Nigerian musician and composer Fela Anikulapo Kuti performs on September 13, 1986 at the “Party of Humankind” of the French Communist Party at La Courneuve in Paris, France. (AP Photo/Laurent Rebours)
When American music audiences and critics can’t find a way to define a particular artist or song, they just call it “pop.” Pop music is an umbrella term so hard to define it doesn’t even fit the name it’s been given. A lot of pop music isn’t popular at all. Many pop songs are only called pop because they blend other genres and fashion them into something unrecognizable.
Throughout the last couple decades, pop musicians in America have played nice with popular music forms across the world to create unlikely compositions that blur the lines between authenticity and imitation. Popular examples include Pitbull’s fusion of Latin dance music and hip-hop within his classic club bangers, Gwen Stefani’s integration of Japanese pop on her debut solo album, or the transplant of UK dance music to America in the form of dubstep.
Recently, however, American artists have been taking subtle cues from the vast Afrobeat scene, indigenous to West African countries. The genre, born from Nigeria in the 1970s, has a rich history, that is as much informed by major trends in American music as it is the cultures of the continent it calls home.
People who are not familiar with the lexicon of African music genres may have trouble grasping the sound of Afrobeat. Anyone interested in contextualizing how the sound relates to music in the United States may have to start with American musicians greatly influenced by the genre. Luckily, connections to popular music on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean have existed since the Afrobeat’s genesis.
Fela Kuti, an activist and one of the most notable modern musicians in the entire continent of Africa, coined the term “Afrobeat” to describe the style of music played in his Nigerian club, Afro-Shrine. His sound was comprised of jazzy interpretations of “high-life,” a more contemporary style of music in Africa. This brand of dance music catapulted Kuti into stardom in Africa, but jazz musicians in America also adapted traditional African instruments into their arrangements in the 1970s when cool jazz musicians like Miles Davis and Herbie Hancock began to lead the way in the realms of avant-garde and jazz-fusion.
The rise of electronic instrumentation in 1980s American genres like new wave and hip-hop changed the way music around the world was made – Afrobeat was not exception, as toward the end of the decade synthesized sounds became a norm in African clubs. In 1988 Mahlathini & The Mahotella Queens released “Khazet”, a huge African pop hit that invokes feel-good vibes closer to “The Safety Dance” by Men Without Hats than the high-energy numbers Kuti churned out a decade earlier. The big brass coupled with traditional African drumming made famous by Fela survived on albums like Paul Simon’s “The Rhythm of the Saints” and Peter Gabriel’s “So,” although only via implicit nods and influences.
The marriage of the African and American pop scene continues today, although the two scenes appear to be worlds away from each other on the surface. The “Oxford Comma” crooning indie band, Vampire Weekend, has prominently featured African influences on their albums. After forming on the campus of Columbia University in 2006, members of the band delved deeply into South African artists after acquiring a Brenda Fassie cassette.
“Rock bands have always borrowed from places, and we are no different,” the band’s frontman told UK newspaper The Telegraph.
Vampire Weekend’s 2008 single “Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa” not only displays a direct influence from African pop music in the 80s, but also directly mentions Peter Gabriel in the song’s lyrics for his association with bringing the sound over to America. Koenig returned the favor to Africa for allowing his band to use Afrobeat as their secret ingredient by lending his voice to The Very Best’s “Warm Heart of Africa,” an East African dance record that includes Chichewa and English lyrics.
Aside from indie rock, rap artists have taken notice of the African music world. Even as an artform that is derivative of African rhythmic and griot tradition, hip-hop’s acknowledgement of their roots to the motherland are few and far between. Kanye West has been tossing in elements of Afrobeat in his eclectic mix since “Love Lockdown,” the lead single from his experimental album, “808’s & Heartbreak.” In 2011, West signed D’Banj, a Nigerian entertainer, to his G.O.O.D. Music imprint, featuring him on the label’s compilation, Cruel Summer.
“There is a bridge from everywhere else in the music industry to America, but in Africa that bridge is cut somewhere,” D’Banj told OkayPlayer.com in 2012. “(American musicians) have forgotten us. But then Kanye West saw me and said, ‘Let’s go!’”
Even outside of secular music, artists are finding ways to incorporate African influences. Destiny’s Child vocalist, Michelle Williams, covered “When Jesus Says Yes” a praise and worship song commonly performed in Nigeria for her new gospel single, “Say Yes.” The song, which enlists help from Williams’ former band mates, Beyoncé Knowles and Kelly Rowland, took the Afrobeat-infused record to the top spot of US Billboard’s Hot Gospel Songs list this summer.
After taking a trip on a Fulbright grant to Ghana in 2005 Brooklynite and ethnomusicology student Brian Shimkovitz began Awesome Tapes from Africa, a blog built to facilitate digital files of all the rare Afrobeat cassettes he purchased on his trip. In almost a decade since the blog’s inception, Shimkovitz has expanded the site into a record label that reissues his findings on vinyl. He also plays American festivals DJing his Afrobeat collection directly from the cassettes he’s hoarded. American music media outlets such as Noisey and Village Voice have featured Shimkovitz in articles. Pitchfork has even begun reviewing his reissues alongside the new albums they score, giving Awesome Tapes’ release of Aby Ngana Diop’s 1994 album, “Liital,” an 8.0 in early September. Reviewer Andy Beta likened the rolling, percussive hop of Diop’s “Dieuleul-Dieuleul” to N.W.A.’s bombastic, soul-sampling “Express Yourself.”
Due to the following of African pop music fans like Shimkovitz and Koenig, the marriage between African and American pop will likely continue. The question is who will pick up the beat Fela began next.
