#nigeria70

[feverwolf]

Good mail day yesterday makes for todays’s playlist! #nelscline4 #nigeria70

[sablesouls]

Later the same year, Fela went on a maverick tour to Ghana, the acknowledged home of highlife. He was accompanied and guided on the tour by Benson Idonije, a well-known Nigerian producer who was responsible for the presentation of jazz on Radio Nigeria. But while his music was well received by both Ghanaian audiences and musicians, he felt that in Nigeria his talents were still not appreciated. He either lost or left his job at the radio station after that. While still in Ghana he met a promoter called 'Duke', a Ghanaian who had relocated to California, and together they began to plan a tour to the USA. The tour took place in 1969, and turned out to be a frustrating sequence of triumphs and disasters. It was halted when it was discovered that the promoter had not obtained the proper work permits for all the group's members. In addition, some members absconded, and in a legal fight with some of the local promoters, Fela seized a collection of hired instruments and shipped them back to Nigeria. He left the USA under a cloud of debt and threats of legal action, but in the few months he had been there he also met many musicians and other artists, especially writers and painters, who were harnessing their creative energies to the kind of radical politics that were being espoused by groups such as the Black Panthers. It was on this trip that he realised how valuable an understanding of Africa's history could be to the expansion of music's outreach, and it was during this trip too that he was able to record some of his latest compositions with a new group of musicians who interpreted his musical vision with a greater level of commitment and ability. He called this group Nigeria 70. #felakuti #africa #nigeria #nigeria70 #blackpanther

[cosmosmood]

[phylum]

Nigeria 70: Lagos Jump, Original Heavyweight Afrobeat, Highlife & Afro-Funk

This album cover photo is amazing. Can you imagine the time and place and the rest of the scene around the making of this record?

Album review on pitchfork