Manu Dibango<\/a>, he was one of the ever creative leaders, with a sixty-year career that is imperative to the history of music.<\/p>\n\n\n\nFew drummers can boast playing the lead role, like Tony Allen does. His sound was incomparable amongst the others. He repeatedly stated, \u201cI don\u2019t play like anybody else, and nobody plays like me\u201d<\/em>. An unpretentious claim, spoken as truth. This is why this musician who, along with Fela invented Afrobeat\u2019s magic formula, was invited to work on so many more unique projects, where you are able to identify his unique rhythmic signature as early as the first few bars. The Afrika \u201970 linchpin could have potentially taken respite following his success, but continued to pave a legacy due to his insatiable cravings to play and create, alongside diverse ranges of musicians in an equally diverse number of genres. He recently told PAM \u201cI\u2019m not sure I know how to stay young,\u201d<\/em>, \u201cbut I know I\u2019m alive here and I\u2019m doing the best I can. I don\u2019t like to eat the same thing everyday or dress the same, otherwise I get bored easily, and the same goes for music.\u201d<\/em> Sixty years on from his debut in Lagos, Tony still hadn\u2019t lost the lust for life and music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
From jazz to afrobeat<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\nIt was in the heart of the Nigerian megalopolis, where he was born in July 1940 that he began his professional life as a sound technician for a company from Germany. Passionate about jazz, he became fascinated by the drumming of the great Art Blakey and Max Roach. After work, he would spend his nights in clubs, soon becoming friends with musicians who allowed him to sit at their drum kits. As a self-taught drummer, he quickly made an impression and joined Dr. Victor Olaiya\u2019s Cool Cats, one of the luminaries in Nigerian highlife. Fela had also contributed to the band, and it was at Olaiya\u2019s club that he launched his Fela Ransome-Kuti Quintet. But it was on national radio, where Fela was hosting a music program, that he and Tony would properly hit it off. In 1965, when Fela formed the Koola Lobitos (using the name of the band he started in London during his studies), he asked Tony Allen to join him. The following fifteen years they spent together were paramount in developing their unique Afrobeat formula. They regularly performed at Club Kakadu, but their \u201chighlife jazz\u201d sound did not really engage much interest in Nigeria. Undefeated, they tried their luck in Ghana, where they did several tours, before flying over to the US for a trip that would change the course of their lives, and their music.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In the land of Uncle Sam, they collided with the worlds of showbiz that didn\u2019t care much for these African musicians who came to play jazz, but also with the authorities, since their visas did not allow them to work. Stranded in Los Angeles, the band members \u2013 Tony included \u2013 started working at a factory so they could earn their living \u2013 survive \u2013 and save up to hire a lawyer. And with Fela becoming more politicized whilst in contact with activist Sandra Smith, who introduced him to the Black Panthers\u2019 afrocentric values \u200b\u200b(1969 was also the year of the great riots in the African-American ghettos), Tony took advantage of the situation by staying put in the birthplace of jazz to master his drumming. The booming funk market also influenced the band who went on to record a few inspired tracks on the spot (later reissued under the title of The \u201969 Los Angeles Sessions<\/em>). If the North American odyssey was not successful already enough, they then returned to their home country being hailed as musical veterans, their suitcases packed with all the elements of this cocktail Fela had already found the name for before this trip, but not quite yet the sound for: \u201cAfrobeat\u201d.
Tony\u2019s drums, mixed with percussion and bells borrowed from the musical universe of Yoruba, are the foundations of Afrobeat. Tony \u2013 the only member of the band to have had this privilege \u2013 would record two albums under his name with Africa \u201970, as well as Fela of course. And it\u2019s in this decade \u2013 with Tony on the drums \u2013 that the great future classics of the future \u201cBlack President\u201d were recorded: \u201cRoforofo Fight\u201d, \u201cShakara\u201d, \u201cZombie\u201d, \u201cUnknown Soldier\u201d, \u201cLady\u201d, \u201cWater No Get Enemy\u201d, \u201cYellow Fever\u201d\u2026 The joint venture of the two men came to an end in 1978 after a concert in Berlin, Tony decided to fly solo. Times were changing. Fela renamed his revamped orchestra Egypt \u201980 and Tony, after a final collaboration with Fela on Roy Ayers\u2019 Africa, Center of the World<\/em>, decided in 1984 to fly upwards onto new horizons.<\/p>\n\n\n\n