CDMC Review

Just a few days ago (07/08/2015) we took off to the first Caribbean Dance Music Conference held at the Hyatt Regency Port of Spain. Calling it just a Caribbean Dance Music Conference however fails to describe the importance of this unique and crucial event hosted by CDM Generation.

So who was there? CDM Generation brought in some heavy hitters in both the local and international industry. We got representative from Collective Digital Studios VP Dana Shayegan, Martin “Mice” Raymond, Carl Beaver Henderson, Robin Imamsha, Navid Lancaster, Alex Kubiyashi Barnwell, Mr. Pineapple himself Kickraux, along with the Copyright Organization of Trinidad and Tobago (COTT) and the Trinidad and Tobago Copyright Collection Organization (TTCO). With such an impressive roster of speakers we could only scratch the surface on the wealth of information imparted on CDMC patrons.

Here are a few snippets of the almost overwhelming info and advice given by some of the main speakers.

Kubiyashi
“The crowd loved every second of him”

There were a number of interesting topics discussed ranging from Music Sensibility, finding your audience, going outside of radio and not being a “hustler”. Kubiyashi spoke of going back to our roots to find that local sound and carrying it into present day, that new drop that no one has heard could be in a calypso from years ago.

Go forth and explore your culture and throw it into the mix. Some truly incredible advice as we have a tendency to look outside for inspiration when there is a wealth of it buried in our own culture. Pan, tassa, parang, bandolin, calypso, kaiso, chunty, and the list goes on and on … explore it and you might just hit gold.

When you think about it, pan has been with us forever yet it takes less than a few days for two Canadian producers to incorporate our instruments into music in a manner that we have not.
Dezko and Torrez Steel Drums

Dana Shayegan

We heard from Dana Shayegan the Vice Prisedient of Collective Digital Studios dishing out info on YouTube as a tool for audience growth and speaking directly to your fans through social media.

One particular tip stood out regarding having constant content: instead of dropping an EP try breaking it up, more videos more chances for views off of one production. Teaser videos, lyric videos, behind the scenes are some ideas to toy around with.

All in all some great insight for anyone interested in using YouTube and in a wider sense social media to help grow their brand. This aspect of the local music industry is sorely lacking and it was great to have some light shed on the crucially important branding and exposure side of the business that creatives usually shy away from.

Kickraux (Aka Mr. Pineapple)

Some great insight from Kickraux on branding and representing something with your brand, questions such as “Who do you represent?” and “What are you about?” should be able to be answered before you even attempt to start building your brand.

One memorable quote was “It’s about the branding and the experience”, creating that unforgettable experience for your fans is what keeps them coming back, so watch what you say on social media.

We were also given a treat, a preview of with his unreleased track (which is out now) which had the room grooving. He also spoke about the monetizing of remixes, basically you don’t make money on those and he recommends creating your own original music.

It wasn’t all talk about monetization and YouTube though, we got a lot of old-school knowledge from local heroes Martin “Mice” Raymond and Carl “Beaver” Henderson, laying the history about influential songs “Rock the Boat” that was integral in kicking off Caribbean music. The idea that Caribbean music has always been dance music and is a constant source for EDM/CDM development (Tassa drop anyone?). Did anyone know that Raving was actually a Jamaican term? Who would of thought?

The rest of the conference was filled with great information for anyone involved or wanting to be involved in the EDM/CDM scene as well as the wider Caribbean music scene with speakers from COTT and TTCO giving us info on the legal side as well as us hearing about Intellectual Properties. All in all, a great first conference. We give CDM Generation the official hell yea seal of approval for this one, thumbs up and great work.

Post and pre conference celebrations were in the line up all weekend long. If you want to dive in to the supporting events for the CDMC we will be doing a review of the Free Up even here.

Pros, Cons, Opinions

Pros

Great Turnout

Excellent Presenters - CDM Generation really went out of their way to get some of the best speakers possible.

Networking- Cannot state this enough this was a great opportunity for a lot of the people involved in the EDM/CDM industry to meet up and finally get talking, expect some great things to come out of this.

Cons
Minor technical nuances but nothing truly negative can be said here.

Opinions
This was exactly what was needed to unify and diversify the very thinking that goes in to the local music industry. We expect this powerful event to have a significant impact on our local producers, DJs and artistes and hope there will be many more like it.

Article by: Sean Chas Doobay-Worrell