Oluseun Anikulapo Kuti is the youngest son of Nigerian music legend Fela Anikulapo Kuti, and perhaps his most clear successor. When Fela passed away in 1997, Seun assumed the role of bandleader to his father’s group Egypt 80, at all of 14 years old. Now those digits are reversed, and at the ripe old age of 41, he continues to helm the storied collective, releasing periodic full-length albums, collaborating with famous peers across the genre borders of music, and touring unrelentingly — all while maintaining his central tenet of using music as a tool for social change.
Like Fela, Seun’s music carries layers of meaning behind its ferocious grooves. The title of Seun Kuti’s latest album, Heavier Yet (Lays the Crownless Head), upends Shakespeare’s famous line about the worries of a monarch, reminding listeners that the crownless — the disadvantaged, the multitudes of oppressed and underprivileged — are those for whom we should feel sympathy. With roughly one-third of the African continent’s population living in extreme poverty, Seun’s message is a profound one, and one that he wants to make clear is not simply a stylistic continuation of his famous father’s motifs. “When I play my music and people say, ‘He’s doing his father’s message,’ this is a common misconception,” Seun states. “The message of African liberation is not Fela’s message. It is Africa’s message. It is Africa’s true message. It is Africa’s only message!”
A distinct aspect of Seun’s career has been his openness to working with other musical savants, often stretching outside his obvious comfort zone, always with intriguing results. A 2011 album co-produced by Brian Eno, a 2014 album with Robert Glasper in the producer’s chair, and a host of collaborations with artists as varied as Carlos Santana, Black Thought, Yasiin Bey, and even Sinead O’Connor prove the point. Janelle Monae’s single “Float,” with backing by Seun and Egypt 80, has stacked over 19 million streams on Spotify. For his latest album, Seun welcomes Lenny Kravitz into the executive producer role, acting as a sort of elder guiding force to the affair. Describing the effect as “the magic of Lenny,” Kuti says he cherished the chance “to be close to a master who can impart knowledge.” More knowledge came from another master who shed light on the proceedings, Sodi Marciszewer, who was Fela Kuti’s engineer for some of his most progressive work with Egypt 80, pushing afrobeat to new realms in the ’90s.
Expanding the concept of what afrobeat can be is central to Seun’s musical goals. “The intention of this album is to show the fans all the various influences that can be my music,” he explains, “to expand my sound to all Black music: funk, hip-hop, blues, samba, salsa, reggae, dancehall.” His most recent single from Heavier Yet, “Dey,” demonstrates the proof of concept with a fiery guest spot from another hallowed scion, Damian Marley. On the album’s incandescent lead track “T.O.P.” Kuti takes aim at the capitalist mentality and its deleterious effects. “Things Over People,” he says, “is what the system demands. We need to stop this process that causes oppression and so many atrocities. Society values money and success more than people.”
Taking a long look at the music of the African diaspora and his place in it, Seun reflects that “everywhere we’ve created this amazing sound, as Black people have spread all over the world. I feel this music is inside of all of us as African artists, and I wanted to pay tribute to all of that.”
Heavier Yet (Lays the Crownless Head) is out on October 4th, 2024. Seun Kuti and Egypt 80 will be performing at The Everyman in Cork on October 26th and 27th.
