Femi Kuti

Following in his father's footsteps

Paris 

01/01/2002 - 

Femi Kuti, son of the legendary Nigerian sax-star Fela Anikulapo Kuti, has continued the family tradition, using music as a powerful weapon in his fight against tyrants and corruption in Africa and elsewhere. Playing a mean sax like his father before him, Femi whips up a vibrant cocktail of Afro high-life, jazz and funk, blending primitive and futuristic rhythms on his hard-hitting third album Fight To Win.

When Femi Kuti performed at La Cigale in Paris two years ago, the physical resemblance to his father could not have been more striking. With his muscular black torso gleaming beneath the spotlights, his sax brandished warrior-like in his fist and backed by a troupe of sinuous dance girls and virtuoso African musos, Femi brought the house down, marking all present with his karmic energy. Born in Lagos, the speed-fuelled capital of Nigeria, Femi rallied to the cause after his father's death in '97, leading a crusade against injustice and corruption with the double-edged sword of music and politics. Following in the wake of Fela, aka "the Black President" (who served time in prison for his beliefs), Femi looked set to prove that the next generation of Kutis would fight tooth and nail against corruption too.

The title of Femi's third album, Fight To Win, leaves little doubt about the sax-warrior's intentions. The opening track on the album, entitled Do Your Best, powers along with a hip-swinging Afro-beat, the brass section trumpeting like a herd of elephants about to charge. The song also benefits from a special guest appearance by New York artist Mos Def. Elsewhere on the album Jaguar Wright and Common, the veteran rapper from Chicago, put in some excellent guest vocals too. But woe betide anyone who suggests Femi's new album has an American feel to it.
"'Fight to Win' is not an American album!" retorts Femi, outraged at the very idea, "Anyway, what do you mean by American music? Where do you think 'American' music comes from in the first place? Where does someone like Quincy Jones come from? Where does the music played by my guest artists come from? From Africa, that's where!"
Africa also provides a rich source of inspiration for Femi's hard-hitting songs, whose lyrics denounce the corruption, nepotism and despotism eating away at the continent's core. Femi is not a man renowned for mincing his words and on Traitors Of Africa he castigates the current Nigerian president, Olusegun Obasanjo, with the same fearful energy his father once called up to denounce the military junta on his legendary album, Army Arrangement. But then, this is hardly surprising given that young Femi grew up accompanying his father on stage, before branching out to make his own name as a sax-player. And Femi pays an emotional tribute to his inspirational father on his new album on 97, a slow melancholy-tinged number marking the year Fela finally succumbed to Aids.
Aids is one of Femi's most important battlegrounds on Fight to Win. Indeed, the sax-star throws the full weight of his backing choir and brass section behind the song Stop Aids, putting his message across on the back of his powerful Afro-beat. After all, Femi explains, music is an essential weapon in the fight against the virus.

"The problem is, people in Africa don't see why they should use condoms," says Femi, matter-of-factly, "People in Africa don't understand how Aids can be transmitted by sex when sex is one of the most important things in life. They've practised polygamy for generations and generations, so they don't see why they should limit themselves to one partner now. Governments haven't been doing their job either – up until the last few months, Aids-awareness campaigns have been limited to the strict minimum. But I feel I can do a lot through my music. I can put a real message across, because people are prepared to listen to me."

And the message comes across loud and clear on tracks such as One Day Someday, on which Femi's poignant vocals - "One day someday Africa will be free… " – ring out over a soft groove, blending the best of African tradition and modern musical technology. While the sax-warrior accepts the benefits of the modern world such as democracy and technology, he denounces the damage wreaked by colonialism in no uncertain terms. And Femi engages combat on a semantic level too, giving Africa back its ancestral name on the Afro-jive number, Akebu Lan, and referring to the Nigerian capital by its original Yoruba name, Eko.
"Lagos is a total whirlpool of noise and energy," says Femi, "and that's where I draw my energy from, from the people, the city, the country, from the constant din of the cars, the pollution, the drug problems, the petrol shortage, the power cuts, the daily sadness and joy of it all … I'm a very energetic kind of person, that's the way I am and I combine that with the energy that's always been in African music. It's a powerful mix! You see, Lagos just isn't a quiet, peaceful kind of town and Africans aren't quiet, calm people. They shout at the top of their voices and they love noise and bustle and dancing. Unfortunately, people in Nigeria are very religious too. So you get woken up by Muslims praying at 5 in the morning and you're kept awake by Christians singing hymns all night! It's hard to get a good night's sleep in my country!"

Of course, Nigeria is riven by more serious problems, the delicate balance of the country's two communities constantly threatened by inter-ethnic violence in the north. "The thing is, the government does nothing to play down these tensions," rails Femi, "Their policy is divide and rule. But I don't believe in nationalism of any kind! I believe in music. The only solution for Africa and for the rest of the world is universalism!"

And that, it appears, is just one of the things Femi is "Fighting To Win" on his new album. While Fela Kuti, national hero of Nigeria – and the only candidate for the post of universal black musician/leader alongside Bob Marley – earned a reputation as the "Black President" in his lifetime, his son, Femi, now looks set to win universal suffrage of his own.

Femi Kuti Fight To Win ( Barclay) 2002

Gérard  Bar-David

Translation : Julie  Street