Fela Anikulapo Kuti
(15 October, 1938 – 2 August, 1997), or simply Fela
, was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist musician and composer, pioneer of afrobeat music, human rights activist, and political maverick. [1]
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Biography
Fela was born Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti in
Abeokuta,
Ogun State,
Nigeria,
[2] to a middle-class family. His mother,
Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti was a
feminist activist in the anti-colonial movement and his father, Reverend Israel Oludotun Ransome-Kuti, a Protestant minister and school principal, was the first president of the Nigerian Union of Teachers. His brothers,
Dr. Beko Ransome-Kuti and Olikoye Ransome-Kuti both
medical doctors, are well known in Nigeria.
Fela was sent to London in 1958 to study
medicine but decided to study music instead at the
Trinity College of Music. While there he formed the band Koola Lobitos, playing a style of music that he would later call
afrobeat. The style was a fusion of African
jazz and
funk with West African
highlife. In 1961, Fela married his first wife, Remilekun (Remi) Taylor, with whom he would have three children (
Femi, Yeni, and Sola). In 1963, Fela moved back to Nigeria, re-formed Koola Lobitos and trained as a
radio producer for the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. In 1969, Fela took the band to the
United States. While there, Fela discovered the
Black Power movement through Sandra Smith (now Izsadore)—a partisan of the
Black Panther Party—which would heavily influence his music and political views and renamed the band Nigeria ’70. Soon, the
Immigration and Naturalization Service was tipped off by a promoter that Fela and his band were in the US without work permits. The band then performed a quick recording session in
Los Angeles that would later be released as
The ’69 Los Angeles Sessions
.
Fela and his band, renamed
Africa '70
, returned to Nigeria. He then formed the
Kalakuta Republic, a
commune, a
recording studio, and a home for many connected to the band that he later declared independent from the Nigerian state. Fela set up a
nightclub in the Empire Hotel, named the Afro-Spot and then the Afrika Shrine, where he performed regularly. Fela also changed his middle name to Anikulapo (meaning "he who carries death in his pouch"),
[3] stating that his original middle name of Ransome was a
slave name. The recordings continued, and the music became more politically motivated. Fela's music became very popular among the Nigerian public and Africans in general. In fact, he made the decision to sing in
Pidgin English so that his music could be enjoyed by individuals all over
Africa, where the local languages spoken are very diverse and numerous. As popular as Fela's music had become in Nigeria and elsewhere, it was also very unpopular with the ruling government, and raids on the Kalakuta Republic were frequent. During 1972
Ginger Baker recorded
Stratavarious with Fela appearing alongside
Bobby Gass.
[4]
In 1977 Fela and the Afrika ’70 released the hit album
Zombie
, a scathing attack on Nigerian
soldiers using the zombie metaphor to describe the methods of the
Nigerian military. The album was a smash hit with the people and infuriated the government, setting off a vicious attack against the Kalakuta Republic, during which one thousand soldiers attacked the commune. Fela was severely beaten, and his elderly mother was thrown from a window, causing fatal injuries. The Kalakuta Republic was burned, and Fela's studio, instruments, and master tapes were destroyed. Fela claimed that he would have been killed if it were not for the intervention of a commanding officer as he was being beaten. Fela's response to the attack was to deliver his mother's
coffin to the main army barrack in Lagos and write two songs, "Coffin for Head of State" and "Unknown Soldier," referencing the official inquiry that claimed the commune had been destroyed by an unknown soldier.
Fela and his band then took residence in Crossroads Hotel as the Shrine had been destroyed along with his commune. In 1978 Fela married 27 women, many of whom were his dancers, composers, and singers to mark the anniversary of the attack on the Kalakuta Republic. Later, he was to adopt a rotation system of keeping only twelve simultaneous wives.
[5] The year was also marked by two notorious
concerts, the first in
Accra in which
riots broke out during the song "Zombie," which led to Fela being banned from entering
Ghana. The second was at the
Berlin Jazz Festival after which most of Fela's musicians deserted him, due to rumors that Fela was planning to use the entirety of the proceeds to fund his presidential campaign.
Despite the massive setbacks, Fela was determined to come back. He formed his own
political party, which he called Movement of the People. In 1979 he put himself forward for
President in Nigeria's first
elections for more than a decade but his candidature was refused. At this time, Fela created a new band called Egypt 80 and continued to record albums and tour the country. He further infuriated the political establishment by dropping the names of ITT vice-president
Moshood Abiola and then General
Olusegun Obasanjo at the end of a hot-selling 25-minute political screed titled "I.T.T. (International Thief-Thief)."
In 1984, he was again attacked by the Military government, who jailed him on a dubious charge of
currency smuggling. His case was taken up by several human-rights groups, and after 20 months, he was released from prison by General
Ibrahim Babangida. On his release he divorced his 12 remaining wives, saying that "marriage brings jealousy and selfishness."
