The 2011 West In­di­an Car­ni­val Pa­rade of the Bands was held along East­ern Park­way, in Brook­lyn, New York, but the echoes of hot, spicy Trinidad and To­ba­go so­ca still linger. Just as was the case ear­li­er this year for C2K11 in Port-of-Spain, the hits by lo­cal so­ca artistes, like Machel Mon­tano, Kees and Ben­jai, fu­elled the move­ment of mas­quer­aders along the pa­rade route.

Re­ports in­di­cate that some vi­o­lence and shoot­ings caused a pre­ma­ture end to this year's car­ni­val, much to the dis­ap­point­ment of not just rev­ellers but to thou­sands of spec­ta­tors, es­pe­cial­ly those who trav­elled across the Caribbean to be a part of their favourite T&T-style car­ni­val.