Blaka Dan and College Boy Jesse released “My Time Now” on Monday, October 19, 2026, a cross-island soca single built for Trinidad Carnival 2027. The record pairs Grenada’s first Ultimate Soca Champion with a former International Groovy Soca Monarch, and that exchange is the story.
Soca seasons are built on records like this one, released early, while the fetes are still being planned and the pecking order for Carnival is wide open. What makes “My Time Now” worth an iimiTV post is who is holding it: a Grenadian champion carrying his island’s flag into the Trini season, and a Trinidad and Tobago monarch meeting him halfway.
“My Time Now” Soca: The Credits Behind The Record
The single was written by Wrenroy “Blaka Dan” Ogiste and produced and arranged by Damion “Pappy Boi” La Pompe of Loyalty Family Productions. The official audio credits fill in the rest of the room: it was recorded at ReQuest Muzic Studios, stem mastered by Kasey Phillips of Precision Productions, with background vocals from Valene Nedd alongside Ogiste and Jesse, live guitar by Jeavid Neckles and live bass by Jerrod Nelson. The single is out now on digital platforms, including Apple Music.
Read those credits as a map. Precision Productions is Trinidadian soca royalty behind the board, Loyalty Family Productions carries the record, and the live guitar and bass keep it grounded in the band tradition that still powers the road. This is not a loosie tossed at the season. It is a properly built Carnival record, staffed like one.
Grenada To Trinidad, And Back Again
Blaka Dan won the inaugural Ultimate Soca Champion title in 2025, becoming the first artist ever to claim the prize, a win that certified the rise he had been building out of Grenada’s Spicemas scene. College Boy Jesse is a former International Groovy Soca Monarch winner and a familiar presence on the Trinidad and Tobago Carnival circuit, one of the smooth voices the groovy side of the season runs on. Champions from two different islands, two different crowns, one record.
“My Time Now continues the exchange of talent between Grenada and Trinidad and Tobago while giving both artists fresh material for the coming season.”
That line from Soca News gets the geometry right. Grenada and Trinidad have traded soca talent for generations, through the Spicemas and Carnival calendars, shared producers, shared stages and a shared diaspora. A Grenadian champion does not guest on a Trini season record as a courtesy. He arrives as a peer, and the record treats him that way, with Jesse sharing the front of the song rather than lending it a name.
What It Means For The Diaspora
For Caribbean communities in Toronto, this is not foreign news. The same families who jump at the Toronto Caribbean Carnival in August follow Spicemas and Trinidad Carnival like a second sports season, and the Grenadian and Trini sides of that community share fetes, barbershops and group chats all winter. A Grenada to Trinidad link-up lands in Toronto living rooms because Toronto is one of the cities where both islands live side by side.
The timing is part of the craft. Grenada’s own Spicemas runs in August, which means Blaka Dan arrives in the Trinidad season straight off his home Carnival, match-fit in a way most of the field is not. An October release gives “My Time Now” the full runway: the Christmas fetes, the January build, and the final weeks when the season’s defining records separate themselves. Early records live or die on whether DJs keep them in rotation once the heavy releases land, and a champion’s record, built with a monarch, starts that test with every advantage.
It also sets a marker for the season. When a reigning champion from one island and a monarch from the other open their Carnival 2027 account together in October, the rest of the field is on notice early. “My Time Now” is a title doing honest work: both men are claiming their moment before the season’s bigger guns fire.
Blaka Dan and College Boy Jesse released “My Time Now” on October 19, 2026, and it stands as one of the first statements of the Carnival 2027 cycle. iimiTV’s Caribbean Music desk will be tracking this season from Toronto all the way to the road, and this record is on the board.
