Gail Alexan­der

They have burnt up the stage with ex­plo­sive sound and gui­tar-shred­ding skills since 2013, pi­o­neer­ing a dis­tinc­tive Is­land Rock genre. Now, Five Miles to Mid­night (5M2M) is back on stage on De­cem­ber 4.

The six-mem­ber 5M2M helped birth the I-Rock sound, com­bin­ing the en­er­gy and in­stru­men­ta­tion of rock mu­sic with the rhythms, in­flu­ences and cul­tur­al iden­ti­ty of Caribbean roots. Re­cent­ly re­turned from a hia­tus, the band will per­form at the Big Black Box in Wood­brook along­side well-known emo, punk, met­al and rock artistes We Are the Gal­lows.

Since its in­cep­tion, 5M2M has worked to es­tab­lish a unique place for Trinidad and To­ba­go with­in the in­ter­na­tion­al al­ter­na­tive rock scene.

The band com­pris­es co-founders Alex Burt Ou-Young (rhythm gui­tar) and Rhys Thomp­son (drums), Liam King (lead vo­cals), lead gui­tarist Shal­lun Sam­my, Alex Ale­ong (bass) and Dale Dol­ly (key­boards). It be­gan with young mu­si­cians shar­ing a pas­sion for mu­sic and a de­sire to cre­ate some­thing of their own. They went on to de­vel­op a dis­tinc­tive mu­si­cal iden­ti­ty built around sear­ing gui­tars, pow­er­ful vo­cals, drums and key­boards.

Since its be­gin­nings in 2013, the band has re­ceived in­ter­na­tion­al at­ten­tion, in­clud­ing MTV Ig­gy’s Artist of the Week fea­ture. This was fol­lowed by a de­but EP in 2014 and the re­lease of an orig­i­nal song, Short Term Love, in 2015. In 2016, 5M2M per­formed at Texas’s South by South­west (SXSW) fes­ti­val, show­cas­ing its tal­ent to au­di­ences from around the world.

The band earned op­por­tu­ni­ties to per­form along­side in­ter­na­tion­al­ly recog­nised artistes who ap­peared in Trinidad and To­ba­go, in­clud­ing Ma­roon 5, Evanes­cence, Life­house and Stephen Mar­ley. It has al­so worked with promi­nent Caribbean per­form­ers, in­clud­ing Machel Mon­tano and Fay-Ann Lyons, re­flect­ing its abil­i­ty to move be­tween al­ter­na­tive rock and the wider Caribbean mu­sic land­scape.

A par­tic­u­lar­ly mem­o­rable ses­sion cap­tured the mu­si­cal chem­istry of 5M2M per­form­ing with the late so­ca gi­ant Blaxx, adapt­ing his song Leh Go to in­cor­po­rate el­e­ments of both their styles.

Tak­ing Is­land Rock

be­yond lo­cal shores

The band’s mu­sic and Caribbean iden­ti­ty were al­so in­tro­duced to au­di­ences be­yond lo­cal shores when it was fea­tured by Afrop­unk, a plat­form rep­re­sent­ing Black par­tic­i­pa­tion in punk mu­sic and sub­cul­ture.

The group pur­sued per­for­mance op­por­tu­ni­ties in New York and par­tic­i­pat­ed in Cul­ture Fu­sion, a tele­vi­sion-based mu­si­cal col­lab­o­ra­tion con­nect­ing Trinidad and To­ba­go with New­found­land and Labrador, Cana­da. These ex­pe­ri­ences formed part of the band’s con­tin­u­ing ef­forts to build con­nec­tions across cul­tures and bring its hy­brid sound to new au­di­ences.

In­di­vid­ual tal­ent,

col­lec­tive sound

Lead gui­tarist Sam­my’s light­ning-strike shred­ding is a sig­na­ture el­e­ment of 5M2M’s in­stru­men­tal en­er­gy, es­tab­lish­ing him as one of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s no­table gui­tarists, par­tic­u­lar­ly for his con­tri­bu­tion to the group’s blend­ed mu­si­cal style. Sam­my has al­so been in­volved in oth­er mu­si­cal projects and record­ings, re­flect­ing his wider ex­pe­ri­ence as a gui­tarist and his con­tri­bu­tion to the coun­try’s evolv­ing mu­sic scene.

Lead vo­cal­ist King has been de­liv­er­ing mu­si­cal per­for­mances since the age of 12. Among his ear­ly mile­stones was his par­tic­i­pa­tion in Syn­er­gy So­ca Star, where he ad­vanced to the fi­nals with the group then known as One Cir­cle. He al­so earned the Best Vo­cal­ist award at the 2010 An­chor­age Pop Rock Awards. The group col­lect­ed ad­di­tion­al ho­n­ours that year for Best Drum­mer, Best Bassist and Best Cov­er.

Co-founder and drum­mer Thomp­son’s rhythms dri­ve the in­ter­play be­tween the gui­tars, bass, key­boards and vo­cals. He has al­so been as­so­ci­at­ed with oth­er mu­si­cal projects, in­clud­ing Boom­Boom­Room, a duo formed with Mod­upe Onilu.

Co-founder and rhythm gui­tarist Ou-Young’s play­ing com­ple­ments Sam­my’s fre­net­ic fret­work. His con­tri­bu­tion re­flects the col­lab­o­ra­tive spir­it be­hind the band’s de­vel­op­ment and its com­mit­ment to cre­at­ing an in­di­vid­ual sound.

Bassist Alex Ale­ong’s play­ing is an­oth­er vi­tal part of the group’s mu­si­cal foun­da­tion, link­ing the drums and gui­tars while giv­ing the arrange­ments depth, move­ment and rhyth­mic weight.

Key­boardist Dale Dol­ly com­pletes the band’s mu­si­cal per­spec­tive, adding at­mos­phere, har­mon­ic depth and tex­ture to its dis­tinc­tive arrange­ments.

The gap since the band’s last per­for­mances has not di­min­ished its ex­per­tise. With its light­ning-fast mu­si­cian­ship in­tact, 5M2M is now geared to­wards de­liv­er­ing a deep­er, rich­er mu­si­cal pre­sen­ta­tion when it takes the stage on De­cem­ber 4.

Al­so billed for the Big Black Box event is We Are the Gal­lows, fea­tur­ing the com­bined tal­ents of Nick and Ravi of Red Vel­lum Ra­zor­blades, along­side Shane, An­drew and An­tho­ny of Skid”Neve­ly.

Tick­ets are avail­able on­line.