Fantastic Friday Again - February 17th, 2012

It's that time of year again when all of Trinbago is abuzz with Carnival excitement. Last night I finally got in on some of the action by watching the last half of the Soca Monarch semifinals and for those that managed to catch it, most agree, it was pretty weak. After nearly 47 face palms, this again appears to be a competition between Iwer George and Machel Montano; the rest were just filler. 

Another observation that seemed to be shared by many..........maybe we should just cancel Power this year. With the sudden, meteoric rise of Groovy Soca (thanks Kes/Kerwin/Benjai), artistes have apparently forgotten how to write Power songs. Throughout the night, crowd favourites were moving the masses not with power songs, but groovy ones and for those that elected to do both, their power options were decidedly weak by comparison. Machel didn't even sing a power song last night if I remember correctly; does that mean he's doing groovy only for the final? And with Bunji not even competing this year, what's the point. 

But I digress

Despite my quibbles, I'm never one to back down from a liming opportunity so come Fantastic Friday, I will be stream partying somewhere. This unfortunately is the only option for many of us "foreign-based" who are either unable to or cannot afford to travel. Stream limes have become our way of feeling like we're there. In years past, our options were either a crap feed from Ustream or pay USD$20 for a slightly less crappy but crap nonetheless stream from the official source. 

This year, the carnival streaming Gods appear to be merciful, thus permitting paid streams for USD 99 cents promising HD quality streams (I'll believe that when I see it).  

Go to www.carnivaltv.net for this streaming option. Otherwise, monitor Facebook and Twitter #WITArmy on the night for the inevitable Ustream/Livestream link or two. For the free vibes, I recommend you pay attention to Asylum Radio www.asylumradiolive.com. 

Nothing is fool proof though so as usual, expect the typical stream failures as millions of Caribbean people around the world crush the internet for one night. At 99 cents, I also expect much more people to be jamming the paid sites as well. I really hope that after years of problems, that these folks really get their act together. By now we should have server farms rivaling the likes of Google, Apple, etc, capable of handling the expected traffic. 

With Caroni no longer in existence, I  know we can find some sugar cane land to throw down some damn servers. 

In any case, I hope you all have a safe and enjoyable carnival weekend whether it be live and in person, or vicariously over the web. 

D. T. J