We’d like to welcome you to the groove portion of your festival weekend. If this sextet from Toronto happens to be gracing the stage you’re at, then you, my friends, have arrived at the party.

Since 2017, The Free Label have gotten even the most reluctant booties up and shakin’ from coast to coast to other continents’ coasts, with their fusion of disco, R&B and funk. Cowbell? That’s been played out. With apologies to that certain legendary Saturday Night Live skit, it’s like when you’ve got a fever — and the only cure is more keytar.

That handheld synthesizer vibes along with throbbing bass, tight jazzy drums, good-god-y’all guitar, a second keyboardist and lead vocalist John Tkakas taking control of the soul. The lineup has been mostly intact since they met in college last decade, and when they stare in awe at a colleague’s solo or they unify in one throbbing, pulsating, virtuosic rhythm, it reminds you of what should be a funk-music truism: your band won’t sound this tight unless they’re genuinely tight-knit. They may throw in a Stevie Wonder cover, or even Alice in Chains, but there’s only one certainty during a Free Label set: You. Will. Dance.

- Jason Markusoff