Sean Nero

It's va­ca­tion time, but pa­trons at last week Fri­day's stag­ing of So­ca Cool­er re­liv­ed the par­ty fren­zy syn­ony­mous with T&T Car­ni­val 2011.St John's Am­bu­lance Hall, lo­cat­ed at Fitzblack­man Dri­ve, Wood­brook, was the venue for the event pro­mot­ed and pro­duced by a new out­fit called Wild Fire Pro­duc­tions, which was styled So­ca Cool­er to give re­turn­ing lo­cal stu­dents pur­su­ing aca­d­e­m­ic ad­vance­ment over­seas a taste of the na­tion­al fes­ti­val.While there were no cos­tumed pre­sen­ta­tions, mud or paint em­blem­at­ic of J'Ou­vert, much less a live band or artiste, the theme worked and the event scored.Spir­its were high as teens con­verged at the venue for this great es­cape and got it, thanks to the young im­pre­sar­ios that com­prised the So­ca Cool­er com­mit­tee.

They could have eas­i­ly built the mu­sic en­ter­tain­ment on the night, us­ing the world mu­sic for­mat and called the event by the same name. But the pro­mot­ers, want­i­ng to stay true to their pur­pose, chose to ded­i­cate at least 80 per cent of the play-list to so­ca mu­sic. Judg­ing from the eu­phor­ic scenes from pa­trons, the pul­sat­ing so­ca hits filled their hearts.DJs Mar­cus Williams (Star 94.7FM), Dr Do­minic Williams (94.7FM) Keron Cool Kuts (Boom Cham­pi­ons 94.1FM) and Plexx of Pro­duc­tions Sounds fame were the mix mas­ters on the night, and kept the vibes us­ing the vast and in­fec­tious so­ca reper­toire.It wasn't a pool par­ty, so the or­gan­is­ers im­port­ed a glo­ri­ous sup­ply wa­ter on­to the venue.It was pre­cise­ly 2 am when the house an­nounce­ment was made for the much an­tic­i­pat­ed get-wet fea­ture of the dance to be­gin, and in keep­ing with the frat and soror­i­ty cul­tures, a beer-drink­ing con­test took place to the vis­i­ble de­light of feters at the maid­en edi­tion of So­ca Cool­er.