“The collapse of the Revue is not the failure of kaiso as an art form, but it is a strong indicator of the failure of its practitioners to acknowledge a reality beyond the stage and to understand new channels of distribution and engagement that have left tents financially unviable for more than a decade and positioned its putative managers and leadership as suckling supplicants at the teat of government support.” Lyndersay Jan 2018.

A fierce debate raged in the media – both online and mass- about the state of calypso during the Carnival. Apart from Lyndersay’s quoted comment, Raffique Shah and Chalkie sparred and Eric St. Bernard chimed in.

Shah, appearing to agree with Lyndersay, chastised the managers who “ought to have seen the steady decline…the dire need for re-engineering of the product to enable it to survive in the modern, electronically-driven fast paced world”. Chalkie countered with a laundry list of all the work being done to keep the lyrical content whole. He may well point to Helon Francis’ win as proof that it matters even as the latter sang, “…change not just to be different but better…”

But Eric St. Bernard intoned, “what passes for calypso today is neither attracting the younger generation nor holding the interest of the mature, die-hard calypso fan’. Lyndersay’s indictment: “…stunning level of irrelevance…lost the wit, the personalities, the rivalries, the creative wellspring of lyricism”. This was, for St. Bernard, caused by a double whammy, ‘…trying to satisfy its membership…not motivated to seek new talent or aggressively recruit new artistes with ‘big chune’ hits” and” trained” judges have given us a brand of calypso which is alien to the calypso that the public knows and loves…”

Lyndersay questioned whether the lyrics drove away a key customer group, the Indo-Trinidadian. For him, ‘angry calypsonians abandoned topic…to beleaguer the first dominantly Indo-Trinidadian led Government with blunt ad hominem attacks and lurid slurs.

Meanwhile, back at the Stadium Machel Monday was in full swing…with a slew of new singers in the Kingdom and a crowd that lapped up the show. He doubled down with a fete on Carnival Sunday.

Why is he successful and the traditional tents are not? What ought we as marketers to learn?

If we focus on improving the product, as Chalkie insists, does it guarantee success? Does building a better mousetrap still apply? Will the world still beat a path to the best product? How does one know that a “best” product without understanding what the consumers want? How do new revolutionary applications emerge enter if there is a hierarchy that insists, ‘this is how it was done. This is our sense of quality and value’? How does a brand or even a marketing manager break through and get attention from those determined to keep doing more of the same?

Who are the “must have” consumers? Three segments were identified by the commentators: the young, the mature die-hard calypso lovers and the Indo-Trinidadian. Which is the most viable segment to be focused on? Machel’s answer: the young who want an experience! Are we still stuck on demographics? If we are, we are missing the game that is now on. How we segment is key to success in the future.

Is not ‘experience’ the nirvana of marketers in the age of social media? Why else has there been the meteoric rise of video content and gaming? What is the experience in the tent versus Machel Monday? Why would anyone part with their money? This is the question of all times for marketing people. From ever since, “new and improved” was the tried and faithful formula. What is ‘new and improved’ in our industry?

What about the eco-system – that infinite but connected world in which we live? There is criticism of “Machel and Tony” but together they are building an entirely new world that they control in which young singers and dancers experiment. Yes, they may have gamed the Road March system but why is the young not complaining? Is Machel Monday the Calypso Tent v.02? Have we considered the eco-system for our brand? Or is our brand the “Lone Ranger”? Like the young party goers, our consumers live in a world inhabited by other brands and experiences, if we wish to play we need to understand who the key players are we need to link with.

Kaiso is not the problem; the problem is imagination. Our brand may not be the problem; the problem may be imagination. Our imagination springs from understanding the consumer’s need for our brand and product. Do we know what Machel knows about branding? Or are we still quibbling over non-essentials? Is our product delivering what our consumers need?

Can we stop trying to re-invent the wheel? It may only need re-alignment.