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CDs showcase Nigerian funk-master's 'Afro Beat'
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Pensacola News Journal, CDs showcase Nigerian funk-master's 'Afro Beat' >>
By Aimee Maude Sims
Fela Kuti "The Best of Fela Kuti: Music is the Weapon" (Wrasse Records)
Femi Kuti, "Live at the Shrine" (Palm Pictures, UWE, Mk2 Music)
The Best of Fela Kuti" is a snap shot of the late Nigerian tribal funk-master in his prime. There are two CDs and one DVD full of the scathing 12- and 13-minute lyrical diatribes against the Nigerian government that earned him the nickname "Black President."
The tracks showcase some of Fela's best unending grooves in the genre he birthed called "Afro Beat." Fela floats above cycling guitar licks, pulsating drum beats and call-and-response vocal themes with his syncopated phrases and poignant saxophone solos. Occasionally, he taps out a melody line on the organ.
His suspicion of religion is featured on "Shuffering and Shmiling," and his passion for the survival of his people's represented by "Sorrow Tears and Blood."
The "Music is the Weapon" DVD, released in 1982, chronicles Fela's life from his early education in London to his constant skirmishes with government forces. It shows him holding interviews nearly naked and portrays his indepen dent "Kalakuta Republic" where he maintained, at one point, 27 wives. (He died in 1997 of AIDS.)
If you watch Fela's DVD and Femi's "Live at the Shrine" (2004) DVD back to back, the physical re semblance between the two is un canny Femi looks to be a younger, iess sinewy version of his father. His band, "Positive Force," is more refined, the dancers more erotic. The horns are tighter and clearer, the vocals more in tune, the bass lines works of art.
The original tracks on Femi's "Live at the Shrine" CD complete the CD/DVD set. They are as hypnotic and anti-government as his father's.
However, Femi's live four-hour concert is not intended to spark a political movement, just stress- relieving dancing. 07/08/05
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