Soca music superstar Ian ‘Bunji Garlin’ Alvarez took soca one step closer to the Grammy Awards when he was mentioned as one of the artists having worked on the winning Dance/Electronic album of the year. Skrillex and Diplo presents Jack U, grabbed the Grammy nod for Album of the Year. Alvarez featured on a track called Jungle Bae. Alvarez also penned the lyrics. (Jump to 2:00 on the video)
The duo also won Best Dance Recording for ‘Where Are You Now’, with Justin Bieber.
During Skrillex’s and Diplo’s acceptance speech at the Grammy Awards, Diplo mentioned and thanked Alvarez as one of the people with whom they worked on the album. Alvarez said in phone interview with Newsday yesterday, that he was honored to have received mention by Diplo.
Alvarez and wife, Fay Ann Lyons said they heard about the mention after fans began tweeting and posting about it via social media. The soca power couple were exercising when the news hit social media.
For Alvarez, this mention and the win for Reggae group, Morgan Heritage means that eyes of the world would train themselves upon the Caribbean region.
Therefore, creative entities in Trinidad and Tobago and throughout the Caribbean region need to prepare themselves, he said, to grab the next big opportunity as it presents itself.
“The world will be looking on to see what other talents will come of it to impact the world,” he said.
He said with Diplo the collaboration was always an exchange and “to see that he did not forget to put my name into the acceptance speech and so early into it..hearing my name being called within the first three people says something.” He added that being mentioned so early speaks to the volume of talent that TT has to offer.
“We just did not happen to have an industry. We have had one for decades. By now, collectively, the leaders in the industry, by now, should have figured out a way for the industry to sustain itself.
We have this thing of always wanting to depend on the Government to do this or do that.
We really should be trying to find a way to build ourselves.
Yes they have their part to play but what if they don’t do anything what are we going to do,” he said when asked if he felt the creative sector was being well positioned to aid in this country’s economic diversification.
Alvarez said there will be further collaborations with Diplo.
“We have lots of collaborations in the works right now.
Some that are basically, finished.
We always have stuff with Walshy Fire, Jillionaire and groups like Party Favor…we have a lot of group projects that will be coming soon. We plan to eventually have some of our won local counterparts being involved in it where feasible”
SOURCE: Newsday TT
