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He co-founded Afrobeat, he was also featured in contemporary pop. Now he died at the age of 79 in Paris.
“I am not a metronome. It was always about playing the drums creatively,” he told the “press” in 2002. Tony Allen, born in 1940 in Lagos, Nigeria, was initially inspired by jazz. He learned the sophistication of playing with cymbals from Max Roach’s articles in the American magazine “Downbeat.” Gene Krupa and especially Art Blakey were role models. In 1964 she met saxophonist Fela Kuti. After a phase of direct jazz, they fused jazz with African-style highlife and played the mix in the most complicated way possible. Under the influence of James Brown radio, they made their sound clearer. “An idea, a song”: they also applied the motto to the development of the Afrobeat genre.
Drumming on cushions
Their first tour of the United States together, 1969, would last ten months. While Kuti was politicized by Black Panther activists like Stokely Carmichael, Allen learned through his idol Art Blakey how to play drums on pillows. “Blakey never practiced behind the drums. I did it and he changed my style.” On the return flight, the band changed its name to Africa 70. It was about to flourish. 40 shared albums speak clear language. The music was funky. and jazzy, the strictly political lyrics.
In late 1979 Allen left alone. He went to London, then to Paris. His first four albums, including the famous “No Accommodation For Lagos”, were still produced by Fela Kuti. Then he was drawn to electronics, drum’n’bass, hip-hop, and pop music. As a studio musician, he worked for Charlotte Gainsbourg, Air, and Groove Armada. Above all, he worked with British pop star Damon Albarn u. to. in his star band The Good, The Bad & The Queen. It only shone with albums like “Black Voices” and “Secret Agent”, where tradition and innovation were noticeably balanced.
(“Die Presse”, print edition, May 2, 2020)
