PE­TER CHRISTO­PHER

pe­ter.christo­pher@guardian.co.tt

Rid­ing the wave of not one, but two Road March con­tenders, Neil Iw­er George is among the list of names of fi­nal­ists for the In­ter­na­tion­al So­ca Monarch com­pe­ti­tion.

George sealed his fi­nal spot with his per­for­mance of Stage Gone Bad short­ly be­fore 11pm on Sun­day, hours af­ter per­form­ing the song along­side Kes the Band and his oth­er col­lab­o­ra­tion Con­tender 'Conch Shell' with Machel Mon­tano at Pres­tige in San Fer­nan­do.

The ex­ten­sive work­load ap­peared to af­fect George, as he ap­peared out of breath at times but still did enough to move for­ward in the com­pe­ti­tion

George was joined by oth­er favourites Prob­lem Child and Lyrikal, whose hits "Nasty Up' and 'Ruk­shun" are both pow­ered by the Dark­seid Rid­dim.

The 11 chal­lengers wish­ing to usurp the crown from reign­ing Groovy So­ca Monarch Swap­pi were al­so an­nounced, with crowd favourites Skin­ny Ban­ton, Preedy and Blaxx mak­ing the cut.

No­tably, no fe­male artistes were named among the ini­tial fi­nal­ists, how­ev­er, that may change due to a new ad­di­tion to the event.

In the re­lease an­nounc­ing the fi­nal­ists, ISM con­firmed that "one artiste who en­tered the se­mi-fi­nals but did not place, can be vot­ed in­to the fi­nals."

This, they said, would be fa­cil­i­tat­ed by Fan Fave cat­e­go­ry.

ISM said, "Five artistes will be se­lect­ed for the Fan Fave cat­e­go­ry based on their so­cials."

The five artistes are ex­pect­ed to be an­nounced lat­er to­day.

The Fi­nal­ists:

Groovy :

As­ten Isaac - I.O.U

Blaxx - Can­boulay

Col­lege Boy Jesse - Hap­py Song

Ding Dong - Out­side

Isa­iah Mc Hee - So­ca Slide

Ker­ry John - Go Away

Lead­pipe - Some­times

Preedy - Akeem Chance

Ray­zor - Dread Ta­ban­ca

Rome - Good Good

Skin­ny Ban­ton - Wrong Again

Pow­er:

Iw­er George - Stage Gone Bad

Lu­ni Spark & Elec­tri­fy - Bac­cha­nal Par­ty

Lyrikal - Ruk­shun

Mi­cal Te­ja - Bumper Mur­der

Olatun­ji - Thank­ful

Preedy - Shell It

Prob­lem Child - Nasty Up

Prophet Ben­jamin - Bet­ty Cat

Rome - Easy to Break

Shal Mar­shall - Bun Up

Trinidad Ghost - I Ain't See