Brian Slattery Photo
Kaleta and Super Yamba Band brought the legendary West African sound of Afrobeat to Cafe Nine on Thursday night, proving that the message of the revolutionary music lives on, and connects to the present moment, as much as ever.
The sound of Afrobeat was pioneered by Fela Kuti, who, in a career spanning the late 1950s until his death in 1997, combined funk, jazz, psychedelia, and West African rhythms with a sharp, revolutionary political message to become a giant of African music. His sound swept the continent and the world, and has become an integral part of the global musical landscape.
Originally from Benin, Kaleta (a.k.a. Leon Ligan-Majek) grew up in Lagos, Nigeria, and over the course of his career played first with Nigerian juju ambassador King Sunny Adé and later with Fela Kuti himself through the 1980s and 1990s. Kaleta formed Super Yamba Band in 2017 and has been making waves ever since, pandemic be damned. The band’s stop at Cafe Nine was one in a string of dates that will take them through the summer.
But before they embarked on that tour, the band — Kaleta on vocals and guitar, Daniel Yount on drums, Ajay Olesegua on congas, Eric Burns on guitar, Prince Amu on bass, Walter Farcort on saxophone, and Sean Smith on keys and trumpet, with several swaps for other percussion instruments and plenty of background vocals — had a message to impart.
After a DJ set of records from around the world provided by DJ Shaki (a.k.a. Rick Omonte), Kaleta and Super Yamba Band began with a swell from an organ, followed by a James Brown-like grunt from Kaleta that signaled the band to settle into its first groove. Heads began to bob at once, and people began to move around Cafe Nine’s space.
“Goes without saying, but you are invited to come closer,” Smith said after the first number. “You are invited to dance. Don’t worry about it!” A few people took him up on it right away. Even if the floor didn’t fill with dancers, it was clear from the beaming faces, the swaying, the closed eyes in the crowd, that the band was connecting. Song after song was met with raucous cheers.
“You doing all right?” Smith asked after another couple songs. The crowd cheered back. “It’s getting a little foggy in here,” he said. “If you haven’t danced yet, don’t miss your opportunity. We got a limited supply of funk tonight.”
More people joined those moving on the floor already as Kaleta reminded the audience that this style of music had its political component. He mentioned how, again, we are in a time of war, and addressed lyrics to world leaders, imploring them to understand better what’s happening to regular people on the street. The music put a larger meaning to his words, a meaning that drew from his Afrobeat predecessors: that revolution and social change can, in fact, also be fun; that celebration and joy are perhaps necessary components in any social change with real legs; that maybe it’s easier for people to push for the things they want when they have a good beat to move to first.
“Do you want more music?” Smith asked.
He was met with a wall of cheers. “We got more music,” he said.
With each song, the grooves got deeper, the improvisations got longer, and the band dug into its sound more. The audience was warned that the band had only a couple more songs to play, but that meant at least another half-hour of music to go.
Much of the vocals in Afrobeat are call-response; earlier in the set, Kaleta provided the call and the rest of the band offered up chant-like responses. As the set neared its end, Kaleta sought to change the script.
“In the beginning, we sang for you,” he said. “Now, you will sing for us.” Syllable by syllable, he taught the crowd a chant that would be their response. The crowd learned it and was ready. As the song progressed, Kaleta sang, and the audience sang back.
What did the syllables mean? What was the audience saying? On a deeper level, it didn’t matter. What did matter was that, with that song, everyone in the audience became musicians in the band. Everyone in the room was part of the music, driving it forward together.