The Prague Post - Nigerian Afrobeat legend Femi Kuti takes a look inward

EUR -
AED 4.177083
AFN 81.881364
ALL 99.252011
AMD 444.590916
ANG 2.049629
AOA 1037.158871
ARS 1294.140504
AUD 1.780172
AWG 2.047025
AZN 1.936138
BAM 1.956825
BBD 2.294803
BDT 138.092365
BGN 1.957857
BHD 0.428625
BIF 3332.101328
BMD 1.137236
BND 1.492134
BOB 7.854392
BRL 6.605299
BSD 1.136596
BTN 97.022843
BWP 15.66621
BYN 3.71968
BYR 22289.824581
BZD 2.282996
CAD 1.574122
CDF 3271.82805
CHF 0.930817
CLF 0.028662
CLP 1099.889514
CNY 8.302746
CNH 8.285037
COP 4901.486936
CRC 571.199327
CUC 1.137236
CUP 30.136753
CVE 110.765852
CZK 25.063092
DJF 202.109054
DKK 7.466602
DOP 68.804863
DZD 150.758866
EGP 58.143352
ERN 17.058539
ETB 151.279275
FJD 2.597103
FKP 0.855651
GBP 0.857288
GEL 3.11625
GGP 0.855651
GHS 17.694932
GIP 0.855651
GMD 81.309357
GNF 9843.343513
GTQ 8.754588
GYD 238.429138
HKD 8.82913
HNL 29.46444
HRK 7.431157
HTG 148.317723
HUF 408.387159
IDR 19177.096068
ILS 4.192296
IMP 0.855651
INR 97.094361
IQD 1489.779092
IRR 47906.064281
ISK 145.100277
JEP 0.855651
JMD 179.644139
JOD 0.806645
JPY 161.924773
KES 147.273787
KGS 99.205069
KHR 4566.002606
KMF 492.983993
KPW 1023.512353
KRW 1613.043865
KWD 0.348711
KYD 0.947196
KZT 594.971784
LAK 24598.41385
LBP 101896.340612
LKR 339.937138
LRD 227.418775
LSL 21.444738
LTL 3.357962
LVL 0.687903
LYD 6.22063
MAD 10.547875
MDL 19.662304
MGA 5177.713287
MKD 61.514233
MMK 2387.847064
MNT 4056.884197
MOP 9.086962
MRU 44.847502
MUR 51.278121
MVR 17.512554
MWK 1974.241615
MXN 22.425622
MYR 5.012363
MZN 72.675058
NAD 21.444738
NGN 1824.9257
NIO 41.821916
NOK 11.909658
NPR 155.236349
NZD 1.90379
OMR 0.437833
PAB 1.136596
PEN 4.279429
PGK 4.700463
PHP 64.495497
PKR 319.112584
PLN 4.278742
PYG 9097.767521
QAR 4.140219
RON 4.978936
RSD 117.291464
RUB 93.451578
RWF 1609.188866
SAR 4.267179
SBD 9.516785
SCR 16.196165
SDG 682.914598
SEK 10.940516
SGD 1.490626
SHP 0.893689
SLE 25.900618
SLL 23847.250746
SOS 649.932797
SRD 42.248379
STD 23538.488054
SVC 9.945212
SYP 14786.179821
SZL 21.403111
THB 37.923401
TJS 12.206811
TMT 3.980326
TND 3.398093
TOP 2.663522
TRY 43.238622
TTD 7.712041
TWD 36.987489
TZS 3056.321006
UAH 47.101683
UGX 4166.329832
USD 1.137236
UYU 47.664978
UZS 14768.739292
VES 91.955341
VND 29420.293975
VUV 137.567238
WST 3.158108
XAF 656.312471
XAG 0.034549
XAU 0.000336
XCD 3.073437
XDR 0.816192
XOF 653.910407
XPF 119.331742
YER 278.907598
ZAR 21.404944
ZMK 10236.48675
ZMW 32.36396
ZWL 366.189511
  • SCS

