Machel thrills at Red Concert

Colour me Red; Machel the Return was a blast on Wednesday night, July 12, 2011 and certainly helped to ignite whatever fire was missing from this year’s carnival. Held at the Beausejour grounds in Gros Islet, the event was headlined by Machel Montano HD but also featured an all star cast of Saint Lucian performers including the 2010 Soca Monarch HP, TJ, Sir Lancealot, Superman featuring Killa from Grenada, Scady P, Marianne, Toya, Derek Yarde and Mongstar and Ambi.
However, the biggest surprise of the night came when Machel introduced Ricky T who was sidelined by the promoters over a past issue. But the crowd was

indifferent to whatever carnival politics was going on behind the scenes and simply came out to have a good time with their carnival favourites and Ricky T was certainly at the top of that list. Doing “Pressure” and snippets of his 2011 offering “Mad Ting” he had the crowd in a frenzy as Machel stepped back and allowed him his moment in the spotlight. Ricky T acknowledged on stage the role Machel had played in taking him on tour three years ago and Machel for his part called for respect to be paid to the Saint Lucian Soca artiste.
Machel who came on with his entire cast and dancers started his set in a most flamboyant and magnificent fashion opening with his 2011 Soca hits “De Stage” and “Illegal.” For the next two hours he would have the crowd with old and new hits as well as throwing in members of the HD family Patrice, Zan and Farmer Nappy to entertain with their own hits. Just before introducing Ricky T, he also brought on Saint Lucian Soca newcomer Mongstar to do his hit “Glo-ko-ko.”

The Saint Lucian acts were able to hold their own during the first segment of the show, particularly Scady P on the night who after doing his “Make it Bubble” stayed on to hype up Marianne’s performance making for a nice combination. Mongstar and Ambi did just enough to keep the crowd going with “Glo-ko-ko” and then there was TJ who put on a wonderful set complete with his dancers. On the other hand whilst Superman and Lancealot were energetic on stage, they could have done well with leaving out the lines about “let us show Machel how we do it in Saint Lucia,” and so on.
But all in all Colour me Red was a wonderful event, venue, stage set, VIP décor and parking access and sound quality all helped to make the five hour event worth every red cent.