Seun Kuti & Egypt 80 enlisted Lenny Kravitz as producer for their new album due Oct. 4th. Seun Kuti plays Toronto July 17th.
Here's the scoop from Record Kicks...
As long-time fans of Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti and the whole Kuti family, we’re honoured to announce that SEUN KUTI & EGYPT 80 have joined the Record Kicks roster. The new album by SEUN KUTI & EGYPT 80 produced by Fela’s original engineer Sodi Marciszewer and none other than Grammy-winning rock icon LENNY KRAVITZ will be available on Record Kicks worldwide October 4th. More to be revealed soon.
Seun Kuti, the youngest son of Afrobeat pioneer Fela Kuti, has been a powerful force in the Afrobeat scene, continuing his father’s legacy while forging his own path. This new album promises to be a milestone in the genre.
Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 will also embark on a North American Tour on June 8th which makes a Toronto stop at Budweiser Stage for a show with Red Hot Chili Peppers on July 17th. Tickets for the tour are available for purchase through https://linktr.ee/seunkutitour. See a full list of upcoming tour dates below.
For now, you can watch the video of Seun, Lenny and Sodi at Question de Son studio in Paris working on the new album and don’t forget to follow Seun Kuti on social media and DSPs. Stay tuned for more groundbreaking announcements!
The late Nigerian drumming dynamo Tony Allen – longtime Fela Kuti sideman – has an unreleased Jazz Is Dead session on the way.
Here's the scoop from Jazz Is Dead...
The genius that is Tony Allen departed this mortal world in April of 2020, but not without leaving an unmatched legacy that crossed oceans and borders, bridging cultures and forging a sound that changed music. As the drummer for Fela Kuti’s revolutionary Africa 70, Allen’s polyrhythmic drumming defined Afrobeat, combining American Jazz and Nigerian Highlife to animate one of the most iconic performers of all time. Over the course of Allen’s tenure with the group, and later as a solo artist, he would continue to relentlessly innovate, incorporating new sounds and working with scores of contemporaries. His contributions as an artist and cultural ambassador left an indelible impact on every genre of popular music, from Techno to Jazz to Rock and Hip-Hop. Tony Allen’s music stands as an ongoing testament to the interconnected musical relationships and dialogues across the African diaspora, and their lasting influence on how we listen.
Aside from traditional Yoruba Juju music, Tony Allen was enamoured with Jazz, particularly the recordings of Art Blakey, Max Roach, and Elvin Jones, musicians who had begun to experiment with West African rhythms and musical concepts. At the time, Nigeria’s immensely popular Igbo Highlife music was incorporating influences from Jazz formulating what became known as Afro-Jazz, connecting the American genre back to its roots. These early cross-cultural dialogues pushed Allen to develop a drumming style that fused Highlife and Jazz. In the mid-1960s, Allen met Fela Kuti, and the two formed the group Koola Lobitos, which would later grow to become the legendary Africa 70 band. Nigerian audiences did not immediately take to this new sound, but following a trip to the United States, Kuti was exposed to James Brown and the Black Panthers. Allen began to incorporate the sounds of Black American Funk and Soul. By the 1970s, the group morphed their influences into Afrobeat, the sound of post-colonial Africa, making music that was concerned with economic and political liberation and Pan-Africanism.
The nearly 30 records which Allen appeared on with Africa 70 contain some of the most innovative drumming of all time. Throughout his time with Fela Kuti and Africa 70, Tony Allen introduced the world not only to Afrobeat, but to an entirely new way of conceptualizing rhythm.
In his post-Fela career, Allen moved to Paris and continued to be a vanguard. He experimented with Dub, Electro, and Hip-Hop. He was a willing mentor, collaborating with several generations of musicians inspired by his vernacular. French pop artists, such as Sebastien Tellier, Air, and Charlotte Gainsbourg, called upon Allen to help shape some of their most well-known work, such as Tellier’s “La Ritournelle” and Gainbourg’s “5:55”. His collaborations with Damon Albarn of Blur and Gorillaz formed the bands The Good, the Bad, and the Queen and Rocket Juice and the Moon, where rock stars like Paul Simenon and Flea were eager to enter conversation with a musician Brian Eno once called “perhaps the greatest drummer who has ever lived”.
