Chief Stephen Osita Osadebe died 11 May 2007. His was the voice of Nigeria for many years and he put out scores of top albums throughout the 1970s, 80s and 90s. And what a great voice it was. His music is so laid back it's like being in a warm bath. You never want it to end, and in fact it goes on and on! He was voted Top Highlife Star in 1991 and had a US hit in 1994 with his CD KEDU AMERICA. I believe he moved to the US at this point. His music is a continuation of the traditional Ibo Highlife of the 1950s and 60s, complete with sweet guitars, muted trumpet, trombone, sax, and tons of percussion. Three horns, three guitars, congas, clave and shakers keep it moving behind the Chief's sweet sleepy vocals. His albums were generally one long track on each side so they unroll slowly and deliberately with a sustained pulse.

He was born near Onitsha in 1936 and started his own band, the Soundmakers International, in 1964 just as the Beatles were changing the sound of pop music in the West. But Osadebe kept to his own course and refused to adulterate his pure Highlife. In 1981 he achieved his first gold record for sales, and continued to release albums in praise of various Ibo Social Clubs that would attract his fans to hear him perform. His biggest hit came with OSONDI OWENDI, released on Polygram Nigeria in 1984. His sparkling recording KEDU AMERICA, a CD that recreated many of his great songs but in shorter takes, was aimed at the international market and beautifully produced by Xenophile records of Connecticut. Seven of his albums are available as downloads from Emusic and iTunes, or you can hear a great selection of his hits from 1970-85, remastered (& abridged), on the CD SOUND TIME on Pulse records distributed by indigedisc. Obituary here.

AWON OJISE OLORUN:
POPULAR MUSIC IN YORUBALAND 1931-52 (BRITISH LIBRARY / SAVANNAHPHONE CD AF 010)

I recently purged a lot of Nigerian LPs from my collection, but if you know me for the mouldy fig I am, you can imagine I held on to the oldest stuff, some 10-inches on PHILIPS & DECCA. For most of us the 60s is the beginning of Nigerian music. There's a great series of classic West African recordings that came out on John Storm Roberts' Original Music label in the 1990s, like YORUBA WOMEN OF THE DRUM, LUCKY STARS & ROSY MORNINGS (which covered the Ibadan Juju scene of the 60s), TELEPHONE LOBI (which covered Ghanaian danceband giants of the 50s and 60s) and MONEY NO BE SAND (which featured the sparkling Lagos pop of the 60s). Original Music also put out hits on individual artists such as Ignace de Souza, Godwin Kabaka Opara & Orlando Owoh. Anything predating 1950 has been terra incognita except to a few devoted collectors. There was one Rounder LP from 1985, JUJU ROOTS, that covered the 30s to 50s. The only overlap with the present release is in one or two artists: Irewolede Denge (who stands out) and Ayinde Bakara, not exactly household names. Modern Nigeria is less than a century old and is still going though infant struggles. The government is violent and among the most corrupt in the world, but as long as their violence and corruption benefits foreign interests (like big oil), the rest of the world thinks of Nigeria as a functioning democracy. Juju and Apala were already well-established musical forms when recording technology arrived in 1930. Britain had taken over the land in 1862, so many of the songs are about throwing off colonial oppression and restoring the glory of the Yoruba kings. Because of the ethnic diversity of the kingdoms annexed under the tiny crown of Queen Victoria, it was hard for a pan-Yoruban sound to emerge and to this day there are different styles of music in Benin, Nigeria and Ghana. Apala, the drum-based, rhythmic style reached a zenith in the 60s and 70s but Juju and Sakara (originally street-music played during Ramadan, Sakara became courtly music with the addition of the goje, or one-string fiddle) predominated. All three styles are heard here. The recordings are occasionally rough & it may not be something you play repeatedly but the collection is an important piece of the history of modern African music. The lyrics are translated and annotated which adds considerably to the enjoyment. However the one song which is not translated, Theophilus Iwalokun's "Iyawo o ra mi," is my favourite piece on this collection. Though it clocks in at under 3 minutes (like everything else on here), Iwalokun still manages to get a sleepy juju groove going.

