Carisa Lee
Reporter
carisa.lee@cnc3.co.tt
When Anthony La Fleur, better known as Squeezy Rankin, was 17 years old, he composed a song for a man named Leston, from La Horquetta, who died.
“It is about a man in the community who was a good soldier,” he said during an interview at Guardian Media’s office in Port-of-Spain on Monday.
La Fleur explained that the entire community was grieving for Leston, and the song was a way to honour his memory.
“Everybody does call on me to sing that song and the community know this song from ever since,” he said.
La Fleur believes composing songs with a message has always been his calling.
“I always find myself singing them kind of songs about life, life in the ghetto, holding on. When the level of hardship, when you have no lights, you does have to get something to take you away from that and that was where the music came in,” he explained.
With his 2025 offering Justice making waves on radio stations and on social media, the 2024 Freestyle Monarch is now being encouraged by many to enter the Calypso Monarch competition.
La Fleur said as he became more involved in the music industry, he sang what grabbed people’s attention.
“I said, you know what, you see this good boy thing, let me show them what it is to be bad,” he said.
Squeezy Rankin’ said he put the songs about social issues on the shelf and in 1999 he made a soca hit and decided to pursue that genre.
The Rainy Weather singer said he became disenchanted when a producer told him that the public was not ready for his compositions.
“I was the jaw-dropping artiste, I was the man where women liked to say ‘oh God he outta timing’ and men saying ‘yes he bad’... I going dancehall show and mash up the place,” he said.
Over the years, La Fleur again shifted his style of music.
He said being a father of three children was the catalyst.
“I cyah have a 15-year-old daughter and going on stage and going and say aye big up the gal them and all them derogatory remarks I used to make before, to me that inappropriate,” he shared.
This is why for Carnival 2025, he released Justice, which is about a mother grieving for her criminal son who was killed.
“The mother saying she wants justice because of what happened to she child but if you listen to the song good, the community has been crying for justice from this person all the time, this is something that does happen. I have literally seen it on many occasions ... plenty of we living in denial in we communities,” he said.
Since its release on December 31, 2024, the music video has gained 25,000 views, with many commending him for using his talent to highlight what’s happening in society.
Soca artistes Machel Montano and Ian “Bunji Garlin” Alvarez both took to social media to highlight the song. Radio station owner Antony “Chinese Laundry” Chow Lin On did the same.
“This is absolute fire bro, no one saw this angle coming,” Bunji Garlin wrote in his post.
