Fela Kuti: Fear No Man

Episode 2: Becoming Fela

Host: Jad Abumrad
Podcast: Higher Ground
Release Date: October 15, 2025

Overview

This episode, "Becoming Fela," explores the formative, globe-spanning journey that transformed Fela Kuti from a "colonial boy," classically trained musician, into the revolutionary artist and architect of Afrobeat. Host Jad Abumrad guides listeners through Fela’s upbringing in Nigeria, musical education in London, spiritual search and artistic crisis, and his pivotal time in Los Angeles where he met Sandra Isidore—a partnership that catalyzed his political awakening and musical revolution. The episode weaves together interviews, archival audio, and incisive commentary to trace how Fela’s identity, music, and activism were forged in the fires of race, diaspora, colonialism, and African-American radicalism.

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The Challenge of Defining Fela Kuti (00:11–01:42)

• The episode opens with the difficulty of summarizing Fela's persona, as guests liken him to a fusion of musical and political icons:
  • “Fela is like Bob Marley and Mandela combined... Jagger and James Brown... protest element of Dylan... Malcolm X.” – (B, 00:14)
  • Flea (of Red Hot Chili Peppers) notes the revolutionary energy in Fela's music, comparing it to the hardest hip hop, jazz, and punk, emphasizing its significance and danger to power structures.

2. Early Life: Colonial Nigeria & Classical Education (02:46–05:55)

• Fela’s childhood in a middle-class Nigerian family, British missionary schooling, and sparse documentation of his formative years.
• Rare archival interview (1967) with a young Fela: His parents pushed him to piano at age 9, led the school choir, and then attended Trinity College of Music in London.

3. London Years: Isolation, Jazz, and the Contradictions of Empire (05:55–07:45)

• Visits to Trinity: Fela is among the few Black students in an institution steeped in colonial and classical tradition.
• Host reflects on Fela’s paradox: railing against colonialism while mastering its musical forms.
• Sandra Isidore's voice foreshadows the ideological awakening to come.

"He was still walking around with colonial mentality. He hadn't become Black." – Sandra Isidore (D, 07:02)

4. Musical Growth: From Highlife to the Search for Identity (08:52–11:16)

• Fela’s return to Nigeria in 1963. His early music (with his band Koola Lobitos) blends jazz with highlife and Latin American influences—searching, commercial, and not yet radical.
• Early songs like “Ololufe” focus on romance, revealing a Fela in transition.

“He was just a gentleman. He was singing love songs, you know... folklore. It wasn’t complete gentlemen.” – Baba Ani (B, 09:30)

5. Turning Point: The Impact of James Brown and Black Power (13:08–14:25)

• The arrival of funk, especially James Brown, electrifies West African youth, laying a cultural and rhythmic foundation for future Afrobeat.
• The irony: Fela suspects James Brown has appropriated his style, years before Brown actually visits Nigeria.

“James Brown turned Africa upside down inside out.... That music actually gave Africans a point of reference and cultural redefinition.” – Michael Veale (B, 13:08)

6. Crisis in Lagos and the American Odyssey (15:31–17:14)

• Fela, frustrated and unsuccessful, laments cultural disconnect; is invited to the US for a tour aimed at exposing Americans to "authentic" African highlife.
• Arrival in the US; chronicles their struggles—financial hardship, expiring visas, and cultural disorientation.

7. The Pivotal Encounter: Sandra Isidore (17:26–33:44)

Sandra’s Story and "Black Realness"

• Sandra, raised in Watts and Compton, California, is shaped by both generational silences around racism and the awakening fires of the Watts riots and Black Power.
• Her introduction to radical Black music (Nina Simone, Ray Charles, etc.), Malcolm X, and a hunger to “meet a real African.”
• Parallels drawn between Black Americans’ search for African authenticity and Africans’ own search for identity complicated by colonialism and diaspora.

"In order to know the real story, I'm gonna need to meet a real African." – Sandra Isidore (D, 24:29)

Fela and Sandra Meet (27:16–33:44)

• Their electrifying first encounter at a Hollywood Gardens event: immediate mutual fascination, Fela’s boldness, and Sandra’s realization about preconceptions of Africa and Africans.
• Early days: Fela’s music is still apolitical—e.g., songs about soup rather than liberation.

“You’ve been doing all this and you singing about some soup. At that point I said, why would you do that when you can use your music to educate people, uplift people?” – Sandra Isidore (D, 33:10)

• Notable moment of honesty: Sandra confesses she'd rather have faced slavery than colonialism—a controversial sentiment that sparks further discussion about the erasure and brutality of colonialism as compared to the visible horrors of slavery.

8. Awakening: Dialogues of Pain, Solidarity, and Transformation (36:22–44:45)

• Fela, at his lowest, is taken in by Sandra’s family and absorbs Black struggle in America—firsthand and through history. Sandra educates him about the legacy of American racism, lynchings, and civil rights.
• The pivotal act: Sandra gives Fela The Autobiography of Malcolm X. It shatters his worldview and redirects his sense of purpose.

