Band turns to bingo, trivia to connect with fans

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 10/03/2021 (2019 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Every band on the planet is looking for new ways to engage with audiences during the pandemic. For Winnipeg hip-hop ensemble Super Duty Tough Work, innovation comes in the form of bingo cards and online trivia.

The band launched its Hip Hop Bingotrivia event last weekend and will be running an online game and talk show every Sunday through the month of March. The project is hosted by Super Duty frontman Brendan Grey and supported by a Safe at Home grant from the province. The idea for the online program stemmed from a desire to step outside the box.

“We wanted to have something that was more interactive and (had) some more involvement from the audience, as opposed to just, you know, watching a video of us playing music,” Grey says.

Super Duty Tough Work, a seven-piece jazz-infused hip-hop group, formed in 2014 and played live exclusively until releasing its first album, Studies in Grey, in 2019. To say they’re missing playing to a crowd would be an understatement.

“We existed without recorded music for four or five years, we were solely a live performance group,” Grey says. “It was just part of our ethos… the involvement of other people, crowds, audiences, friends, family, all of that.”

Hip Hop Bingotrivia has a few different elements. The program takes place on Facebook Live and features a new guest co-host from the local music scene every week; rapper Anthony OKS joined Grey for the inaugural event and Cree emcee Rey will take part on March 14.

Participants make their own bingo cards at home and fill the squares with tunes from a Spotify playlist of 90 songs curated by Grey — a task that took longer than expected.

“I was putting together the playlist… and it just got to the point where it could be endless,” he says. “I was trying to have an all-encompassing, or as encompassing as possible, selection of songs that weren’t just era specific, while also including local artists. I’m not gonna say hard, but it wasn’t easy.”

During the livestream, Grey picks the first song and sets the playlist on shuffle to randomize the results. Players cross off a square when they hear the associated song; a bingo happens when the required shape is achieved. Grey has also come up with trivia questions for each song, which participants can answer while they play bingo.

Bingo and trivia winners will each receive a prize pack of goodies from Manitoba businesses and organizations valued at $100. Players are also invited to flex their artistic muscles because the person with the most creative bingo card at the end of March will receive a prize valued at $250.

“It’s just another way for people to be engaged and involved,” Grey says. “Perhaps bingo is not your thing, perhaps you don’t have the knowledge for trivia, but perhaps you’re artistically inclined, one of the elements of hip-hop is graffiti art, right?”

Visit superdutytoughwork.ca/bingo for more details.

eva.wasney@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: @evawasney