In­nis Fran­cis

in­nis_fran­cis@ya­hoo.com

Band­leader Ankome “Bob­by” Paul de­feat­ed all odds to form the band—The Fact and Us—sin­gle-pan steel­pan from St James. The name was cho­sen since be­ing your broth­er’s keep­er is im­por­tant in the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic.

Paul said when he de­cid­ed to leave the Wood­brook Mod­er­naires Steel Or­ches­tra (WM­SO) to form the band, he did not know the di­rec­tion it would take, but he had to make that de­ci­sion for the love of the steel­pan.

The band was formed on Jan­u­ary 5, 2022, with on­ly sev­en mem­bers from around the coun­try. He said they did not have a sin­gle piece of in­stru­ment and no fund­ing to pur­chase any. He said sev­er­al oth­er bands chip in and give them some. Paul said this came just in time when they de­cid­ed to pre­pare for the Jam Yuh Set In De Ram­ma—Pan Mov­ing For­ward show at WACK 90.1, F.M.

Paul said his de­ci­sion to move was right for a num­ber of rea­sons. “It is a strug­gle due to the lack of no spon­sor­ship, no mon­ey, no in­stru­ments. It was oth­er bands who as­sist­ed us. Our mem­bers are play­ers who know each oth­er from around the coun­try. Our bands wasn’t giv­ing us the op­por­tu­ni­ty to par­tic­i­pate in this com­pe­ti­tion and that was for po­lit­i­cal rea­sons.

These are the peo­ple who are op­pos­ing Pan Trin­ba­go in the elec­tions. But we are not of all of that, we just want to play pan. It is two years we out of it, and we have a pas­sion for the pan; we saw an op­por­tu­ni­ty and we grab it. This is just the be­gin­ning for us. I am not go­ing back to them (WM­SO), is on­ly for­ward now. We just try­ing to keep sur­viv­ing, but we are seek­ing cor­po­rate spon­sor­ship to help us. Right now we are us­ing mon­ey from our pock­ets, it is a re­al sac­ri­fice,” Paul said.

He said their mantra is to ad­dress the na­ture in which the band came in­to ex­is­tence. The his­to­ry of steel­pan is sur­round­ed with the strug­gles and chal­lenges that their fore­par­ents over­came for them to en­joy the gold­en ages of steel­pan to­day.

Paul said their mo­ti­va­tion comes from the suc­cess­es of the el­ders to con­tin­ue to pro­vide the world with “ex­hil­a­rat­ing” steel­band per­for­mances. The ‘facts’ are clear that the steel­band move­ment faced var­i­ous chal­lenges be­fore its many suc­cess­es and ‘us’ those who de­vote the ef­forts to con­tin­ue T&T’s rich her­itage.

He said since form­ing the band, the Jam Yuh Set In De Ram­ma—Pan Mov­ing For­ward show was the first vir­tu­al and he was hap­py for the 20 min­utes of view­er­ship and cash con­tri­bu­tions they got. He said it is now up to the view­ers to like, share, and com­ment that would de­ter­mine whether they move to the fi­nals for a chance to grab a cash prize of $15,000, $10,000, and $5,000 for first, sec­ond, and or third place win­ners re­spec­tive­ly.

Paul said the band does not lim­it their reper­toire and dab­bles in gen­res in­clu­sive of Ca­lyp­so, So­ca, Reg­gae, Latin, rock­ers and afrobeat.

The fi­nals would take place on Feb­ru­ary 27.