LOCAL songwriting/production duo Full Blown Entertainment (Kevon and Kory Hart) have struck gold once again – this time with their Big Links Riddim.

Featuring songs from themselves, Machel Montano, Kes and Yung Bredda, it is safe to say they are in good spirits as it continues to dominate TT’s airwaves.

Their catalogue includes a long list of hits.

For Montano alone, they wrote The Fog, Like Ah Boss, Junction, Vibes Cyah Done, Epic, Bottle of Rum, Mr Fete, Take It Slow, among others.

They’ve also collaborated with artistes such as Kes (People, Fallin’, Dutty Flex, Mental Day), Kerwin Du Bois (Too Real), Nessa Preppy (Tingo), and Voice (Cheers to Life).

In addition to their extensive song-writing portfolio, Full Blown boasts five Soca Monarch titles and one Road March victory.

They have also worked with international acts like the legendary group Boyz II Men and Nigerian singer 2Face Idibia (now 2Baba).

In recent years, they have branched out as artistes as well.

They told Sunday Newsday the idea for this riddim was “very fresh” and stemmed from creating a tune for themselves.

It is their second riddim, with the first being the Palmwine Riddim in 2022 which featured them, Kerwin Du Bois, GBM Nutron and Teddyson John.

Zess meets groovy

The Big Links Riddim features guitars from Kyle Peters, bass by Josh Richardson, and was mixed and mastered by Nikholai Greene (NMG Music).

“We usually like to do a song for ourselves every Carnival but because of how much work we had going on with other artistes, we didn't really get time to sit and focus on something for ourselves. But then one day, randomly in the studio, we started to compose this piece of music,” Kory said.

He explained that he mainly handles production elements of their music and Kevon is the main writer.

“So he (Kevon) took it home and he wrote our song on the riddim, which is Good Spirits.”

Starting off with the infamous “zess” beat on the tabla, the riddim then smoothly unfolds into a groovy soca.

Asked if the plan was always to incorporate zess with soca, Kory said originally, it was “purely soca.

“And it was nice, it was sounding cool and the melodies were sweet…But then Kevon was like: ‘What about this zess sample?’

“I don’t know how he heard that, I don’t know how he thought that. But without it, the riddim is very ordinary to me. So the sample gave it an edge and to me, that’s the defining moment in the production.”

[caption id="attachment_1129371" align="alignnone" width="681"] Kory Hart of Full Blown Entertainment.- Photo by Shay Caruth[/caption]

Their song is called Good Spirits, Montano’s is The Truth, Kes’s is No Sweetness and Yung Bredda’s is The Greatest Bend Over.

Kevon said, “Writing (songs) for ourselves (as artistes), we know what we want to say, we have topics that just we like to talk about like love and loyalty and integrity and values that mean a lot to us. And everything we sing, we try to make it applicable (for any time) and not make it seasonal. We don’t sing seasonal songs.”

It speaks abou