BASSETERRE, St. Kitts - DESPITE the current Haitian tragedy, that country’s superstar Wyclef Jean gave an excellent performance last night (Jan. 16) at the launch of the St. Kitts-Nevis Labour Party’s Manifesto held at the football stadium in Warner Park.
The event featured some early performances by the Grand Masters Band, Red, C-money and Kash Man, while DJ Ronnie Rascal provided music in between performances and speeches made by the Labour Party candidates.
International entertainer Wyclef Jean appeared on the stage singing Bob Marley’s ‘No Woman No Cry’ while many persons in the enormous crowd sang along with him. He then changed to a number of his collaborated hit songs including ‘Take Me as I Am’, ‘L.O.V.E’ and ‘911’ as he encouraged the crowd to get out of speech mode and free up themselves.
Jean ask the crowd if they knew which musical group he had represented in the past and belted out a few of the ‘Fugees’ hits like ‘Ready or Not’ and ‘Fu-Gee La’.
One of the highlights of the evening was when Jean invited Prime Minister Douglas on stage to rap a line or two, and he did so saying, “Labour is good all the time”, which caused the crowd to respond with loud cheers and screams. Jean then added his own lyrics to what was said as the PM moved to the music and threw up his hands from side to side.
It was not just all of his own songs that the Grammy award singer belted out last night; he also juggled some old school Hip-Hops and Mavado dub-plates.
The other surprise for the night was when Jean played local artiste Infamus’s ’21 Gun Salute’, who went onstage with his famous one leg hop and performed the song. Infamus also sang his ‘Sometimes I Feel Like Crying’, with almost half of the crowd singing along.
Infamus and Jean did a duet as the Haitian got on the shoulders of his bodyguard and went out into the crowd singing. He then gave his microphone to a young man in the crowd who rapped a few lines and was then pulled through the parted crowd to go onstage, where he, Jean and Infamus free-styled, bringing another set of cheers from the huge crowd.
For all those who thought Jean was just all rap and R&B, the artiste surprised them with a Soca piece titled ‘It’s Carnival’, as he invited persons from the audience to join him onstage to jump and wave.
As the night progressed, Jean kept the crowd alive by performing not only his songs but a few more of Bob Marley’s. Jean said he could have performed all night, as he asked the crowd if they were ready to go home. The response was a resounding “NO”.
Sandy Point artistes C-Money and Kash Man also surprised the crowd when they were invited back onstage by Jean, where they performed ‘My Wish’ the remix and ‘Sweet SK’.
As they left the stage, Jean continued belting out the Marley hits with a little interruption from rain, which brought the curtains down on the event just a little after 3:00 a.m. At this stage, Jean called on all patrons to say a prayer for his native land Haiti.
Although many people thought the artiste would not show up, due to the devastation caused by earthquake in Haiti, Wyclef Jean stuck to his word and performed excellently for more than two and a half hours.