    0.0500

    9.76

    +0.51%

  • NGG

    0.6300

    72.11

    +0.87%

  • RIO

    1.0100

    58.17

    +1.74%

  • CMSC

    0.0400

    21.82

    +0.18%

  • BCC

    0.7800

    93.47

    +0.83%

  • BTI

    0.5400

    42.37

    +1.27%

  • CMSD

    0.0400

    21.96

    +0.18%

  • GSK

    0.5600

    35.93

    +1.56%

  • RBGPF

    63.5900

    63.59

    +100%

  • BCE

    0.4200

    22.04

    +1.91%

  • JRI

    0.1600

    12.4

    +1.29%

  • RYCEF

    -0.1400

    9.36

    -1.5%

  • VOD

    0.1350

    9.305

    +1.45%

  • RELX

    1.0000

    52.2

    +1.92%

  • BP

    0.6600

    28.32

    +2.33%

  • AZN

    0.5400

    67.59

    +0.8%

Nigerian Afrobeat legend Femi Kuti takes a look inward
Nigerian Afrobeat legend Femi Kuti takes a look inward / Photo: FAWAZ OYEDEJI - AFP

Nigerian Afrobeat legend Femi Kuti takes a look inward

Sat comfortably in a large chair at the New Afrika Shrine, his family's legendary Nigerian music venue, Femi Kuti was surrounded by history.

Text size:

The concert hall is an homage to his father Fela Kuti's original Shrine, which had also been located in the northern outskirts of Lagos before its demise.

Femi's own music awards are scattered around, recognition for his determination to keep fighting the good fight his Afrobeat legend father was known for -- calling out corruption and injustice in Africa's most populous nation.

Part of a family defined by its determination to speak defiantly about what was going on around them -- whether through lyrics or protest or both -- Femi Kuti, however, is ready to turn inward, and focus on the "virtues that have guided me in my life", he told AFP in a recent interview.

Those reflections will be apparent in the 62-year-old's upcoming album, "Journey Through Life," his 13th record, set to release on April 25.

In the upcoming record, he sings about "the kind of advice I give myself to where I am today," he said. The title track, for example, is "not political".

But listeners should not expect a member of the Kuti clan to give up politics completely.

- From Afrobeat to Afrobeats -

The elder Kuti came to define Afrobeat, the 70s-era jazz- and funk-inspired genre that would later give birth to the modern, R&B-inspired Afrobeats -- plural -- style shaking up the global music industry today.

He was also a poster child of protest -- using his lyrics to call out government abuses, even under brutal military juntas that ran Nigeria off and on before its latest transition to democracy in 1999, two years after his death from AIDS.

Femi Kuti's grandmother, meanwhile, was a women's rights and independence activist.

It might be a given, then, that the virtues that guided Femi Kuti would be political in nature -- though he has tempered his expectations of what exactly music can do.

"My father used to say music is the weapon. I think music is a weapon for change, but it can't be the soul," he said. "We still need organisations."

After all, the elder Kuti was repeatedly beaten and jailed by authorities -- and with an incomplete record to show for it. Democracy might have eventually taken hold, but the corruption he railed against has been trickier to uproot.

"Self-reflection makes me think maybe it's not possible to change the world. But one thing I'm sure of is that I can change myself, I can make myself a better person," Kuti told AFP.

- New songs, same struggles -

Femi Kuti has spent the last four decades as the heir to his father's activism and musical style.

Together with his son Made and brother Seun, he keeps the New Afrika Shrine a sweaty, bumping place to be each Sunday night, and continues to tour internationally.

The album, Kuti promised, is "still very political" -- and Kuti has some of his own thoughts to share as well.

"I've been singing political songs for 38 years," yet not much has changed. In "Nigeria, it's gotten worse".

"Corruption must stop in the political class," he said. "Everybody thinks the only way to be successful is through corruption."

"The health care -- there's nothing that works," he said.

"We can't afford a good education (for children)."

These days he is unlikely to be beaten or jailed like his father -- which traumatised his family growing up, he said.

Though things are not always rosy for musicians in the modern political climate either.

Broadcasting authorities earlier this month banned "Tell Your Papa", by Eedris Abdulkareem, for its lyrics blasting President Bola Tinubu's handling of the economic and security situation in the country.

The government is pursuing painful -- though necessary, it argues -- economic reforms, while insecurity from jihadist groups continues to menace the country's north.

"It will probably be very hard for me to not talk on political subjects," Kuti admitted, before an electrifying live performance at an all-night show.

"I've lived it all my life with my father"

U.Ptacek--TPP