War
Concert of Colors
July 20, 2025
This review is from Concert of Colors, billed as “one of the nation’s longest-running, largest, free and global music festivals.” With multiple stages and venues, the festival mainly took place inside and outside of the Detroit Institute of Arts in Detroit’s cultural district.
It was a joke that got told 101 times over the weekend, but I never really got sick of it.
“Coming up next… the only War we want!”
For this immensely liberal crowd at Concert of Colors, that was 100 percent true.
You could see the droves of people starting to fill up the lawn outside of the Detroit Institute of Arts as War got set up on the stage. The sun was setting. The weather was cool. Everything felt like summer in Detroit, when the other main piece of conversation was, “wow, you can really feel the city coming to life this weekend” over great music and great vibes.
It certainly didn’t matter to this audience that War – one of the biggest soul and funk bands to ever emerge – features only a single original member Leroy "Lonnie" Jordan. And major love to him because for founding a band all the way in 1969, this guy can still belt it out.
You can’t oversell the “biggest soul and funk bands ever” title, because they actually sold more albums than anyone in 1973 with “The World Is A Ghetto.” Throughout their brisk, upbeat 90-minute set to a packed lawn, they pulled a ton of material from that album.
It was like a greatest hits album performed live. I was left with my jaw on the floor remembering just how many radio hits War has pulled over in this decades-long journey through sound. “Spill The Wine!” “The Cisco Kid!” “Why Can’t We Be Friends?”
It’s still an absolute flex that, after all of that, you can close with “Low Rider” and have the crowd go insane.
It’s like the band was almost responding to the quip of “the only War we want!” from the crowd. Throughout the sets I saw at Concert of Colors, there was of course political messaging that came across. But the main feel from the bands themselves, like War, and the crowd, was this idea of being kind to each other, of finding love and of working on ourselves.
Which can feel a little bit like maybe we’re all grappling with helplessness in this current political climate, so let’s focus on what we can actually control.
But when it’s delivered by a band with the credentials of War, with solid musicianship and elegance to a packed audience on a beautiful day, it’s easy to quit worrying and get into the groove and ask yourself, “why can’t we be friends?”