On some of his last recordings, Allen returned to his love of Jazz, while reminding listeners of the ongoing influence and legacy of the diaspora. Recording with Blue Note, he released a tribute to his hero Art Blakey, along with an album of original material and collaborating with the South African trumpeter Hugh Masekela. In 2018, Allen and Techno pioneer Jeff Mills released an EP that fused Afrobeat, Jazz, and Techno. On 2021’s aptly titled posthumous recording “There Is No End”, Allen worked with Hip-Hop artists such as Danny Brown and UK Grime star Skepta. Allen remained a constant innovator, absorbing sounds that had derived from West African music and conversing with new generations, passing on the ideals of Pan-Africanism. For Jazz Is Dead producer Adrian Younge, it is no small honor to share new music recorded with the drummer revolutionary Tony Allen.
"Don't Believe the Dancers" is the first single from the forthcoming Tony Allen JID018. Have a listen below.
Pat Thomas's Coming Home: Original Ghanaian Highlife & Afrobeat Classics 1967-81 is out now on Strut.
The U.K.-based Strut label has just released the first early career retrospective for Ghanaian highlife master Pat Thomas, covering the Golden Voice Of Africa's late ‘60s big band highlife recordings, funky '70s Afrobeat jams through to the disco hi-life movement of the early ‘80s. With the 65 year-old Thomas now dazzling audiences on the road in support of last year’s album with Kwishibu Area Band, the well-chosen Coming Home 2CD / 3LP collection offers an enlightening glimpse of Thomas’ exceptionally productive and incredibly influential career in Ghana prior to his arrival in Toronto during the 80s and inevitable resurgence.
Growing up with music around him (“my uncle, King Onyina, was an important highlife musician”), Thomas was inspired to become a singer after hearing vocalist Joss Aikins: “He sang with Broadway Dance Band and Decca in Ghana chose him to sing with any group that came into their studios.”
When a new incarnation of Broadway Dance Band was created in ‘67, led by Ebo Taylor, Thomas received his first big break. “Ebo started to write new songs. I added the lyrics and sang them and it worked very well. Ebo and I agreed on things at a very early stage. I understood him and where he was coming from with his music.”
The partnership with Taylor would become one of the enduring forces in Ghanaian music during the ‘70s, creating a fresh, progressive new highlife sound. They played together as The Blue Monks – regularly appearing Accra's popular Tip Toe Gardens nightclub – before forming Sweet Beans in '74 with the backing of Ghana’s Cocoa Marketing Board. Listen to "Merebre" off the False Lover album by Pat Thomas & The Sweet Beans.
The False Lover album for the Gapophone label established Thomas across Ghana. His backing band, The Sweet Beans – featuring bassist Anim Addo, drummer Kofi Addison, guitarist Bannerman Wood, keyboardist Bob Fician, percussionist J.N.K. Asiedu, trumpeter Lovis Hammond, saxophonists J.R. Arhin, Atta Kennedy, Korle Patrick and Conacov – eventually disbanded but the musicians stayed together as Marijata. “The guys initially used Jewel Ackah as their vocalist but they involved me and I re-vocalled the album. This became the ‘Pat Thomas Introduces Marijata’ LP. At that time, I would go to George Prah at Gapophone to ask for money and he would say, ‘if you want me to pay you, go and write a song!’ So, tracks like ‘Coming Home’ came about that way, written on the spot.”
A second Marijata album followed before a damaging coup in Ghana in 1979. “Jerry Rawlings’ 'house-cleaning' was designed to stop corruption but it seriously damaged our country’s music culture. That's when the music died. Before that, there was so much music everywhere. It was so important and then the coup destroyed it all. Bars and venues closed everywhere because of the strict curfews.” Check out the scorching "I Need More" from 1977's Pat Thomas & Marijata album on Gapophone.
