Caribbean Beat — March/April 2019 (#156)

closeup
Queen
of queens
She’s the self-proclaimed Queen of
Bacchanal, and a reliable favourite on
T&T’s Carnival scene. But, twenty years
into her career, local fans and critics still
underestimate the unstoppable Destra
Garcia, writes Nigel A. Campbell. As
the music industry evolves, he argues,
it’s time to rethink what we mean by
“biggest” and “best” — and acknowledge
Destra’s international reputation
Photography by Frame Photography,
courtesy Bamboo Entertainment
Last October, the US National Public
Radio website published an essay
declaring Trinidadian soca star Destra
Garcia the “liberator of revelry.” That
essay was part of a series “dedicated
to recasting the popular music canon
in more inclusive — and accurate — ways” in order
to “challenge the usual definitions of influence.”
Destra is “broadening the sound of soca,”
argued writer Keryce Chelsi Henry — an external
viewpoint that illustrates something taken for
granted in Trinidad and Tobago: Destra Garcia
is the bellwether among women soca artists in
the music industry. The reach of her influence,
I’d argue, has made this soca star a music icon
outside her native country, even dwarfing her local
reputation. And that influence is no longer centred
on Trinidad Carnival. Destra is now international
and perennial.
To suggest subjective classifications like “best”
or “biggest,” it’s useful to have the imprimatur of
some objective measurements. In this modern
age of music, when data is king and “likes” and
“follows” matter more than universally diminishing
record sales, Destra — with her entire catalogue
on all the major digital music platforms — has the
numbers that matter. They make a solid case for her
ascension beyond her self-declared role as “Queen
of Bacchanal” to the more apt title “Queen of Soca.”
Looking at the numbers on popular social media
platforms like Instagram and Facebook, Destra is
indeed the queen, with metrics beyond other women
soca stars like Alison Hinds and Fay-Ann Lyons,
rising talent Nailah Blackman, or even calypso
legend Calypso Rose. Only soca superstar Machel
Montano betters her on Instagram, while Destra is
the clear leader on Facebook among all performing
soca artists worldwide, with over 323,000 followers,
as of December 2018. That includes a strong fan
base in the Caribbean diaspora worldwide.
Even so, soca’s popularity, and the stars who
make this music regional if not global, are still
operating within confined niche markets, even
as the sound and rhythm of soca are tapped by
today’s urban pop stars as a sonic bed for charttopping
hits. The social media numbers for the
most popular soca artists pale in comparison to the
major artists of other genres: Bajan Rihanna has
close to 80 million followers on Facebook, while
Trinidad-born Nicki Minaj has 41 million, and
Cardi B — of Trinidadian and Dominican parents,
and arguably the hottest thing right now — is just
beginning, notching just over six million followers
on the platform.
50 WWW.CARIBBEAN-BEAT.COM