Who would have thought that the highlight of Machel Montano’s Machel Monday concert would be a surprise segment featuring two popular 90s DJs and some dancehall stars?
The huge crowd erupted when DJ Signal to Noise (Joel Morris) joined Chinese Laundry (Tony Chow Lin On) onstage behind the decks. For many in the audience it was a real throwback to the 90s when maxi taxis were pumping loud music—more than likely provided by mixtapes produced by Laundry and Signal.
For their segment, there were appearances by veteran dancehall performers Wayne Wonder, Cutty Ranks and the duo Shakademus and Pliers.
One stunned patron asked: “Where dey dus’ off Cutty Ranks from?” and men in their 40s started dancing like young turks when Cutty Ranks put down his classic Limb by Limb.
Machel Monday was good but many patrons felt the show was far too long. There was no doubt about the quality of the performers who appeared with Montano during the nearly five-hour set including top local performers like reigning Groovy Soca Monarch Olatunji Yearwood, Kerwin Dubois, Farmer Nappy, Patrice Roberts, newly-crowned Junior Soca Monarch Aaron Duncan and the rising star of soca, Aaron St Louis aka Voice.
As Voice touched the stage, the crowd sang “From yuh wake up this morning, yuh’s a winner” and continued singing his big hit Cheers to Life word for word.
One of the unlikely stars of the season is radio “hypeman” Salty, whose appearance on the wildly popular RR riddim has produced one of the novelty hits of 2016.
The song has few real lyrics but something about the repetitive line “Rock it, Rock it, Roll it and Rock it,” on the brass and percussion-infused riddim has soca fans totally mesmerised. Salty in his dapper green suit got an encore from the crowd at Machel Monday.
There was an “unplugged” segment with Montano and his former producer and musical director Kernal Roberts on the keyboards which also went down very well.
Of the foreign acts who performed, the crowd was most appreciative of Pitbull and Jamaican reggae crooner Tarrus Riley.
Puerto Rican star Pitbull features on the new song Taxi Carnival alonside Montano and US hip hop star Lil John, who also performed. Jamaican singer Omi, singer of 2015 “summer hit” Cheerleader, was here to sing Hula Hoop with Montano. There were also appearances by Nigerian acts Timaya and Runtown as well as the Major Lazer pair of Walshy Fire and Chris “Jillionaire” Leacock.
As usual, Machel Monday’s production values were quite high. The stage was impressive and the show ran smoothly.
In an improvement on the 2015 edition, there were no issues with tickets at the entrances, and patrons flowed into the Hasely Crawford Stadium with no problems. The only issue was with the sound system which at times sounded quite muffled.
Speaking on social media, many who attended the show said Montano’s performance was very good, but he should consider keeping down the number of guests, and pare the show back to a more manageable length.
In this short, recession-struck Carnival season, Machel Monday seems to be one concert that is “recession proof” as the turnout seemed to be even larger than last year, particularly in the $600 Platinum (VIP) section.
Even the exclusive $1,200 Diamond section was well-patronised.