Don't Teach Me Nonsense: Fela Kuti as a Sample in Rap

The first Fela Kuti-sampling track I could find comes in 1983, made by George Clinton, which is actually an interpolation on his song “Nubian Nut”. It’s a typically loose and acid-brained Clintonian techno-funk composition — arguably his first rap song featuring two brief, Melle Melleish verses around an extended jam from 1983’s You Shouldn’t-Nuf Bit Fish in the midst of his “Atomic Dog,” Bambaataa - and Kraftwerk-influenced digi era. It’s six minutes of electro bass and David Spradley’s electro synth, but 26 seconds in the chorus plays “Say follow follow they use their ears/Say follow follow then they use their minds”. It’s a direct quote of Kuti’s “Mister Follow Follow” off 1976’s Zombie, on a song dedicated to an African King, embedded in a call for unity. 

In its themes, “Nubian Nut” taps into the politics, philosophy, history and identity that were central to the music of Fela Kuti, the Nigerian artist, Afrobeat founder and political activist whose impact on all forms of pop music are still being felt. Fela stood for pan-Black nationalism in a global resistance against colonial oppression (though we’d be remiss to acknowledge that his record as a feminist was… “spotty” at best). Documentaries, films and Broadway plays have been dedicated to Kuti’s life and work, but Okayplayer’s focus is an aspect of his legacy that is at once more grounded and simultaneously ephemeral, an appropriately nerdy exercise: looking at how Fela’s music has been utilized as a sample source.

Celebrate Fela Kuti's 87th birthday, Oct. 15, 2025, with exclusive merch from the Okayplayer collection. 

Hip-hop is a postmodern medium, founded on the mining and reinterpretation of existing art by the next generation, producers who boost history and appropriate it. This can add layers of meaning and subtle associations to beats. The true masters of this craft, the RZAs and Dillas and DJ Pauls, draw all kind of connections out of their sample sources, making thematic references, sonic footnotes with vocal snippets or song titles or beat changes that lean into or subvert the meanings of both the songs they’re utilized in and the samples they’re warping. Forgive the cliche, but they are like their forefathers in jazz who would fuck with their audience’s expectations, flip phrases and styles to make cerebral in-jokes for and about their peers that only the astute ball knower fans could follow. 

But this is not a tenet of all rap, much less great rap. It’s just as often a case of an astute crate digger matching a melody to a drum pattern that sounds dope together. For instance, Fela has been referred to as the African James Brown, another God of the Rap Sample whose life and career was also rife with racial and political meaning. But, it was once possible to sample the ubiquitous “Funky Drummer” (over 2,000 credited samples according to WhoSampled, in addition to 17,386 total cited samples for the Godfather on the internet beat compendium!) pattern without suggesting anything at all (Though now, I’d argue, it’s a kind of scripture. When you sample “Funky Drummer” there has been too much context stapled on by all its famous historical uses, which is what is so beautiful about rap). 

Fela is different. He’s been sampled far less frequently than you might imagine, with his catalog of classic material that feels sewn into the roots of golden era hip-hop as well as your bloodstream. He “only” has 129 citations on WhoSampled, which feels almost impossible. What you’ll notice below is there’s nearly a complete lack of samples in the early '90s, which was a sample heavy era in rap where you’d expect Fela records to have been raided by the likes of Preemo and Q-Tip and Dr. Dre. Alas, they didn’t, and I don’t have a great explanation for that beyond their taste seeming to run more domestic, more downtempo jazz on the East Coast and more electro funk out West.

But, an examination of his music’s subsequent usages in rap reveals that artists cannot sample Fela without that usage having purpose and meaning. For the most part, with a few notable exceptions we’ll discuss, when a musician sampled Fela Kuti they immediately brought their music into conversation with his. Almost every Fela sample is a concept song that in some way is about Fela and what he represented, though this may be because Afrobeat is so distinct that it is hard to fold into hip-hop, with its polyrhythms and layered instrumentation and call and response in pidgin English and Yoruba. Or, perhaps it simply means too much to the artists who have made it a part of their work, that any conversations including Fela Kuti inevitably become about him. 

