Soca star Menace to throw hat into calypso ring for Carnival

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Menace appeared on the Connecting With Dave Lester Payne show on Thursday (Photo by Gemma Handy)
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By Carlena Knight

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It will be a busy Carnival for soca artiste Dennis ‘Menace XL’ Roberts as the Urlings resident has revealed he will not only be participating in the soca-themed Party Monarch Competition, but the Sir Prince Ramsey Calypso Monarch event as well.

Roberts, who is the reigning Groovy Monarch champion, made the revelation while speaking on Observer’s Connecting With Dave Lester Payne show this week.

“I am going into the calypso competition. I have two songs and I am going to adjust them to bring them to a certain standard for the calypso competition. They said there are two different segments now and I am going to try and enter the double,” Roberts said.

He explained that he was motivated to enter both competitions as the last two editions of Carnival were axed due to the pandemic. Carnival was last held in summer 2019.

“I am making sure I am entering everything. I was at home sitting down too long. The Covid let me feel a little uncomfortable so I am anxious to enter everything,” he explained.

Menace is one of few soca artistes to try his hand in the calypso arena; soca king Tian Winter did so in 2019, placing third with the songs, ‘Cycles’ and ‘Let Loose’.

But the ‘Tanya’ singer said he is not putting any pressure on himself to defend his crown and is just hoping to give patrons a spectacular performance.

“Well, what I notice is that after I gave up actually chasing the crown, I got a crown. So, I am not looking forward to defending the crown.

“I am going to give you wonderful offerings. I am going to go out there and perform to the best of my abilities and give you what I think you deserve. If it comes my way, it comes my way.

“Once I am looking towards the crown, it always eludes me and I end up getting depressed, go into a sense of anxiety, my whole camp gets depressed too and we all end up crying and all kind of subben,” Roberts said.

Thus far, the entertainer has dropped several soca and calypso songs including ‘Feelings’, ‘Brave’, ‘W.A.P.’ and ‘Red-handed’, in preparation for the hotly anticipated festivities, dubbed the ‘Caribbean’s greatest summer festival’.

The Calypso Monarch Competition is scheduled to take place on July 29, followed by Party Monarch on July 31.

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