YOU may be familiar with Roland “RemBunction” Yearwood through his witty songs and comedy sketches, or even as a video director and filmmaker.

But for the 2025 Carnival season, he’s trying out something new, cruising around the country in his car with local artistes as they sing along to their tunes. His Car-aoke (karaoke) series is now an online favourite.

It started on January 6, when Yearwood uploaded a video to Instagram of him and Lyrikal in a car singing the latter’s song Dotish.

The two had been working together on the music video of another one of Lyrikal’s songs, Bacchanal Time.

“So we were heading to different locations, and en route to one of the locations, he let me hear Dotish and I was like, ‘Yo, bro, this one right here, love it.’

“I pulled out the phone and was like, ‘Nah, we had to get this.’”

He said they were leaving either the Temple in the Sea in Waterloo or Icacos at the time.

He admitted he got “bun out” for driving while recording that video from a commenter, for which he took accountability. It is an offence to use a cellphone and drive. Drivers can be fined $1,500 or get three demerit points.

Yearwood said, “So after that, I made sure I set things up properly because safety first. But the first one was just really organic.”

That video now has over 205,000 views and 9,000-plus likes and has attracted over 400 comments.

He said it was a “kismet, beautiful moment,” after which he realised, “Hey, this could be a beautiful thing moving forward.”

Former host of The Late Late Show James Corden had a similar series in the US called Carpool Karaoke, which ran from 2015-2023.

This was not on Yearwood’s mind at all.

“In the first instance, I didn’t even think about that. But then I was like, ‘Oh, right.’

[caption id="attachment_1137870" align="alignnone" width="735"] A screengrab of Roland "RemBunction" Yearwood and soca artiste Lyrikal during a session of Yearwood's Carnival Car-aoke series. -[/caption]

“But there’s nothing like a new idea under the sun, just a new take on an old one.”

Many strangers and friends alike began persuading him to do more of the videos, with some even listing who they’d like to see featured next.

Other artistes who have appeared so far include GBM Nutron, Preedy, Anika Berry, Rae, Trinidad Rio, Ozy Merrique, Olatunji, Juby, Crazy, Lil Bitts and Kevon Carter.

Asked what led to him mixing the old and new school artistes in the series, he said he feels many great, older local tunes deserve more appreciation.

Decked in his classic jacket and tie with no shirt, Trinidad Rio performed his 1983 hit Travelling Man.

Merrique, who was part of local rapso group Homefront, sang their 1995 hit Rollin.

“I am a culture lover to my core. So I always find to know where you heading, you have to know where you come from,” Yearwood said. “No discredit to anybody, but we may not always be aware of the magnitude of our cultural capital…We have so much music that don’t get heard. There are so many songs and I took this as an opportunity to share those