ROUGH GUIDE TO WEST AFRICAN GOLD (RGNET1137CD)

Never set your hopes too high. I was looking forward to this release, thinking I might discover something new or fill in gaps in my knowledge of West African music. Last year's excellent GOLDEN AFRIQUE VOL 1 from Network Medien showed the depth of West African music and covered a large swath of the West African landscape, leaving out the Anglophone countries. Though some of it was familiar, there were many surprises. Rough Guide jumps into the fray with a compilation that covers the whole place, from Senegal to Nigeria, and spreads itself far too thin. There is not a single track on here that is not available on some other CD published in the last few years. Their goal seems to be to sample what's out there as an introduction to newcomers, but the least they could have done is found some rare King Bruce, Mike Ejeagha or Victor Olaiya track. There are two tracks, Celestine Ukwu's "Ife si na chi" and Victor Uwaifo's "Ekassa No 34," leased from Premier Music of Nigeria whose CDs are harder to find than the Sterns, RetroAfric, Dakar Sound and Popular African Music albums they have sampled for the other selections. We go from the roots to Afrobeat to Bembeya Jazz without passing GO or collecting $200 (which we could have used to buy some rare LPs on EBAY and spice this set up a bit). The Bembeya track "Whiskey Soda" is a gem, but it is poorly recorded and by no means the best cut on HOMMAGE A DEMBA CAMARA. This is followed by an even worse recording, Dexter Johnson doing "Manicero." There's an Estrellas Africanas LP with Johnson that sounds heaps better & covers similar material. On the whole this is great music, but it is all too familiar and the transitions (like Eric Agyeman to Rail Band) are incongruous. Call me a purist but I like to separate sets from different cultures unless there is a musical bridge than will connect say Bembeya quoting "El Manicero" in "Dya Dya" to a Congolese group like A. H. Depala doing "Moni Moni no dey." Why doesn't someone take the AFRICAN MUSIC LP (Dutch Phonogram 1983: See my African Top 50) & reissue it on CD? That would be a better service than skimming the surface of this musical ocean.

LAGOS CHOP UP (Honest Jons HJRCD15)
LAGOS ALL ROUTES (Honest Jons HJRCD17)

These are two separate CDs, but constitute a set. In contrast to the elegantly designed Lobi Traoré disc (from the same label), these two have hand-lettered covers (in the Fela tradition) that are a drag to try to decipher. Ghariokwu Lemi's imitations of the awful cover collage by Martin Sharp for Cream's DISRAELI GEARS quickly descended into shorthand for Nigerian funk and is now a tawdry cliché. The text has been run through a fax machine and pasted up crookedly over solid colors to give it a funky retro look. Memo to H-Jons's art director: Bad typography is never cute, it's only bad. While it's true bad typography usually goes hand in hand with lousy copy, in this case it is something we would actually like to read, if we could. The music is familiar: you probably have the classics like "Joromi" by Sir Victor Uwaifo & "Softly softly catch monkey" by Ikenga Super Stars, but they flow together nicely in this well-arranged sequence.

LAGOS ALL ROUTES is subtitled "Juju & Highlife, Apala and Fuji," so it's the traditionally grounded music of the 70s, while LAGOS CHOP UP has Afrobeat instead of Apala, putting a slightly different spin on this disc. But the shots of Apala and Fuji are interspersed with the other styles and it works well. I like the way the music lilts back and forward between the older dance bands with trumpet and scratchy vocals (like Victor Olaiya) and the percussion driven grooves. Afrobeat is represented by the Nigerian Army Rhythm Group, every bit as good as Fela. Mike Ejeagha is surprising (another aspect of bad typography is you instinctively don't trust it, so I will have to check to see if the track listing is right). Lots of gems here: Shina Williams stands out, Rex Lawson delivers with his Highlife classic "Owuna Derina," while Ebenzer Obey keeps us swaying to his classic sound with slide guitar.

