Web Posted - Mon Jul 26 2004 By David Hinkson

Four years after his last victory at the Ermy Bourne Highway, Edwin staged a dramatic “Invasion” complete with paratroops and “gunfire” and wrested the Party Monarch title from Lil Rick. However, Edwin’s fifth overall victory did not go down very well with the audience, who seemed to favour Lil Rick and Timmy, who mesmerized the audience with equally strong presentations.

Second place went to the promising young artist Mikey with “Come Together”, a song with a really nice melody which ought to do well on the road this Kadooment Day as well. Blood, as expected, gave a strong performance of “Idea (Cheese Don Bread)” complete with flags depicting “Cheese on Bread”, question marks and light bulbs symbolising ideas. He finished third overall.

Timmy gave a masterful performance and had a really outstanding presentation. He started off on the stage as normal, then he said, “I want to get closer to my people” at which point he left the main stage and mounted an aerial platform that lifted him above the audience. After mounting the platform, he donned a belt made of fireworks that went off as he performed. After his performance many thought the title was his, but surprisingly he only finished fourth. Khiomal finished in fifth position though his performance was relatively ordinary.

Lil Rick staged a David Copperfield-like disappearing act during his performance, but he was not at his best. First, he sang a verse of “Can’t Dun So” twice, and following his disappearing act, he sang a tasteless verse in which he insulted some of the artists that decided to stay out of the contest and his rivals at the show. When MC Wayne Simmons announced that he had placed sixth it came as a great surprise to the audience since they had loved his presentation.

Statement finished seventh with “If I Can't be with you Tonight”, and MADD’s Eric Lewis, appearing as “Rudefus”, finished eighth despite a beautifully choreographed dance routine reminiscent of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” with the “walking dead” as he sang “Hard Ears”. Of the other contestants, Mr. Impact placed ninth with “Praise Them” and newcomer Storm finished tenth despite a relatively unconvincing performance of “Thunder Rolling”. Like the other young female contestant in the show, Keisha Christian, she looked too much like a clone of Alison Hinds.

The other two women in the contest, Lady J and Crystal, handled themselves well, with Crystal’s presence on stage highly reminiscent of the great female calypsonians of the past such as Singing Francine and Calypso Rose. Lady J’s presentation at the start of her song, “A Man Can’t tek a Dun”, was a bit too long, however. Peter Ram placed 11th, surprisingly low even though he had the crowd firmly in his hands during his performance of “Look Good Bajan Girls”.

Mr. Dale and Dalee B were not very impressive, as they employed every single up-tempo song cliché in their performances, namely running around on stage and waving a rag trying to get the audience’s attention. However, Mr. Dale did a better job, perhaps owing to his greater experience in the field. Once again the East Coast was unkind to the “old veterans” Big Davy, Observer, Grynner and Smokey Burke failed to place despite good melodies and relatively strong lyrics in the case of Smokey Burke and Observer.

Trevor Eastmond started the show as MC, but turned his duties over to Rachel Price whose comedy routines were full of sexual innuendo, some of it unnecessary. Jabae got the show off to a good start and immediately after the contest, one of Trinidad’s leading bands, Atlantik, was getting into a fiery performance but had to stop after a shower of rain completely knocked out their sound. After a break of about 15 minutes, the results were announced and the group got a second opportunity to perform at the close of the show.

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