Once again, Fela continued to release albums with Egypt 80, made a number of successful tours of the United States and
Europe and also continued to be politically active. In 1986, Fela performed in
Giants Stadium in
New Jersey as part of the
Amnesty International Conspiracy of Hope concert, sharing the bill with
Bono,
Carlos Santana, and
the Neville Brothers. In 1989, Fela & Egypt 80 released the anti-apartheid "Beasts of No Nation" album that depicts on its cover U.S. President
Ronald Reagan, UK Prime Minister
Margaret Thatcher and South African Prime Minister
P.W. Botha with fangs dripping blood.
His album output slowed in the 1990s, and eventually he stopped releasing albums altogether. The battle against military corruption in Nigeria was taking its toll, especially during the rise of dictator
Sani Abacha. Rumors were also spreading that he was suffering from an illness for which he was refusing treatment. On 3 August 1997, Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, already a prominent
AIDS activist and former Minister of Health, stunned the nation by announcing his younger brother's death a day earlier from
Kaposi's sarcoma brought on by AIDS. (Their younger brother Beko was in jail at this time at the hand of Abacha for political activity). More than a million people attended Fela's funeral at the site of the old Shrine compound. A new Africa Shrine has opened since Fela's death in a different section of Lagos under the supervision of his son
Femi Kuti.
Music
The musical style performed by Fela Kuti is called Afrobeat, which is essentially a fusion of jazz, funk,
psychedelic rock, and traditional West African chants and rhythms. As Iwedi Ojinmah points out in his Article "Baba is Dead - Long Live Baba," Afrobeat also borrows heavily from the native "tinker pan" African-style percussion that Kuti acquired while studying in Ghana with Hugh Masakela, under the uncanny Hedzoleh Soundz. Afrobeat is also characterized by having vocals, and musical structure, along with jazzy, funky horn sections. The endless groove is also used, in which a base rhythm of drums, shekere, muted guitar, and bass guitar are repeated throughout the song. His band was notable for featuring two
baritone saxophones, whereas most groups using this instrument only use one. This is a common technique in African and African-influenced musical styles, and can be seen in funk and hip-hop. Some elements often present in Fela's music are the call-and-response within the chorus and figurative but simple lyrics. Fela's songs were almost always over 10 minutes in length, some reaching the 20- or even 30-minute marks, while some unreleased tracks would last up to 45 minutes when performed live. This was one of many reasons that his music never reached a substantial degree of popularity outside of Africa. His songs were mostly sung in Nigerian pidgin, although he also performed a few songs in the
Yoruba language. Fela's main instruments were the saxophone and the keyboards, but he also played the trumpet, guitar, and took the occasional drum solo. Fela refused to perform songs again after he had already recorded them, which also hindered his popularity outside Africa. Fela was known for his showmanship, and his concerts were often quite outlandish and wild. He referred to his stage act as the Underground Spiritual Game.
Fela attempted making a movie but lost all the materials to the fire that was set to his house by the military government in power.
Political views
The American
Black Power movement influenced Fela's political views. He was also a supporter of
Pan-Africanism and
socialism, and called for a united, democratic African
republic. He was a fierce supporter of
human rights, and many of his songs are direct attacks against
dictatorships, specifically the
militaristic governments of
Nigeria in the 1970s and 1980s. He was also a social commentator, and he criticized his fellow Africans (especially the
upper class) for betraying traditional African culture. The African culture he believed in also included having many wives (
polygyny) and the
Kalakuta Republic was formed in part as a polygamist colony. He defended his stance on polygyny with the words "A man goes for many women in the first place. Like in Europe, when a man is married, when the wife is sleeping, he goes out and fucks around. He should bring the women in the house, man, to live with him, and stop running around the streets!"
[6] His views towards women are characterised by some as misogynist, with songs like "Mattress" typically cited as evidence
[7] In a more complex example, he mocks the aspiration of African women to European standards of ladyhood while extolling the values of the market woman in his song "Lady." It should be noted, though, that Fela was very open when it came to sex, as he portrayed in some of his songs, such as "Open and Close" and "Na Poi."
Bypassing editorial censorship in Nigeria's predominantly state controlled press, Kuti began in the 1970s buying advertising space in daily and weekly newspapers such as
The Daily Times
and
The Punch
in order to run outspoken political columns.
[8] Published throughout the 1970s and early 1980s under the title
Chief Priest Say
, these columns were essentially extensions of Kuti's famous Yabi Sessions—consciousness-raising word-sound rituals, with himself as chief priest, conducted at his Lagos nightclub. Organized around a militantly
Afrocentric rendering of history and the essence of black beauty,
Chief Priest Say
focused on the role of
cultural hegemony in the continuing subjugation of Africans. Kuti addressed a number of topics, from explosive denunciations of the Nigerian Government's criminal behavior; Islam and Christianity's exploitive nature, and evil multinationals; to deconstructions of Western medicine,
Black Muslims, sex, pollution, and poverty.