FELA ANIKULAPO KUTI
THE TWO SIDES OF FELA JAZZ & DANCE (Wrasse Records WRASS 077)

To know Fela's music is to love its churning momentum, but to know Fela is to have second thoughts. I've said it before, Fela was a fanatical control-freak who ran his little empire (Kalakuta Republic) almost as a religion. He was like David Koresh with a better band. It's silly to separate his music into "Jazz" and "Dance" as it's all one. I think he fits more into an R&B category than jazz proper (whatever that is). But if you think of jazz saxophone, i.e. Ben Webster, Coleman Hawkins, Pharoah Sanders, for example, Fela doesn't cut it, not even as a keen student. Or take jazz piano: not even Chick Corea or Keith Jarrett would allow this playing out under their name. (I would have said Air Supply but is that classified as jazz?) Anyway, Fela's music is to enjoy and not to dissect. Like James Brown it's all about him and not the individual musicians who really make the sound. I didn't rush out to get the many Fela box sets that came out since his death in 1997; this is the first repackage I've sprung for and it's a well-chosen nine tracks. It's a shame I had four of them on vinyl but that shows that the best stuff is the perennial picks: "Water no get enemy," "Sorrow tears and blood," "Roforofo fight," and "Kalakuta show." New to my collection is "Just like that" with its tedious chorus, and "Pansa pansa" which is a gem that riffs on "Go slow" as well as "Monkey banana."

TUNDE WILLIAMS
MR BIG MOUTH
LEKAN ANIMASHAUN
LOW PROFILE (Honest Jon's Music, two LPs or both on one CD)

A couple of Nigerian rarities: Fela Anikulapo Kuti's band, Africa 70, at the height of their popularity in Africa at the end of the seventies, jamming on four tunes. Each jam is about 12 minutes of the the slow sweaty groove you associate with Fela and each features one of his sidemen. Mr Big Mouth was Tunde Williams, lead trumpeter, and clearly a fan of Miles Davis. He turns in a brace of tunes. The second pair comes from Baba Ani, the baritone sax player. Fela sticks to keyboard and second sax. No hassle, just a mellow late-night groove. Actually there are lyrics, but not Fela's, some of the other band members recorded indistinctly do a sing-along chorus in what sounds like a live recording. A slice of low-fi funk n' fun from the clubs of Nigeria: It's one for the die-hard Sufferers and Shmilers.

ORLANDO JULIUS & HIS AFRO-SOUNDERS
ORLANDO'S AFRO IDEAS 1969-72 (Ekosound 001 2003)

Here's one for fans of Afrobeat. One of the great Juju artists in an early incarnation doing the funky thang. Nine tracks available outside Africa for the first time, show another side of O.J., as well as another take on Afrobeat. It doesn't take long to build to the groove and, once there, it locks in. While Fela is usually credited as the pioneer of AfroBeat, it was O.J. & his Modern Aces who, from 1965, began pushing the Highlife sound towards American R&B, releasing SUPER AFRO SOUL in Nigeria in 1966. Four members of O.J.'s band defected to Fela's Koola Lobitos, taking the sound with them.

O.J. is best known for his early 1980s American hit DANCE AFRO BEAT. I remember running into him in Leopold's Records in Berkeley in 1984 and being amazed to learn he was teaching African percussion on campus just two blocks away. After working in the US for two decades, he returned to Nigeria in 1998 and continues to make music. This album fills in an important gap in his career as well as a big piece of the story of Afrobeat. After two of his early singles (one a welcome to Nigeria for James Brown), we get the whole of the album ORLANDO'S IDEAS from 1972, where the band are stretching out. It was right after this important album that he decided to emigrate to America. Who knows where the music would have gone if he stayed, however some statements only need to be made once.

AFRO BABY
THE EVOLUTION OF THE AFRO-SOUND IN NIGERIA 1970-79 (Soundway CD002)

