Northern Soul
Northern soul is a British dance scene built around rare, fast American soul records from the 1960s, named after the northern English clubs where it grew.
The scene took shape in the late 1960s at clubs such as the Twisted Wheel in Manchester and later Wigan Casino, where DJs competed to find obscure singles in the uptempo Motown style. The music has a heavy, steady beat and urgent vocals, and dancers answer it with spins, kicks and drops at all-night events. It is unusual in being defined by collectors and dancers in Britain, not by the American artists who made the records.
Artists it is known for: Frank Wilson, Gloria Jones, Dobie Gray.
- Family
- R&B & Soul
- On Spotify
- A current genre
- What it is
- A scene
- From
- Northern England, late 1960s
- Trackify listeners who play it
- 2%
About 1,900 of 83,000 Trackify listeners with public profiles have northern soul among their top artists of the last four weeks. Rounded; updated 13 November 2026.
Northern Soul artists
Marvin Gaye
The Isley BrothersThe northern soul artists most Trackify listeners have in their top fifty. Each opens on Spotify.
Sources
The definition is written for this site from open sources, and was checked against them on 13 November 2026.