Midnight Blue” – Kenny Burrell
• “Love Child” – Diana Ross & the Supremes
• “Detroit State of Mind” – eLZhi / Will Sessions
• “Air (feat. DOOM)” – Dabrye
• “Feat. Phat Kat” – J Dilla
• “Knights of the Jaguar” – DJ Rolando
• “Sharivari” – Dirtbombs
• “Check Stub” – DJ Assault
• “Timeline” – Underground Resistance
• “Nite Life” – ADULT.
• “Think Twice” – Detroit Experiment
• “Behold” – James Jamerson
• “I Wonder” – Rodriguez
• “As” – Stevie Wonder

Listen to In the Groove with host Ryan Patrick Hooper weekdays from noon-3 p.m. ET on 101.9 WDET or stream on-demand at wdet.org.