“Everything about Africa started coming back to me. He would later tell the New York Times, ‘It was incredible how my head was turned. Everything fell into place.’” – Jad Abumrad quoting Fela (A, 44:09)

“Sandra taught me a lot about blackism. Gave me books to read: Malcolm X... I had to sit down and think about myself. Say, what am I doing? Am I already playing African music? ...I have to start to rethink and re-analyze myself. I started to write new music.” – Fela Kuti (B, 44:13)

9. Transformation: The Birth of Afrobeat (45:06–51:42)

• Fela rebrands his band to Nigeria 70, then Africa 70, and debuts a new radical sound—Afrobeat—honoring both Yoruba tradition and global Black struggle.
• The first song of the new era, “My Lady’s Frustration,” is written for Sandra and launches a string of sold-out LA club dates.
• With the release of “Jin Koku” (1971), Fela explodes in popular consciousness back home; his blend of James Brown’s funk, jazz, highlife, and Yoruba drumming creates a Pan-Africanist musical language.
• Analysis of Afrobeat’s unmistakably diasporic, unifying groove—accessible and revolutionary for both audiences in Africa and the diaspora.

“You could bring my mother, who has never been to the US... and bring an African American person who has never been to Nigeria and the two of them can actually interface because this music brings them together. Fela is like a magician trying to create a kind of Pan Africanist musical language.” – Olabode Omojola (B, 51:12)

10. Coming Home & Legacy (52:01–end)

• Sandra follows Fela to Lagos, experiencing both exoticization and celebration.
• Fela, emboldened and liberated in fashion as well as politics, cements himself as an iconoclast and leader.
• The two do not become the fairytale partnership they envisioned, but their impact together cannot be overstated.

Blackness, Diaspora, and the Illusion of "Realness"

“African Americans look to Africa for a past. Folks in the diaspora look to the African Americans in the diaspora for a vision of possibility... So we look to them for the past, they look to us for the future.” – Louis Chude-Sokei (C, 52:22)

• Final reflection: Black identity, like Fela’s music and myth, is always in flux—performed and constructed, yet still meaningful.
• Powerful statistic: More Africans migrated to the US since 1990 than during the slave trade—a reminder that identity is continually evolving.

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Defiance:
  “If you think I’m going to change or compromise, they’re making me stronger.” – Fela Kuti (B, 02:42)

• Sandra on Cultural Identity:
  “You want to check me? My voice carries.” (D, 07:06)

• On Afrobeat’s Power:
  “Fela is the epitome of a musician whose music matters. In fact, his music was so dangerous to the people in power ... they threw him in jail. Not once, not twice, but a hundred times.” – Jad Abumrad (A, 01:42)

• On Transformation Through Malcolm X (Sandra’s Memoir):
  “It was during this discussion, I showed him news clippings and pictures of blacks being hung from trees ... He didn’t know our real story.” (D, 42:11)

• On the Roots of Afrobeat:
  “The key says Bode, is that Fela found a precise blend where everyone can hear what they want.” (A, 51:12)

• Identity and Diaspora:
  “Blackness is up for grabs in the same way that whiteness is being transformed by immigration. So is blackness.” – Louis Chude-Sokei (C, 55:09)

Important Segment Timestamps

• (00:11) — What is Fela? Icon comparisons and opening question
• (03:43) — 1967 Interview with Fela on early years and Trinity College
• (05:27–07:02) — Tour of Trinity, colonial contradiction, Sandra’s foreshadowing
• (09:30–12:08) — Early band years, "Ololufe," and searching for a voice
• (13:08–14:25) — Influence of James Brown and the new African sound
• (17:26–24:29) — Sandra Isidore’s coming-of-age, Watts riots, and Black consciousness
• (27:16–30:46) — First meeting: Sandra and Fela’s instant connection
• (32:33–33:44) — Sandra confronts Fela’s apolitical lyrics: “You’re singing about soup”
• (36:22–44:45) — Fela’s education in American Black struggle & the impact of Malcolm X
• (45:06–51:42) — Birth of Afrobeat, “My Lady’s Frustration," and international recognition
• (52:22–52:31) — Louis Chude-Sokei on diaspora’s mutual gazes: searching for past/future

Thematic Takeaways

• Fela Kuti’s emergence as a revolutionary artist was as much a product of the diaspora’s crosscurrents and ideological exchanges as it was of his musical genius.
• Afrobeat is not only a genre but a signifier of resistance, blending the languages of jazz, funk, soul, highlife, Yoruba tradition, and radical Black consciousness.
• The search for ‘realness’—in Blackness, in Africanness—is shaped by layers of trauma, misunderstanding, and the longing for connection across the Atlantic.
• Sandra Isidore’s role was transformative—her “Blackism” was the ignition for Fela’s awakening.
• Fela’s journey is emblematic of how the collision of personal, political, and artistic forces can spark a revolution that transcends borders.

Closing Reflection

The episode closes with a recognition that all identities, like music, are constructed and shifting, yet they have power when believed and performed. Through the lives of Fela and Sandra, the episode paints a vivid portrait of the birth of Afrobeat as both a personal and political awakening—a sound where the diaspora finally meets itself, dances together, and becomes more than the sum of its past.