On this episode, Suneel Jethani explores the sounds of Trinidad and Tobago.
Trinidad and Tobago is a dual-island nation in the Caribbean that is most known on the global stage for homegrown sounds like soca and calypso. But as you’ll hear, the islands have digested many diverse genres and influences over the years.
Delving into some of these sounds for us is Dr Suneel Jethani, a writer, academic & educator based on Gadigal Country (Sydney). Suneel’s research lies at the intersection of Science and Technology Studies (STS) and Critical Data Studies, covering topics such as people’s experiences with sensor-enabled house arrest bracelets and the ethics of self-tracking wearables. He also shares our passion for collecting and sharing interesting music and has been collecting vinyl and DJing on-and-off for over 20 years.
When we drew Trinidad and Tobago as Suneel’s randomly selected country, he explained his planned jumping-off point like a true academic, by linking us to this doctoral dissertation, Sounding the Transnational: Caribbean Jazz in Trinidad and Tobago by Jiselle Rouet. Rouet’s thesis, in her own words,
engages the concept of transnationalism, a process usually defined by the permanent migration of people across the borders of nation-states, to highlight the complexities of the sound of Caribbean jazz in Trinidad and Tobago. This musical practice draws on an array of sounds that are distinctly local, yet certainly influenced by knowledge of and connections to the world at large. The sounds of Jamaica (reggae), Brazil (bossa nova), the United States (R&B, funk, disco) and India (sitar) amongst others can be heard and felt in the music.
The transnationalist framing comes through clearly in Suneel’s mix, which features disco, jazz, reggae, and other internationally-inflected sounds but all with a distinctively Trini feel.
We spoke to Suneel about the mix, what he learnt about Trinbagonian music, and his approach to digging and DJing.
One Planet Under a Groove: How familiar were you with the music of Trinidad and Tobago before you began researching this mix? How did you go about digging for this project? And what did you learn as you went along?
Suneel Jethani: Not familiar at all. When we drew it, I was at a bit of a loss because the Calypso/Soca or Indian-influenced Chutney sound isn’t something I relate to in my own listening. I did the convenient thing of going into Bandcamp and Discogs and listening widely around the Trinidad and Tobago category just kind of filing away things that sounded good to my ears that I’d play out or put on a mix just in its own right. I started by looking for some writing on Trinbagonian Jazz and found Jiselle Rouet’s thesis which has a chapter that examines the work of the pioneering Kaiso Jazz artist Clive “Zanda” Alexander through the lens of materiality, history and colonial subjectivity. I recognised Ogun from a mix by Volcov of Neroli Records which is a label that features heavily in my collection so that kinda set the intention for the mix.
I also came across the Esso Trinidad Steel Band and I wondered about the connection. After reading a fascinating article by Dale Parker, a researcher at Aarhus University, on Van Dyke Parks’ time in the Caribbean I learned that he’d produced their album in 1971 along with Mighty Sparrow’s Hot and Sweet album in 1974. I guess the whole theme of exploring the sonic and cultural aspects of transnational influence came from there.
The only track on the mix that I have on vinyl is from Trinidadian Deep’s Caribbean Love EP which is on a London-based label that I really love called Broadcite. Everything else came from desk research. Digging around on Bandcamp, Discogs and YouTube, finding compilation albums, digging into artist repertoires. I tried to avoid Spotify for as long as possible but got there in the end and it turned up some gems, many of them not ending up on the final mix but there’s a longer playlist for anyone who wants to dive in. I usually only work with vinyl so I found it really challenging selecting for this mix and as you folks know, I did a few versions before I was happy with the end result. I wanted to only use music that I’d buy for my own collection and play out in their own right.
1PUG: The mix brilliantly encapsulates the “transnational” essence of Trinidad and Tobago’s music, fluidly moving between genres and styles. This also reflects the sound you’ve cultivated in your personal mixes: unbounded, free-flowing, and sidestepping standard DJ conventions to put the focus on the selections themselves. Could you shed light on your general approach to assembling tracks and crafting a cohesive mix? And what guided your selection of the particular tracks in this mix?
