Destra moves the masses
SHE may not have any hit songs outside the Eastern Caribbean, but soca darling Destra is certainly not short on fans. Hundreds of them turned out at the Mas Camp in St Andrew last Friday to enjoy her performance at Bacchanal Live.
She spoke to the Jamaica Observer following her set and gave her take on soca’s lack of consistency in major music markets.
“Soca has a lot of diversity. With dancehall and with reggae, you can clearly identify the music. With soca before you can identify songs, you need to identify the genre and it’s difficult to identify what soca is because you have power soca, slow soca, dancehall soca and ragga soca,” the Trinidadian singer explained.
Despite soca’s regional appeal, few of its exponents have done well in the pop arena. Arrow’s party monster, Hot Hot Hot, released in 1982, is the genre’s first big seller. Who Let The Dogs Out by The Baha Men from The Bahamas was a massive hit in the United States in 2000.
Differentology was a strong seller for Bunji Garlin, Destra’s compatriot. Remixed by EDM kingpins Major Lazer, the song did well in the United Kingdom before making waves in the US where it won a Soul Train Award in 2013 for Best International Performance.
“Soca music is so infectious. Every so often we hit one that you can’t stop. Until we figure out how to make people gravitate to soca as a body, because with reggae, when Sean Paul sings a song, even if it’s on a ‘collab’ for a pop song you hear dancehall,” said Destra.
The Mas Camp crowd savoured the soca queen’s hour-long performance, an energetic set by her despite nursing an ankle injury.
“My set is pretty much a skeleton. There are certain songs that I do at a certain time. I don’t plan what I’m going to say because that part of it is very ad hoc, very spontaneous, tailored to every country,” she said.
She started with new songs before going into Family, Call My Name, and Max It Up. Her customary strategy of pitting the VIP section against the general audience kept things light and fun.
“Tonight was excellent. The Champs (Boys and Girls Championships at nearby National Stadium) crowd kinda held up the patrons a bit, but the turnout was amazing. ‘General’ was rammed. VIP was past capacity. Destra’s performance was amazing. What can we say, she’s the queen of Bacchanal and we’re so happy she’s back in Kingston,” Michael Ammar III, a Bacchanal Jamaica director, told the Jamaica Observer.
It was the last of the regular Mas Camp events as Bacchanal Jamaica heads into the closing week of carnival with Beach J’ouvert on Saturday in St Ann.
