Various Artists - Nigeria 70: The Definitive Story of 1970’s Funky Lagos (Album)
Somewhere back in the pre-Napster 1990s the record buying public (remember when there used to be such a thing) were exposed to one of the all-time great music marketing ploys. Retailers, realising they were stocking lots of music from places other than the US and UK, took all the music in their catalogue from the rest of the world and started selling it under the label ‘World Music’.
While Frankfurt-school groupies started fondling themselves over the subject-other dichotomies engendered by this commercial, and broadly benign, decision; the strategy dovetailed nicely into the spending habits of the first post-rave generation who’d burned out on E and were searching for a way to express a global new-age consciousness with their wallets. At the tail end of the World Music boom, UK dance label Strut released a compilation of there-to-fore under-appreciated African funk that traded on the growing popularity of Afro-beat star Fela Kuti to expose a decade of amazing music emanating from 1970s Lagos (the most populous city in Nigeria). At the time Nigeria was a decadent jumble of international trade and African high-life and the recently re-released ‘Nigeria 70’ compilation brims with a dance-floor burning gumbo of Carribean, North American, East and West African musical morsels.
Hammond Organs and decrying saxes wail over hypnotic polyrhythms underpinned by deep-bass grooves and grounation horn stabs. Afro-beat ambassadors Fela Kuti and Sunny Ade are name-checked but the best part of this compilation are the tracks that never made it out of Nigeria. The compilation reveals the complexity and diversity behind Kuti’s musical legacy and also the rich cross-pollination with North American Jazz. Herbie Hancock, Joe Zawinul and Miles Davis all turned to Africa for inspiration and the template for late 70s American Jazz is clearly audible in tracks by Shina Williams and Balla Miller.
While I have a soft spot for anything with 70s and funk in the title, Nigeria 70 is a truly exceptional compilation of exciting music that I would never have otherwise been exposed to and comes very highly recommended.