Chief Priest Say
was cancelled, first by
Daily Times
then by
Punch
, ostensibly due to non-payment, but many commentators have speculated that the paper's respective editors were placed under increasingly violent pressure to stop publication.
Discography
Year
| Title
| Label
|
1971
| Live ! (with Ginger Baker)
| Wrasse Records
|
1971
| Why Black Man Dey Suffer
| Wrasse Records
|
1972
| Stratavarious
(with Ginger Baker)
| Polydor/Wrasse Records
|
1972
| Na Poi
| Wrasse Records
|
1972
| Open & Close
| Wrasse Records
|
1972
| Shakara
| Wrasse Records
|
1972
| Roforofo Fight
| Wrasse Records
|
1973
| Afrodisiac
| Wrasse Records
|
1973
| Gentleman
| Wrasse Records
|
1974
| Alagbon Close
| Wrasse Records
|
1975
| Noise for Vendor Mouth
| Wrasse Records
|
1975
| Confusion
| Wrasse Records
|
1975
| Everything Scatter
| Wrasse Records
|
1975
| He Miss Road
| Wrasse Records
|
1975
| Expensive Shit
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| No Bread
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Kalakuta Show
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Upside Down
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Ikoyi Blindness
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Before I Jump Like Monkey Give Me Banana
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Excuse O
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Zombie
| Wrasse Records
|
1976
| Yellow Fever
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| Opposite People
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| Fear Not For Man
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| Stalemate
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| Observation No Crime
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| ''Johnny Just Drop (J.J.D Live
| at Kalakuta Republic)''
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| I Go Shout Plenty
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| No Agreement
| Wrasse Records
|
1977
| Sorrow, Tears, and Blood
| Wrasse Records
|
1978
| Shuffering and Shmiling
| Wrasse Records
|
1979
| Unknown Soldier
| Wrasse Records
|
1980
| I.T.T. (International Thief Thief)
| Wrasse Records
|
1980
| Music of Many Colours
(with Roy Ayers)
| Wrasse Records
|
1980
| Authority Stealing
| Wrasse Records
|
1981
| Black President
| Wrasse Records
|
1981
| Original Sufferhead
| Wrasse Records
|
1981
| Coffin for Head of State
| Wrasse Records
|
1983
| Perambulator
| Wrasse Records
|
1983
| Live in Amsterdam
| Wrasse Records
|
1985
| Army Arrangement
| Wrasse Records
|
1986
| Teacher Don't Teach Me Nonsense
| Wrasse Records
|
1989
| Beasts of No Nation
| Wrasse Records
|
1989
| O.D.O.O. (Overtake Don Overtake Overtake)
| Wrasse Records
|
1990
| Confusion Break Bones
| Wrasse Records
|
1990
| Just Like That
| Wrasse Records
|
1992
| Underground System
| Wrasse Records
|
2004
| The Underground Spiritual Game
| Quannum Projects
|
Filmography
- Music Is The Weapon
1982, Stephane tchal-Gadjieff & Jean Jacques Flori, reissued in 2002 by Universal
- Fela In Concert
1981
- Fela Live! Fela Anikulapo-Kuti and the Egypt 80 Band
1984, Recorded Live At Glastonbury, England
See also
- Ransome-Kuti family
- Tony Allen
- Seun Kuti
- Antibalas
- Chopteeth
- Wrasse Records
- Ginger Baker
- Lemi Gharioukwu
Notes
- Seattle Weekly: Barack Obama and the Original First Black President
- Hamilton, Janice. ''Nigeria in Pictures'', p. 70
- Meaning of Anikulapo in Nigerian.name
- Bobby Gass credits Allmusic
- Fela Kuti remembered | World | guardian.co.uk Music
- Fela Kuti
- Fela and His Wives. Jouvert, ''The Import of a Postcolonial Masculinity.''
- This section includes material copied verbatim from "Chief Priest Say", at chimurengalibrary.co.za, released under GFDL.
References
- Seattle Weekly: Barack Obama and the Original First Black President
- Hamilton, Janice. ''Nigeria in Pictures'', p. 70
- Meaning of Anikulapo in Nigerian.name
- Bobby Gass credits Allmusic
- Fela Kuti remembered | World | guardian.co.uk Music
- Fela Kuti
- Fela and His Wives. Jouvert, ''The Import of a Postcolonial Masculinity.''
- This section includes material copied verbatim from "Chief Priest Say", at chimurengalibrary.co.za, released under GFDL.