Soka in Moka scores

IT IS entirely possible that for the second year in a row, a Grenadian soca artiste may have the most impactive song for the Trinidad Carnival season.

While last year was dominated by Mr Killa's Run With It, this year the spice isle's Skinny Banton has enthralled crowds with his very popular Wrong Again.

At Trinity College's Soka in Moka on Sunday night, the young singer received generous cheers from fete-goers who sang along with the artiste as he asked the question, "What I do wrong again?"

The song has been enjoying heavy rotation on radio since last year and this was reflected by the crowd's ability to sing the lyrics word for word and with a connection to the content that was almost comical.

The artiste asked the Moka audience, "Who never get horn in their life?" Very few hands went up.

While Banton was a crowd favourite, he shared that title with a very feisty Nadia Batson, who started her performance with the very popular song Fatt, and Patrice Roberts, who walked on stage and sang Carry On, just one of her very popular songs released this year.

Three bands performed throughout the night, starting with Dil-e-Nadan joined by St Lucia's Lashley Winter (Motto) –another crowd-pleaser and Olatunji Yearwood.

Blaxx and D'All Starz followed with Blaxx asking the crowd to take a first jump for the new polymer $100 bill.

While older soca music is a staple in the Carnival season, there seemed to be more old songs played than new ones as the audience clearly connected to the older music.

This was evidenced by crowd reaction to Blaxx's highlighting of brass and singing older songs and Swappi's tribute to Shadow, both in song and clothing choice. Swappi also brought on stage veteran soca singer Baron, who crooned along to Feeling It, which Baron originally recorded.

Nailah Blackman also had a throwback to old-school soca during her set with D' All Starz and when she asked the crowd what they wanted, they readily supplied the answer of "more soca."

Also performing during D'All Starz segment was Lyrikal who lifted the crowd with his power soca offering Rukshun, Mical Teja, Farmer Nappy and Lil Bitts, Ricardo Drue, and newcomer Leonce.

Shortly after 10 pm, host Nicky Crosby announced the so-called president of the red man association, and Kes the Band started its performance with last year's favourite, Savannah Grass, quickly followed by this year's hit, Boss Lady, before launching into the band's other hits. He was joined on stage by Voice to sing their song, Dear Promoter, another crowd favourite.

For about two hours from the start of the all-inclusive fete, patrons avoided the area near the stage in favour of the food zone.

One of the Carnival season's early all-inclusive experiences, patrons, during the early hours, seemed less interested in the soca music as they were interested in the diverse offerings of food near the entrance of the fete.

The food zone featured choices of seafood cocktails, a pasta station, Indian food, bake and shark and a wing bar, with a never-ending line of those waiting to taste.

The drink stations, spread across the fete area included a traditional bar, as well as a Sangria station and a wine bar.

The night was filled with good music, great foods and smiles on faces.

No dancehall was played at this event, whether local or otherwise.