The next installment in the story of Nigerian soul, funk and R&B comes along in a handsome package with more great near-lost sounds from the 70s. Following up on the great GHANA SOUNDZ album from Soundway last year, this one shows why Afro-beat and Afro-funk have such staying power and continue to attract new fans. Fela is here but he is only one of a roster of great Nigerian artists who took the message of James Brown, "Say it loud, I'm black and I'm proud," to heart. The Afrocentric beat had strong reverberations in Lagos. For me the strongest tracks on here are by the stalwarts of the sound: Victor Olaiya and Orlando Julius, whose track "Mura Sise" is the outstanding gem here. (It can also be found on OJ's AFRO IDEAS CD.) But there's lots to discover here. Fred Fisher's "Asa-sa" thumps right to the middle of the dancefloor with its heavy beat. It's something of an all-star session with Fred on trombone and Tunde Williams of Africa 70 on trumpet adding some punchy horn stabs. Fred's twin brother Bob Ohiri, lead guitarist with King Sunny Ade at the time, plays a Famous Flames riff while monster bassman Ken Okulolo (from Johnny Haastrup's Mono Mono and now of West African Highlife Band) keeps it booming. Call and response vocals in the style of Fela make it instantly memorable.

VARIOUS ARTISTS
RED HOT + RIOT (MCA/Universal Music)

I went off Fela Kuti for reasons other than his popularity in the West. I always liked his albums and he deserved crossover success as a contemporary of James Brown. But I saw him in concert three times and each time he was insufferable and not "Shmiling." He hogged the spotlight, taking over the solos from his more talented sidemen, made long ranting political speeches, and generally showed what an egotist he was, flaunting his gaggle of young and pretty wives who were paraded like chattels on the stage. Nevertheless his music was supremely important and who can fault a lack of humility given his situation in the realpolitik of Nigeria. His worst break was of course dying of AIDS-related illness in 1997. We've all lost friends, teachers, and those we admired to this disease but it seems to be leveling off in our society. However in sub-Saharan Africa more than 20% of the adult population is affected by HIV, and in the next 20 years 55,000,000 Africans will die of AIDS-related causes. (This will not alleviate the problems already there brought by famine and war.)

The latest installment of the AIDS benefit CD series is called RED HOT + RIOT and is totally devoted to the music of Fela, remixed sampled and spun out with varying degrees of success by a batch of mostly African artists. Fela's music, of course, lends itself well to this treatment as it is cyclical, groove-oriented and trancelike and can be broken down into samples easily. Also there are the famous riffs: "Suffering and Shmiling," "Water no get enemy", "Zombie," to name the most obvious. These riffs are even famous in the US and everyone knows at least the chorus. So when a talented bunch of people including Djelimadi Tounkara, Roy Hargrove, Blackalicious, Jorge Ben Jor, Cheikh Lo, Les Nubians, Dead Prez, Meshell Ndegeocello, Archie Shepp, Baaba Maal, Sade, Lenine and Tony Allen (Fela's original drummer), sample Fela tracks and rework them, the result is bound to be interesting. Add in snippets of Fela saying things like "I have death in my pouch, so I can't die," and you have a very interesting document, and a solid addition to your Fela collection that goes a lot further than, for example, the posthumous Bob Marley tracks with dancehall additives that did nothing for the music. I thought of Marley's Ghost because the remixing inevitably uses dub techniques.

Cheikh Lo's "Shakara/Lady" is a good example and is a real dance hall crasher. It segues into a dance mix with Manu Dibango honking pontifically. Djelimadi Tounkara adds great "pan-African" guitar to "Tears and Sorrow" delivered by an artist known as Common.

"Zombie" is the first weak track (#13, at 37 mins in!), delivered in a bad cover version by Bugz in the Attic featuring Wunmi. I have no idea who they are but assume they have some hairstyle-of-the-month status that got them aboard the project. (Aha! Instant answer: "You saw her first as the famous braided Soul II Soul dancer showing the world the moves of the new soul vibes in her self designed clothes." -- Google search result.) Part Two is much better with Roy Hargrove on trumpet, adding to the original baritone bomp of Oluwaseyi Clegg.

The producers, made a smart decision in putting the mellow stuff at the end. After Sade, we get Lenine, one of Brazil's great singer-songwriters with a band called Yerba Buena (!) doing "Colonial Mentality" for a brief ninety seconds then it turns into a Baaba Maal album for the last ten minutes. Kaoding Cissoko's kora adds the magic to transport us to Mali, but the band on this cut, New York-based Antibalas, are one of the best Fela tribute bands. Added to this is Taj Mahal doing the English vocals and playing acoustic guitar. This is an excellent fusion, and a great rounding out to the album. A fine concept, well executed.

