Encore songwriter, producers proud of back-to-back Road March wins

NARIS­SA FRAS­ER

Af­ter a “Pardy” on the road last year, song­writer An­dre Jef­fers and pro­duc­ers Xplic­it­Mevon (Mevon Sood­een) and Kyle Phillips got their “En­core,” as they suc­cess­ful­ly de­fend­ed their Road March ti­tle this year – and they are elat­ed.

The song, per­formed by Machel Mon­tano, was played 171 times on the road over Car­ni­val Mon­day and Tues­day. Aaron “Voice” St Louis placed sec­ond with Cyah Be­have (127) and Bun­ji Gar­lin was third with Still A Road Man (97).

Jef­fers yes­ter­day told Guardian Me­dia he felt great but added that this win was “ex­tra spe­cial” for dif­fer­ent rea­sons. He pre­vi­ous­ly won with Kes and Iw­er George’s Stage Gone Bad (2020) and Mon­tano’s Pardy (2025).

“One, Machel got his record-break­ing win, and sec­ond­ly, it was re­al­ly in­spir­ing to kind of see up close the lev­el of per­fec­tion, hard work and ded­i­ca­tion that he put in­to this year in par­tic­u­lar. It was al­most like he was an em­bod­i­ment of the song. He took that on as his per­son­al mantra,” Jef­ferts said.

Mon­tano now holds the record for the most Road March wins – 12 – sur­pass­ing the Ald­wyn “Lord Kitch­en­er” Roberts.

Jef­fers, ANSA McAL’s Chief Stra-

tegy Of­fi­cer, said the songs he writes will al­ways be a tes­ta­ment to the fact that so­ca mu­sic can have deep and mean­ing­ful lyrics.

“So­ca mu­sic and award-win­ning so­ca mu­sic does not nec­es­sar­i­ly need to have the same sto­ry­lines over and over, the same hand-in-the-air, rags, flags... As a cre­ative, you can find your space in our cul­ture with­out it sound­ing like 80 to 90 per cent of the oth­er things.”

He said they took a risk to go “that lyri­cal” and “that philo­soph­i­cal,” but it has al­ways been his style.

“I write songs that I want kids and grown-ups and old­er folks to sing word for word, and I write for the stage and try to in­cor­po­rate that,” he said.

“That’s the chal­lenge I give my­self every year – not just to win a Road March, but to cre­ate the song of the mas­quer­ade with a bit of clev­er­ness and depth.”

He al­so con­grat­u­lat­ed Voice on hav­ing a “re­al­ly strong chal­lenge,” call­ing him an “amaz­ing song­writer and com­pos­er.”

“He shouldn’t be dis­cour­aged. I think he should be en­cour­aged by how this year went.”

Sood­een said he felt re­lieved and emo­tion­al.

“It was a dog fight to the end,” he said with a laugh.

“We went straight down to the wire.”

He added, “I am def­i­nite­ly hap­py. It’s one thing to win the Road March but to win it back-to-back, very few peo­ple have ever done it. And it’s on­ly fit­ting that the name of the song is En­core.”

Asked how it felt to see the amount of work Mon­tano put in­to cam­paign­ing a song he pro­duced, he said it has been amaz­ing.

“To know that he pri­ori­tised this song above all his oth­ers, to nam­ing his al­bum En­core, the pro­mo, the mar­ket­ing – every­thing. It just gave me the con­fi­dence that he re­al­ly be­lieved in it and be­lieved in us.”

He said Mon­tano’s ded­i­ca­tion and work eth­ic should be a les­son to the pop­u­la­tion.

As for Phillips, he said it is not on­ly hard work that pays off, but smart work.

“I feel good ... and this is smart work pay­ing off,” he said.

It is his fourth Road March ti­tle. He won with Mon­tano’s Wait­ing On The Stage in 2016, as well as Stage Gone Bad (Kes and Iw­er George) and Pardy.

He said while he knew it was a close race, “we held firm in the be­lief that we have it locked up.”

He de­scribed Mon­tano’s work eth­ic as “in­sane” and be­lieves no one has worked as hard as he did this sea­son.

Laugh­ing, he said, “Be­y­once, Bruno Mars, none of them... He is the hard­est work­er I know in this life.”

Mon­tano yes­ter­day con­grat­u­lat­ed the men when the news broke, send­ing a What­sApp mes­sage say­ing, “WE DID IT!!! Every­one did what was need­ed and it is done. CON­GRAT­U­LA­TIONS and thank you.”