Original Broadway Cast Recording - Fela!

(Cast Records)

If you can’t get to London’s National Theatre to see the phenomenal show telling the extraordinary life of Afrobeat’s Fela Kuti, look no further than this tremendous recording of the original Broadway show. It evokes Lagos in mid-1970s, Fela’s nightclub The Shrine built in the family compound, and the police attack that killed his mother and took Kuti to torture, prison and then an attempt at the presidency. Sahr Ngaujah makes a convincing Kuti, the man who through music which blended jazz, funk, highlife and traditional African rhythms and provocative lyrics, challenged the corruption of the military rulers of Africa’s most populous country.