Thomas left for Berlin and stayed true to his highlife roots, becoming the first Ghanaian to record highlife there. “Guitarist George Darko was already there playing clubs with his band and I then began to work with some great Ghanaian highlife players who eventually became the Roots Anabo Band. There was Ekow Brown, Sammy Quist on guitar and a guy called Willie. We were put in a big studio, Audio-Tonstudio, where many big artists had recorded. We simply called the album 1980. George Darko played on it, Bob Fician came in on keyboards, Kologbo on rhythm guitar, Nat Osmasu on bass." Listen to the synth-tweaked dancefloor destroyer Yamona from the 1980 album below.
Thomas then travelled to Togo and London before heading to Canada where he spent much of the rest of the 80s living, teaching and performing in Toronto as part of the vibrant Queen West music scene. “A professor/doctor friend arranged for me to come over to Toronto. There was a band there who took me on. While I was flying in, looking at Toronto from the sky, I thought it looked so heavy! I had a sense that I was going to live in this city and I end up there on and off for 10 years. I taught percussion privately there, played for universities, Ghanaian societies and a WOMAD Festival. The band and I also landed a one-year contract at The BamBoo nightclub in the city.”
Pat is now back in Ghana, recording and touring worldwide with Kwashibu Area Band, a project put together by talented young musicians Kwame Yeboah and Ben Abarbanel Wolff. Explains Thomas, “Highlife is part of Ghana's musical DNA but, what people like Ebo Taylor and I did was to make it fresh and modernize it, make it more relevant to our day and more funky. We took the great Kwa music of Kumasi and other local styles and added Western elements with new horn arrangements, vocals, guitar and other developments. Since then, highlife has become the world's music and I am proud to still bring it to audiences wherever we play." Check out the horn-hyped "We Are Coming Home" from 1976's Stage Two album on Gapophone.
This year, February could be considered Fela Kuti History Month. With the critically acclaimed Bill T. Jones Broadway musical FELA! currently packing 'em in at New York's Eugene O'Neill Theatre pimped out to look like The Shrine, the late Nigerian Afrobeat shaman is having his music back catalogue given the ultra-fancy reissue treatment.
On February 16, Knitting Factory Records launches the first phase of their chronological roll out of Fela's finest recordings with the Chop N' Quench Deluxe Package bringing together nine albums worth of material originally cut between 1969 and 1974 (including The '69 LA Sessions, Live With Ginger Baker, Fela's London Scene, Shakara, Roforofo Fight (plus 2 singles), Open & Close, Afrodisiac, Gentlemenand Confusion) on six digi-packs with original artwork along with Carlos Moore's authorized biography Fela: This Bitch Of A Life. For those with no interest in CDs, Knitting Factory is also offering a digital download version in 320 kbps MP3s (plus free Apple Lossless file upgrade) as well as ringtones. So if your mom happens to call you while you're out power lunching with Jay-Z, it'll be considerably less embarrassing if your cellphone suddenly starts blaring out the horn riff from Shuffering and Shmiling.
For those who grabbed all the Fela Kuti stuff they needed during the prior reissue onslaughts of Universal and Wrasse, the Now Again subsidiary of Stones Throw has come up with the perfect set to complement the collection of the Fela fan who has everything. Black Man's Cry: The Inspiration of Fela Kuti is a cleverly conceived 15-track selection of obscure covers, tributes and thinly disguised rip-offs from around the globe which reveal the unmistakable influence of Fela's music from the 70s right through to today.
Along with the expected contributions from Fela's Nigerian contemporaries, there are a few surprises from South America and the Caribbean. For some unknown reason, Fela's tune Black Man's Cry is a repertoire staple for a number of steel pan bands and there are three different recorded versions included here, with the GTE sponsored Slyvania East Side Symphony and Mosco Tiles Fonclaire Steel Orchestra both performing it as a medley with Egbi Mi O – go figure. The unexpected highlight however is Lisandro Meza's squeeze-box fueled blast through Shacalao which will be a shock to anyone familiar with the Colombian accordion king's more popular vallenato recordings that followed years after that self-released single was recorded. Vinyl enthusiasts will appreciate the fact that Black Man's Cry compilation will also be issued as a limited box set of four 10" records as well as a single CD.
