Caribbean Fever Music Festival 2012 at Barclays Center: Machel Montano, Alison Hinds, Cham & More
Brooklyn became a meeting point for Soca, reggae, dancehall and classic hip-hop on Monday, December 17, 2012, when the inaugural Caribbean Fever Music Festival took over Barclays Center.
The concert brought an unusually broad Caribbean lineup into one of New York City’s newest major arenas, with performers including Machel Montano, Alison Hinds, Cham, Mr. Vegas, Morgan Heritage, Doug E. Fresh, Slick Rick, Farmer Nappy, Patrice Roberts, Kerwin Du Bois, Benjai, Chubb Rock and others. Barclays Center later identified the 2012 concert as the festival’s inaugural show at the venue.
Julianspromos preserved performances from five of the night’s major acts: Machel Montano, Alison Hinds, Cham, Mr. Vegas and Morgan Heritage.
The footage was shot by Intrigue Lane and edited by Julian C. Hackett.
Machel Montano performing at the inaugural Caribbean Fever Music Festival at Barclays Center in Brooklyn on December 17, 2012.
Caribbean Fever Comes to Barclays Center
Caribbean Fever was originally scheduled for November 2, 2012, only weeks after Barclays Center opened in Brooklyn.
Hurricane Sandy changed those plans.
In the aftermath of the storm, organizers postponed the festival to December 17, with previously purchased tickets honored for the new date.
When the concert finally happened, the concept remained ambitious: bring several branches of Caribbean and Caribbean-American music together on one Brooklyn stage.
The original flyer highlights Machel Montano HD, Morgan Heritage, Mr. Vegas, Cham, Alison Hinds, Slick Rick and Doug E. Fresh, immediately showing how deliberately varied the festival was.
It wasn't simply a Soca concert.
It wasn't simply a reggae show.
Caribbean Fever moved between genres throughout the night.
Machel Montano Brings Soca to Barclays Center
Machel Montano arrived at Barclays Center at the end of an extraordinary year.
Earlier in 2012, he had dominated Trinidad and Tobago Carnival with “Mr Fete” and “Pump Yuh Flag,” completing the rare combination of Groovy Soca Monarch, Power Soca Monarch and Road March victories.
His Caribbean Fever performance therefore captured Machel during one of the defining Soca years of his career.
The surviving Julianspromos footage gives fans another view of that 2012 era — this time not on a Carnival road or outdoor festival stage, but inside Barclays Center in Brooklyn.
Alison Hinds Represents Barbados and Soca
Alison Hinds brought another unmistakable Soca presence to Caribbean Fever.
The Barbadian artist was among the performers specifically promoted by Barclays Center when the festival was first announced, alongside Machel Montano, Cham, Mr. Vegas, Doug E. Fresh and Slick Rick.
Her inclusion helped give the festival a genuinely regional feel, with Caribbean music represented by artists from multiple islands rather than one dominant scene.
Cham Brings Dancehall to Brooklyn
The night shifted into Dancehall with Cham, then widely promoted as Baby Cham.
His appearance demonstrated exactly what made Caribbean Fever different from many of the Caribbean concerts happening around New York at the time.
Soca could be followed by Dancehall.
Reggae could sit beside classic hip-hop.
Different audiences shared the same room.
Barclays Center's later retrospective also lists Cham among the performers who took part in the inaugural 2012 festival.
Mr. Vegas Keeps the Dancehall Energy Moving
Mr. Vegas added another major Jamaican presence to the lineup.
By 2012 he had already built a catalog capable of moving between Dancehall, Reggae and crossover Caribbean audiences, making him a natural fit for a festival designed around musical variety.
The surviving performance is especially useful alongside the Cham footage because the two videos preserve different parts of the Dancehall side of Caribbean Fever rather than leaving the archive dominated entirely by Soca.
Morgan Heritage Brings Reggae to Caribbean Fever
The fifth surviving Julianspromos video captures Morgan Heritage.
Their presence pushed the festival further into Reggae and added yet another dimension to an already wide-ranging lineup.
Barclays Center's own 2013 retrospective confirms Morgan Heritage among the performers at the inaugural show, alongside Machel Montano, Alison Hinds, Mr. Vegas, Cham and numerous other artists.
With Morgan Heritage included, the surviving Julianspromos collection now reflects three of the festival's major musical lanes: Soca, Dancehall and Reggae.
A Caribbean Festival Inside a New Brooklyn Landmark
The venue itself adds another layer to the story.
Barclays Center had opened only a few months earlier in September 2012, making Caribbean Fever part of the arena's inaugural period.
The official event listing promoted the December concert as an evening bringing together dancehall, reggae, Soca and classic hip-hop, with Barclays Center presenting the festival as a celebration of Caribbean music inside Brooklyn.
That mattered in a borough with one of the largest Caribbean populations in the United States.
A lineup featuring artists from Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados and Jamaica was now performing inside Brooklyn's new major arena.
Five Performances, One Night
Taken individually, each surviving video documents one artist.
Together, they give a much better picture of what Caribbean Fever was trying to accomplish.
Machel Montano and Alison Hinds represent the Soca side.
Cham and Mr. Vegas preserve the Dancehall element.
Morgan Heritage brings Reggae into the surviving collection.
And beyond those five videos, the actual concert stretched even further, with performers such as Doug E. Fresh, Slick Rick, Farmer Nappy, Patrice Roberts, Kerwin Du Bois, Benjai and Chubb Rock appearing during the inaugural festival.
From the Julianspromos Archives
Caribbean Fever Music Festival 2012 survives in the Julianspromos archive as more than a single performance.
The five videos capture Machel Montano, Alison Hinds, Cham, Mr. Vegas and Morgan Heritage sharing one Brooklyn concert stage during a night that moved freely between Soca, Dancehall and Reggae.
All five surviving videos were uploaded on December 22, 2012, just five days after the concert.
The footage was shot by Intrigue Lane and edited by Julian C. Hackett, with no Julianspromos on-camera host for the assignment.
Together with the five surviving photographs and original flyer, the collection preserves the inaugural Caribbean Fever Music Festival at a particularly interesting moment in Brooklyn music history — Caribbean artists taking over Barclays Center during the arena's first months of operation and establishing a festival that would return on a much larger scale the following year.
