I have not been out on a weeknight in a good while, got an e-mail about Eyan Alleyne playing at Bump & Wine Café, it seems he is launching a CD for radio airplay – knowing Barbadian Radio Stations I decided to check it out and I was glad for the good time and the reunion with people like Beat One’s , the ex-Spice & co front man Alan Sheppard now restaurateur, plus some buddies I usually only see on Facebook.

The opening group is in fact the regular feature for Tuesday evenings down Cavans Lane, they’re known as Fighting Traffic – not a really cheerful name considering Barbados’ overclogged highways – and their playing style is reminiscent of In Living Colour (not to be confused with the Keenen Ivory Wayans’ comedy whose colour was spelt “COLOR“ the black metal band’s version is like Britain and caribbean’s way “COLOUR“).

They played ’til after 10:00 pm and there was an intermission and Eyan (both of us are Ian, but he spells his in a way to catch everyone’s eye) stated his groove triumphantly! The disk itself is a bit hot in its engineering, my poor speakers started distorting the high notes – if you have Peaveys or better then your amps can handle the wattage but Pat Bautz at Real Drum Studio needs to make sure in future that the disk can be played by any old Cuthbert, Theophilus or Athelstan out on the block or wherever.

The EP (Extended Play, not quite a full album) was recorded at Aasramam Studios and at Real Drum, but mastered at Music House Mastering by Mike Dominici, so be careful in future guys – you could blow out a speaker or worse an eardrum?

The tunes are are all romantically centred, especially the 2nd track “Gone” which reminded me of , but watching Eyan play live is a joy unto itself and now a rare treat, – as he’s heading for Sweden for a bit to build his career.

Eyan let go his version of Prince’s “Purple Rain” which is a guitar player’s joy, I remember when Eyan would be down at harbour Lights and playing the guitar with his butt and his teeth, but that was a while back so his botsy may be out of condition but his teeth are not dentures – LOL! He made his guitar SING!!

The EP is not for public consumption, which is suicide marketing-wise, but meant for local FM stations to play – a bit of a hard pull at Christmas time while the radio stations are mainly pandering to advertiser’s wishes of slutting it up with tons of Yuletide music so as to try and encourage Bajans to spend what they don’t really have.

So here’s hoping in January the radio stations will have a heart and pump Eyan’s music, if them all it’s likely Mix 96.9 may use it in their format but the others will cop out saying this is rock and they handle calypso, dub or reggae but I say it’s Bajan and play the disk before you get your butt legislated to play it by Law, fool!