Cori Baynes

Trin­bag­o­ni­ans are a mul­ti-cul­tur­al peo­ple with a large ap­petite for mu­sic, re­gard­less of its genre. So­ca, Chut­ney, Dance­hall, Hip Hop and Ca­lyp­so are just a few of the mu­si­cal of­fer­ings that com­mand large au­di­ences na­tion­wide and cap­ti­vate the minds of the lis­ten­ers, es­pe­cial­ly the youth. How­ev­er, al­though Rap mu­sic is ex­treme­ly pop­u­lar in­ter­na­tion­al­ly, the lo­cal un­der­ground rap artistes, like 6326-The Move­ment, have been hav­ing a hard time break­ing on­to the mu­sic scene. The eight-mem­ber group, led by 21-year-old Michael Noel, has been on the lo­cal rap cir­cuit for the past three years, and has about 35 songs to its cred­it.

Up­lift­ing and pos­i­tive rap mu­sic

And while many peo­ple as­so­ciate rap mu­sic with vi­o­lence and gang­ster lyrics, the main mes­sages car­ried in the tracks of 6326-The Move­ment pro­mote well-be­ing and up­lift­ment. Noel, whose stage name is Kol­lat­er­al, said that through its songs, the group aimed to take both Rap and Hip Hop to new lev­els in T&T. "Rap is some­thing in which we can freely ex­press our­selves as op­posed to any genre of mu­sic. We are not gang­sters so we don't do gang­ster rap," Noel said. How­ev­er, he lament­ed the fact that even though his is a tal­ent­ed group, there were very few es­tab­lished nich­es in which rap artistes could show­case their tal­ents. "We try to be orig­i­nal and make songs that peo­ple can re­late to and un­der­stand where we are com­ing from. "We are from Trinidad and peo­ple like to par­ty. We, in our mu­sic, sing about con­scious­ness and pos­i­tiv­i­ty.We want peo­ple to be able to vibe to our mu­sic," he ex­plained.

But re­gard­less of their in­ten­tions, Noel con­fessed that the biggest ob­sta­cle fac­ing the group was the neg­a­tive feed­back from crit­ics who don't ap­pre­ci­ate that par­tic­u­lar genre of mu­sic. "Peo­ple in this part of the world are not re­al­ly open to change, and many peo­ple think that we should not be singing rap mu­sic. "Even though it's an Amer­i­can based genre, we want to show that we are just as good, and even a bit more cre­ative than the bonafide artistes of that mu­sic." He said many of the par­ty pro­mot­ers were un­will­ing to dip in­to their pock­ets to in­vest in, or pro­mote a lo­cal rap group, be­cause it is not seen as be­ing mar­ketable.

That's a Rap

But, in spite of the set­backs, 6326-The Move­ment re­mains de­ter­mined and hope­ful that even­tu­al­ly they will leave a last­ing im­pres­sion on the lo­cal par­ty cir­cuit. "We have a lot more to do in this mu­sic. Every­body brings some­thing to the ta­ble and we as artistes learn from each oth­er. "We have to be per­sis­tent and keep it in the pub­lic's ears that Trinida­di­ans have the tal­ent to do Rap mu­sic. "We have to be hum­ble and well-ground­ed. We can't for­get where we came from, be­cause we are role mod­els and we have to give our peers some­thing that they can be­lieve in and em­u­late," he said. Noel said in ad­di­tion to mak­ing mu­sic, the group had the added re­spon­si­bil­i­ty of be­ing role mod­els for scores of young peo­ple. "We know that peo­ple might look up to us, but the one thing I must stress on, is to not to be­come a vic­tim of peer pres­sure. "That is one of the worst things you can do. Be an in­di­vid­ual and don't let any­one com­pro­mise your prin­ci­ples," he ad­mon­ished.