Updated October 17, 2025 at 4:34 PM MDT
Fela Anikulapo-Kuti is one of the most influential musicians of the 20th century. The icon's colorful life and inspiring career is the focus of a new podcast series Fela Kuti: Fear No Man created by veteran journalist Jad Abumrad.
Abumrad is well known for creating and co-hosting WNYC's Radiolab. He worked on the program for 20 years, won two Peabody Awards with the team and left the show in 2022. In recent years, Abumrad has also embraced podcast series, breaking down and analyzing the complex lives of celebrated musicians — including his series Dolly Parton's America, which earned him a third Peabody Award.
With his latest podcast Fela Kuti: Fear No Man, Abumrad continues his thorough exploration into famed artists by analyzing the life of Kuti. The podcast dissects the Nigerian musician's creation of Afrobeats, a popular and modern West African music genre, and how Kuti used music to tell stories and advocate for his country and people.
"He was making music that was just great to dance to — I mean, it still kills in a party — but he was also structuring his music so that the people dancing would have these moments of awakening," Abumrad said about the late Kuti.
In an interview with NPR's Michel Martin, Abumrad discussed the experiences that shaped Kuti's artistry and his impact on music and freedom movements across generations.
The following exchange has been edited for length and clarity.
Interview Highlights
Michel Martin: How do you describe Fela Kuti to somebody who doesn't know?
Jad Abumrad: You could call him the Nigerian James Brown, because there are elements of funk in his style — it's got jazz and West African drumming — but that doesn't really capture him because there's layers and layers of movement politics. So, you'd have to add in a Malcolm X and a Muhammad Ali. He's all of those people in one because he was making music that was just great to dance to — I mean, it still kills in a party — but he was also structuring his music so that the people dancing would have these moments of awakening. And they would suddenly step back and look at their lives and think, "My God! Look at this madness. We have to do something."
Martin: So, Nigeria became independent from British colonial rule in 1960. Tell us what was happening in Nigeria around the same time that Fela Kuti was becoming popular.
Abumrad: Right around 1960, when the country declared its independence, there was this wave of optimism. A lot of the Europeans started coming home to try and build the nation, and the wave of optimism kind of crashed on the shore and receded and left big chunks of foam behind, because these sort of neo colonial structures built around oil money sort of came in. And then you basically had the Nigerian ruling class beholden to British gas companies and then German and then American — and then there was corruption that came on the heels of that. Fela really is the voice, I would say, he's the soundtrack of that post-independence falling of optimism and rising of cynicism. He's the guy who says, "This isn't okay. What's happening? We need to do something."
Martin: You have an entire episode about his most popular song, "Zombie." So tell us about how that piece was received, first by fans, and then by the military leadership of Nigeria.
Abumrad: To say it's a flagrant attack on the regime would actually be an understatement. It's basically calling the soldiers brainless droids.
Zombie no go go, unless you tell am to go (Zombie)
Zombie no go stop, unless you tell am to stop (Zombie)
Zombie no go turn, unless you tell am to turn (Zombie)
Zombie no go think, unless you tell am to think (Zombie)
They kill when they're told to kill. They go left when they're told to go left. They die when they're told to die.
The song was immediately banned on the radio — you couldn't play it. But, apparently, it was playing out of every house, every shanty, across Lagos. I mean, he really, really poked the military in the eye. So, in 1977, there was an altercation with the police. They came and they burned his compound down. And, apparently, one of the inciting incidents was that Fela got up on top of the roof with his sax and he played "Zombie" down to the soldiers. That song really became the point at which even some of his followers thought he had taken it too far.
Martin: You know, I can't gloss over just how much brutality Fela endured. You just told us about how his compound was attacked, right? His mother was thrown from a second story window. She would later die from complications following that incident. He was riddled with scars from past injuries.
Abumrad: It's crazy. Yeah.
Martin: What effect did you think that had on him?
Abumrad: When they threw his mother out of a window, that's when you really see a shift happen in him. We talked to his kids who talked about that's when he starts getting into some questionable spiritual practices. It's at that point where you really see the cost. Ultimately, the state does win, unfortunately.
Martin: Why do you say that?
Abumrad: The violence basically extracted a toll that was maybe too much for him to bear. But in the long run, what I find really beautiful about Fela's story is that you see protest movements, like long after his death — in 2020, as the George Floyd protests were happening in America, in Nigeria, you had the EndSARS movement, which is a protest also against police brutality. And there you had tens of thousands of young people in the streets all playing Fela. He's still soundtracking these freedom movements. So there is some way in which there is a kind of endless return of him that speaks to a kind of immortality.
Editor's note: Fela Kuti: Fear No Man is presented by Higher Ground Productions and Audible, a company owned by Amazon. Amazon is among NPR's recent financial supporters and pays to distribute some NPR content.
The audio story was produced by Adam Bearne and edited by Phil Harrell. The digital version was adapted for web by Destinee Adams and edited by Treye Greene.
Copyright 2025 NPR