THE ROUGH GUIDE TO HIGHLIFE
(Rough Guide RGNET 1002 CD)

Graeme Ewens compiled this set, and what a pleasure it is! From the blissfully dystonic Celestine Ukwu to the squelchy Burger Hilife of George Darko, the disc tells the story of one of the happiest, party-ing-est (!?) musics known.

One of the cornerstones of the Highlife sound is an out-of-print album simply titled AFRICAN MUSIC that came out on Dutch Phonogram in 1983 (cat 814 480-1). It's due for reissue as it features the crème de la crème of Highlife; Rough Guide could have simply reissued it. Two of the artists on there are conspicuously absent from the Rough Guide: Gentleman Mike Ejeagha and Prince Nico Mbarga, who in their way bracket the music from the sixties through the eighties. However, all the other great highlife stars made the Rough Guide, and certainly all the choices are hits. It kicks off with Celestine Ukwu's "Igede" which can only be described as a Desert Island disc, one you have to have. But again, as on the Dutch compilation (and even Ukwu's GREATEST HITS compilation that Flametree did in 1997), it's only Part One of this scorcher. (If any future compiler is interested, Part II is on Polydor LP polp 093, that also contains his hit "Money Palaver.") Like so many of these musicians, Ukwu's career was truncated by the Civil War and tragically cut off by his premature death.

There are two tracks by Sir Victor Uwaifo on AFRICAN MUSIC: "Ekassa 24" and "Five days a week love," either of them a better choice than the obvious pick, "Guitar Boy," which wears thin. I'm sorry Mike Ejeagha and his Premier Dance Band, who ruled the sound in the early sixties, didn't make the Rough Guide, but it is truly surprising that Prince Nico was omitted. He was the biggest Highlife star (He died in a motorcycle accident a couple of years ago). Perhaps the fact that his songs were hits outside Africa has damned him to exclusion, but then George Darko had one hit in Germany, compared to the several hits Prince Nico had internationally.

Ewens' love for Franco is evident in his choice of Alex Konadu's "Asare" which has a flanged guitar imitating the style of the Grand Master. Inyang Henshaw is new to me. A member of the minority Efik people, his track is light and pleasant in a "Blue Spot"-ish way. These old-time songs are great and it's wonderful to have them all being recycled again, but I wonder what is going on in West Africa right now. The political and economic news is bad and it could be that indigenous music is in a sorry way. Highlife itself fell victim to reggae, and a curfew effectively killed the club scene. People stayed home and listened to cassettes.

The big shocker on this Rough Guide album is the licensing credits. Most of the tracks, including the classics like "Bere Bote" by Rex Lawson, "Omo Pupa" by Victor Olaiya, "Guitar Boy" of Victor Uwaifo, as well as the bracketing tracks by Ukwu and Darko are currently unavailable. If you don't have these artists' albums, you'd better grab this Rough Guide and then you'll know what it is you are supposed to be looking for!

THE ROUGH GUIDE TO NIGERIA AND GHANA
(Rough Guide RGNET 1075CD)

Even without liner notes you'd recognize the music on THE ROUGH GUIDE TO NIGERIA AND GHANA -- I.K. Dairo, King Sunny Ade, C.K. Mann, Tony Allen, Captain Yaba, Adewale Ayuba, Sir Victor Uwaifo, E.T. Mensah, Eric Agyeman, Chief Stephen Osita Osadebe, and Sweet Talks comprise this album. From Highlife and Afrobeat to Juju and Fuji this CD covers all the bases in Anglophone West African pop. The only artist I didn't know was the last one, Amazeba Nat Brew who has five albums out in the speedy kpaalogo style which owes something to soukous and other international styles. This may be the future of the music but the more traditionally based artists like Chief Stephen still sound great (& appeal to me more). This album also reminded me we haven't heard from Captain Yaba since his killer debut funk album, TINANURE, six years ago. I'd have liked to see Celestine Ukwu in the line-up. But then there's also the African Brothers, the Oriental Brothers, Prince Nico Mbarga, the Ramblers and Rex Lawson -- enough artists in fact to make up a sequel, or call it a prequel and emphasize the roots. Then again Adewale Ayuba's "Fuji Shuffle" is as rootsy as it gets and will delight anyone just getting into Nigerian music backwards, that is through the recent popularity of Afrobeat. Unfortunately it's only a 6 minute piece, and Fuji kind of takes over so you need to play a whole hour's worth. But then the point of any successful sampler is to get you to buy the whole album sampled. This Rough Guide does a great job of covering all current styles while paying homage to the pioneers like Dairo and Mensah. This must have been an easy and fun compilation to put together and hopefully will expose more people to the deep riches in Nigerian and Ghanaian music.