Here's the track listing:
Black Man's Cry: The Inspiration of Fela Kuti
1. Dan Satch And His Atomic Band - Woman Pin Down
2. 6th Infanrty Brigade Of The Nigerian Army - Black And Proud
3. Bola Johnson - Never Trust A Woman
4. Bola Johnson - Hot Pants
5. Segun Bucknor - Adebo
6. Jerry Hansen - Sisi Mi
7. Phirpo Y Sus Caribes - Comencemos
8. Cumbia Moderna De Soledad - Shacalao
9. Lisandro Meza - Shacalao
10. Lever Brothers Gay Flamingoes - Egbi Mi O, Black Mans Cry (Medley)
11. Mosco Tiles Fonclaire Steel Orchestra - Black Mans Cry
12. Sylvania East Side Syphony - Egbi Mi O, Black Mans Cry (Medley)
13. Daktaris - Up Side Down
14. Karl Hector And The Malcouns - Toure Samar
15. Whitefield Brothers - Lullaby For Lagos
Not to be left out of the February Fela festivities, Soundway is putting out their fourth installment of their ongoing Nigeria Special archival compilation series, Nigeria Afrobeat Special: The New Explosive Sound in 1970s Nigeria. Compiled by Soundway boss Miles Cleret, the triple LP set (also available on disc with five less tracks) due out February 22 favours obscurity over quality with disastrous results.
Loading up collections with unknown oddities wasn't as much a problem when Cleret began doing these regional compilations but since rival compilers started concentrating their digging efforts on West Africa as well, there have been fewer amazing "lost" artifacts on his sets and more mediocre tracks by relative unknowns. Nigeria Afrobeat Special's main attraction is the Fela Kuti & Africa 70's original 45 version of Who're You? before the song was re-recorded at Abbey Road for the Fela's London Scene album. All the rest, well, not terribly explosive.
Nigeria Afrobeat Special
1. Fela and The Africa 70 - Who re you? (Original 45 Version)
2. Bongos Ikwue and The Groovies - Otachikpopo
3. Orlando Julius and His Afro-Sounders - Afro-Blues
4. Saxon Lee and The Shadows International - Mind Your Business
5. Eric Showboy Akaeze and His Royal Ericos - We Dey Find Money
6. Mad Man Jaga - Hankuri
7. The Nigerian Police Band (The Force 7) - Mori Keke Kan *
8. Bob Ohiri and his Uhuru Sounds - Ariwo Yaa
9. The Anansa Professionals - Enwan
10. Godwin Omabuwa and His Casanova Dandies - Do The Afro Shuffle
11. The Tony Benson Sextet - Shish Ke Bab *
12. Segun Bucknors Revolution - Gbomojo
13. The Black Santiagos - Ole
14. Abiodun Bakare and His Kobis band - Nigeria *
15. The Martins Brothers Dance Band - On Shakara O *
16. The Sahara All Stars - World People *
* Vinyl only tracks
Further on the Fela tip, the man of the hour is featured on the cover of Wax Poetics No. 39 – The Africa Issue which is currently on stands. In addition to an excerpt from Carlos Moore's aforementioned biography Fela: This Bitch of a Life, there are informative features on Fela's drummer of choice, Tony Allen, Nigerian illustrator Ghariokwu Lemi responsible for Fela's mind-bending record sleeves, Senegalese super stars Orchestre Baobab, Mali's awesome Rail Band, Benin's Orchestre Poly-Rythmo, Pax Nicholas and DJ Rich Medina. There's also a profile on obsessive digger Frank Gossner behind the consistently great Voodoo Funk blog who is readying a reissue compilation of his own called Lagos Disco Inferno 1976-81, soon to be released by Academy LPs who recently reissued sought-after African grail items by The Mebusas, S.J.O.B. Movement and Ofege.
Fela Kuti - Don't Gag Me, Live in Calabar, Nigeria 1971
