Brian London holds on to National Extempo Monarch title

Brian London retained his National Extempo crown on Wednesday evening when he defeated his cousin Winston “Gypsy” Peters at Kaisorama, held at the Queen’s Park Savannah.

After being named the finalists out of the eight competitors on the night, the two went after each other in the “war” segment where they had to sing six verses each. London’s first salvo at Gypsy came when he asked, “If you win, will you take NCC money to pay yourself?” The audience went up in a roar. Gypsy answered saying it was a TUCO competition and NCC had nothing to do with it.

London continued, saying the crown was going Fyzabad while Gypsy said the money was going to Mayaro. The “bomb” came when London told Gypsy he ran from the PP and he was lucky the PNM took him back.

When the two men came onstage again after the results were announced, they were accompanied by Patsy Calliste, wife of veteran calypsonian Leroy “Black Stalin” Calliste, and Shirlaine Hendrickson, vice chairman of the Trinbago Unified Calypsonians' Organisation (TUCO) north zone.

Again, they took the microphone but this time Gypsy sang he did not mind being beaten by his cousin, and London told the audience everything he did was learned from Gypsy.

“Is just that the student beat the teacher tonight,” London said.

“I dedicate this victory to Black Stalin. I told him, before I left San Fernando, I was coming to do it for him.”

He said he and Stalin are very close as he is also his godfather. “I visit him every weekend and I decided to dedicate everything I do this season to Black Stalin. Before I left him to come to the competition, he kissed my hand as if to say go get them.”

London’s victory came after two rounds of extempo. His first topic was, “When they win, the judges know everything.” In the second round he came up against Black Sage with the topic “Spanish women taking over town.”

In his first round, Gypsy had it easy with the topic “The extempo MC.” He then faced off with Lingo in the second round to sing about “The party boat leaking.” After they started off singing about safety aboard pleasure boats, the topic took a turn towards politics with Lingo telling Gypsy about his tenure with the People’s Partnership. Gypsy responded by saying he abandoned that ship for one that was staying afloat (the PNM).

The evening saw several guest artistes performing between the extempo rounds. These included Kid Kalaloo, Ninja, Funny, Brother Ebony and Pink Panther. Most of the songs were humorous and held the audience’s interest. But it was 88-year-old Robert (Lord Nelson) Nelson who had the audience singing along to his hits La La and Meh Lover.

Comedian Tommy Joseph was honoured by TUCO for his contribution to arts and culture.