Suneel: It’s nice to know that you’re hearing that in my mixes. For me one of the best examples of a perfectly crafted complication is a mix CD that Attica Blues put out in 2001 called Drum Major Instinct and in the liner notes there’s a comment about genre-boxed thinking in post-90s black music culture which that mix cuts right through. It’s a style that I’ve always aimed for in my own mixes –being a bit agnostic to tempo and genre and arranging stuff by some other, more personal and internal logic. For this mix I tried to keep the sequence linear and clustered which I think strengthens the effect of moving between styles as the mix rolls along.
1PUG: Your mix features “Marijuana” by Indo-Trinidadian singer Mookraj Sahadeo, who sings in a mix of Hindi and English (“Oh ghabrana se rehana yeh kisi nahi khel, [Oh to live with worry, this is not some game] When de police hold you dey put you in de jail!”) and “Chutney Boy” by Natalie Yorke who, though herself not of Indian descent, sings here in the Hindustani influenced “chutney-soca” sound. Can you tell us anything about how the South Asian diaspora fit into Trinibagonian culture and music?
Suneel: As a person of South Asian extraction, the Chutney stuff is just so wild (and catchy) but it’s really not a sound I relate to. I did want to include a little bit of this sound just because it’s such an important part of Trinbagonian culture. I knew a little bit about this from an episode of the excellent brown history podcast and Indian indentured servants arrived in Trinidad in 1845. The Indian dimension of Chutney has a strong connection to Bhojpuri music which is just stunning. It’s also interesting to see how the Chutney sound has flowed back into Bollywood. There’s also a great book on this subject, Cutlish by Rajiv Mohabir.
1PUG: Your mix also features a couple of rapso tracks by Brother Resistance (who sadly passed away in 2021). Afropop Worldwide describe the rapso genre/movement as “an infectiously danceable rhythmic oration style that comes with a philosophy championing a Trinidadian identity in the face of a colonial history and a globalized present”. From your research, did you get any sense of how Trinibagonian music intersects with politics and identity?
Suneel: I think that as a style it’s natural that the Soca-calypso aesthetic would get re-rinsed through sounds influenced by 1970s Black Power and then Hip-Hop in the 80s. You’ll notice that in the lyrics of one of the Brother Resistance tracks I selected, Dancing Shoes he’s criticising Trinidadians for embracing foreign forms such as disco. There’s also a great deal of music dealing with themes of cultural imperialism and environmental degradation.
1PUG: We first came across you when we chanced upon your Mixcloud, where you’ve been quietly uploading a heap of excellent, genre-spanning mixes over the past half-decade (each given an understated title: “Episode 1”, “2”, “3” etc.). Can you tell us the story behind these mixes? And how does music collecting and sharing fit into the rest of your life?
Suneel: I’ve been collecting vinyl since I was a young teenager in the early 90s and DJ-ing on and off for over 20yrs now. I was born and raised in Melbourne where people are just so lucky to have a healthy scene with good record stores, radio like RRR and PBS and a long standing and dedicated intergenerational community pushing interesting sounds.
The stuff on Mixcloud was something I wanted to do to reconnect with my collection and maybe just share some of that with friends. With those mixes the process was to pick a record, hit record and then just pull out records on the fly and see where it goes. There’s a few themed ones in there as well. Episode 30 is all new-jack swing era slow jams. It’s been a while since I’ve done one and when you folks first reached out I’d been in a bit of a lull musically so I have to say thanks for trusting me with this project, it’s rekindled the diggers instinct which might have been a little dormant after lockdown(s), moving up to Sydney and a busy few years in terms of work and focus on other aspects of creative practice.
Tracklist:
Clive Zanda – Ogun
Suns of Dub – Connecting
Natalie Yorke – Chutney Boy
Jackie Johnson’s Back Beaters – Tobago Beat
Stephen Encinas – Lypso Illusion
Trinidadian Deep – Mind Channel
Trinidadian Deep – Caribbean Love
Black Truth Rhythm Band – Ifetayo
Mookraj Sahadeo – Marijuana
Shadow – Let’s Get Together
Nadie La Fond – Hot For Your Love
Embryo – Wajang Woman
Wild Fire (Al Kent Version) – Try Making Love
Brother Resistance – Dancin Shoes Rapso
Brother Resistance – Rapso Takeover
105 – Change My World
Michael Boothman – What You Won’t Do For Love
D’Rebel Band – Solid
Cover artwork: “The Prophets Descend” (2023) by Trini-Canadian artist Kvita Mongroo. kvita.art/about-the-artist/
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