The lyrics are easy to recall, easy for anyone to sing – but the song’s premise is anything but simple.
Austin “SuperBlue” Lyons and Romell “Smiddy” Smith’s Canboulay Dancers aims to introduce the story of the 1881 and 1884 Canboulay Riots to new generations.
The single was released on December 26. SuperBlue wrote it, Smiddy produced it, and it features live brass by Temperature the Band.
It could never be denied that SuperBlue’s work laid the foundation for today’s soca. Flags waving, people jumping, dust raising and wildly gyrating hips are symbolic of the effects of his music. He has nine Road March titles and six Soca Monarch titles.
In the age of mass media, he continued the work of Sparrow, Kitchener and others by shining greater visibility on the artform, appearing on the TV show Sesame Street and being the first soca artiste to perform at the Wembley Conference Centre in London.
His philosophical approach to music has always been that an artiste is supposed to “inform, educate and entertain.”
He hopes this song will reignite some interest among younger people in TT’s history. He said in an interview at his home at Finland Street, St James, that he would tell them to google and learn about Canboulay.
Canboulay is derived from the French phrase cannes brulées, “burnt cane.” It began as a harvest festival where enslaved people would sing, dance, chant and drum.
After slavery was abolished, freed people took to the streets in celebration, singing, dancing and drumming. The Canboulay festival was eventually incorporated into Carnival. The Idakeda Group re-enacts the riots every year in a Carnival Friday-morning production called Kambule.
The riots happened when colonial police tried to restrict Carnival. There was rioting in San Fernando, Port of Spain and Princes Town, and the brutal suppression led to injuries and fatalities.
The telling of history through song is not new to SuperBlue.
The iconic, trendsetting artiste has previously told history through soca: his 1995 Signal for Lara told the story of cricketer Brian Lara’s record-breaking innings, and 1980’s Soca Baptist immortalised the hypnotic rhythms of Baptist prayer meetings.
[caption id="attachment_1132897" align="alignnone" width="1024"] Austin 'Superblue' Lyons stands with his "BMW" plantpot at his home on Finland Street, St James on January 7. - Photo by Faith Ayoung[/caption]
He prefers to create songs with a message.
“Why do people go to the tents? To get information, to be educated, to be entertained – and to heal any problems they have.”
Known for his poetic style dipped in TT’s colloquialisms, SuperBlue had worked with Smiddy before and decided to do so again this year.
He would usually work on 14-16 songs for any given Carnival, then decide which was best for him.
“I work with the vibes.”
His method of writing and then choosing songs includes adding pieces to each one until it feels right.
“Smiddy send a riddim for me,” he said and his manager, Danuellia Ramdeen, “was contemplating whether to approac