VARIOUS ARTISTS
THE SHRINE AFROBEAT (Union Square Music)

What explains the sudden surge in popularity of the music of the late Nigerian superstar Fela Kuti? His numerous albums are appearing on CD; the original scratched LPs are going for ridiculous sums on EBAY; there's boxed sets and a slew of Afro-funk albums. The answer is quite simple: it's easier to display a stuffed tiger than a live one. While Fela was alive he was a tricky even problematic character, always giving promoters a hard time, putting out brilliant albums then going on tour and refusing to play anything the audience might be familiar with. THE SHRINE AFROBEAT is a compilation of Afro-funk from England's Ocho label that kicks off with a typical if obscure Fela cut, "Fefe naa efe," based on a Yoruba proverb in praise of breasts. Then it goes off into dream space for "Yegelle Tezeta," an Ethiopian jazz groove that is sort of dance-floor filler material while people get drinks & the deejays find their direction. Then an old fave, "Washi Wara," a Latin groove by the great Bantous de la Capitale rocks the house. Surprisingly the fourth track sounds like rockabilly: that's Jimi Solanke's "Eje Kajo." C.K. Mann's "Funky Hilife" takes a typical highlife ballad and halfs the tempo adding a bassline from funk. Historically it's interesting but I don't see it making it on the dancefloor which allegedly was the criterion for inclusion on this compilation. Similarly King Sunny Ade's "Synchro system" was important in its day (July 20, 1984) but it's no longer something you play at parties unless you are really a neophyte. Captain Yaba, on the other hand, is waay cool, and the Ghanaian's "Yaba funk" from his 1996 CD TINANURE really slams. (Yes I know the origin of "cool" comes from Yoruba.) Manu Dibango's "Wakafrica" is pleasant but his playing is very lounge. He lacks the creativity of Jean Serge Essous or the real edge of Momo "Wandel" Soumah. The CD ends with a new cut from trappist, er trap-drummer Tony Allen, co-creator of Afrobeat with Fela, adding dub to a characteristic slowly building percussion piece with chicken-scratch guitar. Overall THE SHRINE AFROBEAT is an interesting concept and a tribute to a style of music that essentially died with Fela. There are many other Highlife artist worthy of this compilation like Black Masters or African Brothers, but the serious omission here is Sonny Okosun. Artists like Captain Yaba will take elements of it and help it evolve. (I'm assuming readers have the Captain Yaba album, if not, buy that instead of this.)

WEST AFRICAN HIGHLIFE BAND
SALUTE TO HIGHLIFE PIONEERS (Inner Spirit IS03CD 1998)

A great party album that goes to the roots of Highlife and enlivens your spirit from the get-go. The band (who rightfully should be called West African Highlife All-Stars), based in Oakland, California, are almuni of some of the great Nigerian bands of the 1960s, when they were all starting out. Now elder-statesmen of the music, with busy fingers in other bands like Kotoja and Nigerian Brothers, the modest quintet put together a "greatest hits" of their youth rife with memorable riffs. But this is no "Stars on 45" reprise, it's an all-out jam! Bobby Benson's "Taxi Driver" will be best-known to new ears (it was even covered by the wacky 3 Mustafas), but the others are equally gold, from Rex Lawson's "Bere Bote" to Victor Olaiya's "Omo Pupa." My only regret is that there's no trumpet, which would have sweetened the sound. Instead Pope Flyne's keyboard takes the part. Flyne, ex-Sweet Talks, contributes two songs and bassist Ken Okulolo appends the closer, "Kajo." As one of the many hits on this glowing disc attests, "It's time for highlife!"