Son of progress

The name Marvin “Mr King” Lewis is one that many in TT would be familiar with. He has given the country such songs as Oh Laventille and Borderline, which became MTV Tempo’s regional tagline for years in the fight against crime and violence in the region.

But a dream has changed Lewis’ direction. Being the son of soca royalty, so-to-speak, (he is the son of the late Austin “King Austin” Lewis, whose Progress is often regarded as one of the best calypsoes of all time), he has been mandated from the great beyond to: “Keep it groovy and make them dance.” Lewis has since teamed up with LVT Productions, a subsidiary arm of growing band, A Team, to produce the songs mandated by his father.

He said in an interview with Newsday, “This year, after the passing of my late father, King Austin, I decided to do some writing. He passed away late last year after suffering from Alzheimer’s for a number of years. We were quite close...

“Before he passed he insisted that if I stopped singing music, the least I could do is write music and let other people sing it. I write for LVT Productions, which is an offshoot of the A Team band. They gave me some music to write as well. I wrote two songs for them.

“While driving in my vehicle one day, I felt a second presence being there. I got chills and goosebumps stood up on my hands as I heard someone humming to the melody. I stopped the rhythm and started it over and there was this song again.

Someone else was in the car humming this melody. I repeated the beat about three times and the humming kept starting over every time I started over the rhythm. Then the third time I sang the song from the top straight to the chorus as if it were something I had heard before.

“The song was really a tribute to my father. I went home, finished writing the song and I returned to LVT’s studio and sang the song for them. They wanted to record it right away, which we did.

“The following night, after recording the song. I dreamt my father. I dreamt I got a phone call from him and I answered the phone and he was on the line. In the dream, I knew he had passed, so I kept asking, ‘Who is this? Who is this?’ And he was like, ‘But you hearing the voice, boy, why you keep asking who it is? I said, ‘But it can’t be you.’ He said, ‘How you mean is not you, and I talking to you, boy?’ He said, ‘I know you’ve gotten the message and I want you to sing it. I want you to sing it. Once you sing it, they can’t fight you. Just keep it groovy and make them dance and they will like it. You will get money’.” Lewis said he got up the next morning and decided he would defend calypso, something his father always envisioned he would do.

King Austin always told him to forget other genres of music and sing kaiso, since: “Kaiso grow yuh.” Lewis said he grew up in many calypso tents, moving around with his father when he performed.

So for Carnival 2017, Lewis is offering Legacy Music, which was born out of the conversation he believes he had with his father from beyond.

Helping him achieve this is LVT Productions, which consists of three young musicians, Keron “Trak” Robinson, Keron “Light” Harris and Brennon “Val” Virgil. The musicians, all from Laventille, have been working to produce a sound “that gives life to what was and what will be.” Robinson said LVT functions within the A Team band, which has backed some top artistes at fetes this year. The three-year-old band has carved a name for itself, being likened to legendary local band Roy Cape All Stars.

The band came into being when some former members of the Soca Unit came together. The A Team is also owned by its core members, of whom Robinson, Harris and Virgil form a part.

The new production arm of the band, LVT Productions, has done work for Blaxx, Lord Nelson, Stephen Marcelle of Dil-E-Nadan and Explainer, among others. The band tried production before but was rebranded late last year as LVT Productions.

It’s also created a rhythm, Robinson said, which captures the sound of what TT was with the new sounds of soca and calypso today. It is their hope that the merged skills of Lewis and LVT Productions that calypso and the indigenous sounds of TT would have a lasting legacy.

Lewis and LVT have blended his initial reggae sound with calypso to bring a different sound to the market. The combined forces are expected to release some songs with this blend of calypso and reggae after Carnival.