Like her musical style, which is adding to already favorite genres and classics, Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas also add to the meaning of the word "hybrid." Raised a baker's daughter in Detroit's famous Mexicantown, her fresh-faced genre-bending band mixes pop, blues, gypsy-folk, rock, big band and jazz with distinctive soulful vocals. It calls Rock City home and is on its way to being the champion of the Detroit music scene.
The stunningly beautiful Hernandez has a flair for the dramatic. Even snarling and crazy-eyed onstage during the incendiary peaks of her performances, Hernandez is striking with a voice comparable to the sheer powerhouses like Amy Winehouse, Adele and Fiona Apple. But Hernandez is one of a kind. It's doubtful that any of those R&B divas would film a one-take music video in the backseat of a Lincoln Continental. This type of spontaneity and authenticity is where Hernandez thrives.
Both the 5-track EP Demons (released in Nov. 2013) and the Deltas' upcoming album, Secret Evil (out Aug. 19) have elements of black magic. Hernandez sounds like she was born out of a cloud of low-lying fog with evil in her eyes, siren screams on her lips and her faithful troop of jazz-trained musicians at her back.
Never cavalier and always fiery, Secret Evil has moments of distinct pop glory, but is peppered with the quirky musical diversity that makes Hernandez and the Deltas a group to watch, a member of the just-under-the-surface acts that tour the country and produce phenomenal albums, but haven't yet fully broken though to the mainstream. But don't count Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas out of the pop charts just yet. A beautiful woman with a voice that will floor you, a band of talented musicians, a work ethic that won't quit, combined with a little black magic is a cocktail mixed to perfection to take the band places much bigger than its Detroit roots.
Jessica Hernandez and the Deltas
6:30 pm.
Fri., July 18
Parrilla Grill, 635 NW 14th St. | $5.
