GAIL ALEXAN­DER

If T&T’s na­tion­al “con­ver­sa­tions” have jarred psy­che, brain and body, shake it all off on Au­gust 23 as some of the coun­try’s lat­est rock groups head­line at The An­chor­age, Ch­aguara­mas, in the sec­ond of two con­certs mark­ing the venue’s 31st an­niver­sary of host­ing pop-rock events.

“It’s a big ‘birth­day’ and we’ll be cel­e­brat­ing three decades of con­certs and mu­sic, pre­sent­ing the lat­est bands at two con­certs this month,” said pro­mot­er Ro­ry Ga­jad­har.

The con­certs, held on Au­gust 9 and con­tin­u­ing on Au­gust 23, are spon­sored by GML’s 95.1FM Ul­ti­mate, Sushi Gar­den, Cat­a­logue Sue and Re­li­able Signs.

The An­chor­age’s scenic lo­ca­tion at Ch­aguara­mas has been a go-to des­ti­na­tion for T&T par­ty­go­ers since the 1980s, when the Jol­ly Roger cruis­es—T&T’s first “boat ride” ven­ture—de­part­ed from there and the venue be­gan host­ing so­cial events.

An­chor­age re­al­ly came in­to its own, how­ev­er, 31 years ago when it be­gan host­ing pop-rock con­certs and pi­o­neer­ing an­nu­al rock band com­pe­ti­tions.

The ven­ture pro­duced sev­er­al gen­er­a­tions of mu­si­cians, in­clud­ing drum­mer Obasi Springer, who made his de­but on the T&T mu­sic scene with bands at An­chor­age. Springer, who won Best Drum­mer in one of An­chor­age’s an­nu­al “Sum­mer” rock mu­sic com­pe­ti­tions, is well known for his ap­pear­ances with Or­ange Sky and Up­set the Or­der.

The an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tion fea­tures a to­tal of 15 bands across the two con­certs. A sin­gle tick­et cost­ing $250 pro­vides ad­mis­sion to both con­certs, plus free cut­ters.

The Au­gust 23 line-up fea­tures Man­tis, FUSE, The Cho­sen Whites, EFX Band, Dog­gie and The Koolkatz, The An­ar­chists and The Guys from The Band.

There will be some well-known faces from the mu­sic busi­ness over the years, as well as per­form­ers who have made their mark in the last five years and new, up-and-com­ing tal­ent on the lo­cal mu­sic land­scape.

Among the new­er bands is The Anom­aly, a five-mem­ber band with roots in the north, fea­tur­ing lead vo­cal­ist Ar­ryan­na Loutan. The group has moved from per­form­ing cov­er ver­sions to re­cent­ly pro­duc­ing its first orig­i­nal song, “Walls”, a pro­fes­sion­al­ly pro­duced, gui­tar-heavy num­ber with a strong beat and a dis­tinc­tive style.

Among the vet­er­ans are for­mer mem­bers of Black Rose, now per­form­ing as The Guys from The Band. Jeri­cho, a well-known name on the Ch­agua­nas bar scene, led by Evan Moon, will per­form cov­er ver­sions, in­clud­ing heavy met­al favourites.

Those who have been on the scene for four to five years in­clude Skulkyd, whose front­lin­ers Yasha and Kyle Trys­tan draw in­spi­ra­tion from the dy­nam­ic, hard-rock­ing style of Ten­nessee-based Paramore. Band mem­bers hail from East and Cen­tral Trinidad.

Skulkyd al­so rep­re­sents a grow­ing al­ter­na­tive-rock pres­ence on the lo­cal mu­sic scene. Front­woman Yasha Hanoomans­ingh has been per­form­ing in­de­pen­dent­ly since 2016 and first gained wider recog­ni­tion through Dig­i­cel Ris­ing Stars.

Her mu­si­cal ex­pe­ri­ence spans al­ter­na­tive rock, pop and acoustic mu­sic, and she lat­er be­came the vo­cal­ist for Skulkyd.

Hanoomans­ingh, who was raised in Cunu­pia, stud­ied Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Stud­ies and Film Pro­duc­tion at The Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies, St Au­gus­tine. Her ex­pe­ri­ence per­form­ing across dif­fer­ent mu­si­cal styles has helped shape her ap­proach to fronting the band.

Mul­ti-in­stru­men­tal­ist Kyle Trys­tan brings an­oth­er lay­er of ver­sa­til­i­ty to Skulkyd, play­ing drums, vo­cals, gui­tar and bass. He has al­so per­formed with oth­er lo­cal bands, giv­ing him a broad mu­si­cal back­ground that com­ple­ments the group’s rock sound.

The pres­ence of younger mu­si­cians such as Hanoomans­ingh and Trys­tan re­flects the con­tin­u­ing role of An­chor­age as a plat­form for de­vel­op­ing tal­ent, while the an­niver­sary cel­e­bra­tions bring to­geth­er per­form­ers with years of ex­pe­ri­ence on the lo­cal rock cir­cuit.

The venue’s his­to­ry with the genre stretch­es back more than three decades, with its an­nu­al com­pe­ti­tions help­ing to in­tro­duce new mu­si­cians to au­di­ences while cre­at­ing op­por­tu­ni­ties for bands to de­vel­op their stage­craft.

The Au­gust 23 event opens at 1 pm, with the first band tak­ing the stage from 3 pm.