Words by Jesse Serwer and Eddie STATS Houghton
Michel Martelly looks presidential as he prepares to tackle one of the world’s hardest jobs: hauling earthquake- and poverty-ravaged Haiti back from the brink. Now, try reconciling that guy with this one:
Or the even the man in the pink baseball cap, playing air guitar in front of a video-toaster montage of beaches, hotels and creole hotgals in the video for Sweet Micky’s “San Ou.”
Micky and Martelly are of course one and the same, the biggest star in the world of konpa, Haiti’s pre-eminent musical style–and now the man the country’s fate rests on. It’s no small feat for a guy who, until recently, was a regular presence at New York’s SOBs, where you might catch him performing his signature 1998 hit “Pa Manyen,” on a Friday night in his signature outlandish attire.