5 books to read (and one to toss) on Fela Anikulapo-Kuti

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By Victor Akhidenor

It is the time of the year when the king of Afrobeat, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti, is remembered in a week-long event tagged Felabration
This year’s edition (the 20th in the series) kicks off today and ends on October 15, the day the Abami Eda would have been 79.
What better way is there to start our series on the music maestro than to examine some of the books documenting the songs, tours, trials, travails and triumphs of the legend? Sadly, one of the books tries to tell Fela’s story but fails woefully. And sadly too, that’s where we will start from!
KALAKUTA DIARIES by Uwa Erhabor
Taste in book is subjective. Notwithstanding, if you like this 148-page book with its unattractive cover design, then you are a total … (fill the gap with an ‘I’ word)! The author dedicates the book to the memories of Sola and Fehintola Anikulapo-Kuti. However, if these damsels were alive they would sue Erhabor for unsolicited association with a bad product. Poor grammar, spellings, and punctuations were compounded by poor story telling skills. It is the mother of awful books!
Verdict: Toss with a great heave

FELA: THIS BITCH OF A LIFE by Carlos Moore
This authorised biography of Africa’s musical genius is a masterpiece. First published in 1982 as Fela, Fela: This Bitch of a Life, Carlos Moore’s effort is the most referenced book on the Abami Eda. This unique book – told mostly in Fela’s own words – explores the amazing journey of the brave pan-Africanist ‘who confronted multiple forces of oppression with the force of an imperishable music’. It is a must read for anybody interested in the life and times of Africa’s greatest musician.
Verdict: Grab your copy

FELA: WHY BLACKMAN CARRY SHIT by Mabinuori Kayode Idowu
Idowu, a member of Fela’s Young African Pioneers (YAP), wrote this book ‘out of my personal conviction that in order to be able to judge a man correctly, one has to have a deep knowledge of the man’. In that regard, the book, which was first published in 1986, achieves its aim. It offers more insights to the earlier work by Moore and offers more pictures and historical background to the essence of Fela’s socio-political ideologies.
Verdict: Read

FELA: THE LIFE & TIMES OF AN AFRICAN MUSICAL ICON by Michael E. Veal
If you are on a lean budget and still want a book that will capture all you need to know about the Abami Eda, look no further than this book written by a professor of Ethnomusicology. This book, published in the year 2000, is, by far, the best written on the music legend. The book demonstrates the author’s deep knowledge on Fela and the Nigerian music scene, delivering immense reading pleasure. No reader, whatever his like or dislike for the subject, could fail to be moved by the passion and intelligence of Veal.
Verdict: Collector’s item
AFROBEAT! FELA AND THE IMAGINED CONTINENT by Sola Olorunyomi
First published in 2003, this work which has a feel of a doctoral thesis, is a study on Fela’s ‘uncommon virtuosity and an exploration of his mystique’. Olorunyomi, a professor of African studies, explores Afrobeat as a musical practice and cultural politics in this book. If you like books with serious touch backed up with solid scholarship, you will relish the author’s approach to the language. If not, you won’t go beyond the preface.
Verdict: Researcher’s delight
ARREST THE MUSIC! FELA & His Rebel Art and Politics by Tejumola Olaniyan
Of the lot, Olaniyan’s book is the most aesthetic! As Stephen King famously remarked on book openings, the front cover of this book also says: “Listen. Come in here. You want to know about this.” And when you indeed enter its world, you are not disappointed. This lively study on the Abami Eda looks at the context, lyrics, instrumentation, visual art and people through which the music maestro produced his music.
Verdict: Beauty and the beat!