The globalization of soca

Remember this classic scene from Beetlejuice? That's calypso as popularized by '50 musical icon, Harry Belafonte. Remember the infectious hit 'Who Let The Dogs Out' from the Baha Boys in 2000? That's actually a cover of a 90's soca song by the same name, sang by Anslem Douglas (who, interestingly, is the uncle of Meghan Trainor).

This post isn't meant to be a history lesson on the origins of soca, the cultural music of Trinidad and Tobago. You can go here for that. Instead, it's meant to be a reflection on what seems to be the ever-increasing international appeal of soca from the perspective of a Trinbagonian residing in the US since 2004.

Earlier iterations of soca (e.g., Calypso) left several notable marks on mainstream American music culture, and although today's globalization of soca doesn't seem to have the same quantifiable impact, the sound has generally become more palatable for the typical international listener.

Here's where it gets interesting.

The number of soca songs to have 'crossed over' into American pop culture to date remains sufficiently low to have resulted in lists like this, that, and Rolling Stones articles like this. As such, until recently, it's always felt like cross-over worthy soca tracks were the exception and not the norm. Groups like Major Lazer, lead by Diplo, and artists like Machel Montano have played no small part in helping to change this. Anecdotally, despite living in the US for 13 years, it's also only been post-Differentology that I've found an increasing number of Americans stumbling across soca on their own, diving more deeply into the music, and liking what they hear. It's hard not to think that these same people would have been much less impressed had they opened up a treasure chest of soca music in 1998. To be clear, these aren't the rantings of some opinionated madman who is out of tune with the rest of the soca-loving world. This conversation (or debate) is widespread and continuously on-going in Trinidad and Tobago.

I often wonder if it's a chicken and egg situation. Did the soca world realize that the global musical community was paying more attention and thus, started trying to more actively appeal to it? Or was soca always doing its own thing, and this is merely the result of globalization in all aspects of our lives? Honestly, I couldn't care less either way; I love the result 'irregardless'.

If you've made it this far through this article and aren't already a soca convert, I'll close by appealing to you. New-age soca tends to be ~128 beats per minute; the same as most pop and house songs. So, assuming that you listen to either of those latter genres, it's going to be an easy transition in that sense. Wait, what's that? You don't understand what they're saying, or singing about? Fortunately, recognizing the increased attention from the global music community, soca artistes have recently started creating 'lyric videos' for their songs (much like this) which make it really easy to follow along. Also, as far as content goes, soca songs tend to be relatively limited to a small handful of topics (for better or worse). These include the following themes:

1) general partying; reminiscing about it, looking forward to it, missing it, etc.

2) he/she who parties the most, or is the best partier, etc.

3) rum

4) partying with friends; who's 'crew' is the best or parties the most, etc.

5) not leaving the party/partying till the sun comes up/being sad or angry because the party is nearly finished but you want to keep partying

6) the opposite sex (most soca artistes are male so there are more songs focussed on women, but the female artists definitely make their voices heard and don't shy away from singing about men)

7) playing carnival, looking forward to playing carnival, how badly you miss carnival, etc.

8) dancing; wining (or whining). this is hip-gyrating dancing that accompanies soca

9) putting your hands up to the sky

10) being uninhibited in general

Sounds like fun, doesn't it? Be sure to check out my soca 2017 preview mix at www.djmarcusboston.com to hear what I'm talking about.