Steel Drums making a comeback

John Heald said there would be a live 2 piece Calypso band, not a steel drum band. This thread is bogus.

Sounds like an improvement to me. You can only hear Jimmy Buffett oh so many times.

steel drums are for novices....REGGAE bands are the real deal, guitar, drummer, keyboardist :eek::D

Always enjoyed a mix of both. :cool:

Amazing.

 

When Carnival listens they don't really 'hear' anything.

How do you know that the majority of cruisers want steel drums? Maybe they are listening to the majority. Everytime there is a thread here about steel drums, I see more people not wanting them as much as they want a variety of live music.

I am glad after I left that others took up the "not what he said" posts. It is amazing how people twist something to mean what they want it to mean.

OK, I'm just teasing about quitting Carnival. We love them and live in Houston, so we will never quit sailing Carnival unless they move away from TX. Then again, we like them in the Med too, so I guess you can say we are hooked.

 

Anyway, in regards to the OP ...

 

Live music is always more fun but Steel Drum music…now that's Caribbean and puts me in a Cruising state of mind. We have a local restaurant that has a steel drum playing on the weekends and it always puts us in a vacation mood and brings us back to the restaurant. The food is good, but the live Steel Drum music is the reason we continue to dine there.

Even piped in Steel Drum music around the pool would be better than the same old "hits", in our humble opinion. ;)

I hear ya - I hear ya!! Bring back the steel drums Carnival.

I'll take the Calypso Duo over a DJ anytime!

It doesn't have to be strictly steel drum music. How about a mix of Calypso, Reggae, and Latin? Confine the hip-hop to one of the clubs.

What he said is that there will be a duo playing Caribbean inspired music. It will usually be a guitar player and a keyboard, but the keyboardist will use a steel drum sound as he or she chooses based on the song. He never said they would be actual steel drums.

 

I'm excited about them putting live duos back out vs. the DJ's and I'm glad it's not just steel drums he's talking about. They are so one note and after about 15 minutes, they are boring and kind of annoying by then. Just my opinion.

 

Just wanted to clarify what JH said so that people who think he meant actual steel drums aren't misunderstanding the post.

A steel drum sound is fine! That would make my happy.

Sounds like an improvement to me. You can only hear Jimmy Buffett oh so many times.

Well I like Jimmy Buffett but even more, I like UB40 and groups like that.

It doesn't have to be strictly steel drum music. How about a mix of Calypso, Reggae, and Latin? Confine the hip-hop to one of the clubs.

Now this is the perfect combination of cruise music.

Happy to hear that. Steel drums are good for about 5 minutes then they become irritating. :)

Totally agree, every single song (and I use the term song loosely) sounds exactly the same.....:confused:

My, wife is on the Pride repo now and this is what they have .

[ There is two guys that are playing some music at the pool which sound like the steel drums but it is canned music. They sing, play keyboard and guitar. They sound great and are a nice improvement! ] hope this help's some what :)

Vic

still better than a DJ with techno music !

My, wife is on the Pride repo now and this is what they have .

 

[ There is two guys that are playing some music at the pool which sound like the steel drums but it is canned music. They sing, play keyboard and guitar. They sound great and are a nice improvement! ] hope this help's some what :)

 

Vic

Thanks for clearing up the confusion.

still better than a DJ with techno music !

You do know you can ask the DJ to play something else, right? I was sitting behind the DJ in the smoking section and asked if he had any Zac Brown Band and he said sure. Next two songs were ZBB songs. :)

Will this be on any other ships besides the Pride?

Just had them on our Princess cruise and it's so relaxing. They did have the Sexy Legs (Men's) contest in a different area of the ship for the party crowd.

Anybody just get off the victory or Breeze? Curious to see if either of those ships have live music. I would prefer that over the DJ on the lido deck any day!

I love the steel drums!

Me too!

Me too!

I guess we need to keep complaining. These complaints seem to be having an effect, where things once lost are making a comeback.

Prefer steel drums, but anything is better than a DJ playing those same, tired line-dancing songs (if I never hear "Electric Slide" again I'll be just fine).

Steel drums specifically are not coming back. John Heald mentioned this on FB a month or so ago. He said they will start using a lot of duos on the Lido deck, who are able to play a wide range of music, including Caribbean inspired music. I'm guessing this means less of the DJ.

I prefer the steel drums, but the steel drum "sound" is a move in the right direction. Much better than a DJ. With good, quality steel drum bands the music doesn't all sound alike after 5 minutes, either.

I totally agree with you - hearing the Cupid shuffle, Casper slide, Wobble etc. is fine but come on - not EVERY DAY! - Calypso / steel drums go with my idea of a what makes the lido deck a good time

I totally agree with you - hearing the Cupid shuffle, Casper slide, Wobble etc. is fine but come on - not EVERY DAY! - Calypso / steel drums go with my idea of a what makes the lido deck a good time

Imagine this on a B2B2B cruise.. :rolleyes: I deleted these songs from my ipod right after I got home from the cruise.