So in that spirit, we cherry-picked the “most relevant” rap songs to analyze. Let’s travel through time and consider what we talk about when we talk about Fela samples.

Honorable Mentions. Before we dig in, a few artists and songs that have sampled Fela outside of rap:

Burna Boy and Wizkid: These two Nigerian giants who make music in Fela’s tradition share an obvious and emphatic reverence for his music. Burna Boy has the most direct connection. His grandfather is the music critic Benson Idonije, who served as Fela’s first band manager. But both artists have images of Fela tattooed on their bodies, both have referenced his fashion or actual image on album covers, and both have sampled him a number of times. They even have samples in common. Both touched Fela’s “Lady” (Wiz’s “Jaiye Jaiye”- with Fela’s son Femi, and Burna’s “Boom Boom Boom”), and “Shakara” (Wiz’s “Sweet Love” and Burna’s “My Money, My Baby” from the Queen and Slim Soundtrack). 

In some cases, these references are explicit. Burna Boy’s “Collateral Damage” samples Fela’s “Sorrow, Tears and Blood,” one protest song quoting another. However, on Wizkid’s “Joro” we see the weight that comes with a Fela reference, as Wiz lifts the hook from Fela’s “Zombie,” and faced criticism for taking a snippet of dialogue in a political anthem that had dire consequences for Fela and flipping it into a pop love anthem. It’s a direct example of how loaded Fela’s work is to casually wade through, and what kind of flak an artist, even one as dedicated to Fela’s music and memory as Wiz, can receive for not lending Fela’s source material its proper due. Both Afrobeat legends are proof of how, outside hip-hop, Fela continues to serve as a lodestar for the genre he pioneered. 

Fatboy Slim - “First Down” (1996), Phoenix - “Fleur De Lys” (2017), Kelly Rowland - “Hitman” (2020): Three different genres interacting with Fela's work on a shallow level, as pure sonics, with no thematic or spiritual ties.

The purveyors of crate digging dance pop that might score a Volkswagen commercial in the late '90s or early aughts, like Fatboy Slim and/or the Avalanches, loved Fela, as his percussion and horns pair beautifully with that hemisphere of nerdy/middlebrow electronic music. 

Phoenix’s “Expensive Shit” jack feels illegal, in the Poltergeist, "building a family home on an ancestral burial ground” sense, putting one of Fela’s most searing satirical political critiques through a Coldplay-filtered taffy pull (without catching the same flak Wiz received). 

Kelly Rowland mines George Clinton’s Fela favorite “Mr. Follow Follow” for “Hitman” off K, an EP that leaned into Afrobeat and feels like the kind of hybrid project it’s surprising we haven’t seen more of in American pop, because it whips. 

So, without further adieu…

“Obe,” from The ‘69 Los Angeles Sessions (1970)

Jidenna - “85 to Africa” (2019)

No one can accuse Wisconsin born and raised Jidenna Mobisson of subtlety, which has perhaps never been more accurate than this concept song, featuring Fela horn stabs that sound like a honking horn, about taking Interstate 85, which runs through Atlanta, to Africa. Jidenna is half Nigerian, his Igbo father immigrated to the Midwest from Imo State, so it’s somewhat surprising this was the only Fela sample I could find from his catalog. It’s a fun if slightly giddy effort, but actually does suggest a literal bridging of the American and African experiences, which Fela would approve of.

“Eko Ile,” from The ‘69 Los Angeles Sessions (1970)

Wyclef Jean - “Fela Kuti” (2017)

In 1979, Fela formed a political party called Movement of the People, or M.O.P., which means I’ve either never given enough credit to Fame and Danze as global political historians (who I’ve always given a tremendous amount of credit to) or there’s a hilarious coincidence that connects '70s Nigerian politics and '90s street rap from Brownsville that no one has ever bothered to point out to me. Fela wanted to run for president, but was banned from doing so by the corrupt government that was at the time under military rule. In 2010, Wyclef was similarly blocked in his bid to run for president of his native Haiti in the wake of a calamitous earthquake. Though there were disqualifying issues, such as he hadn’t lived in Haiti continuously for the previous five years, a proof of citizenship was required of any candidate to run, and there were some questions as to how funds were mishandled by his charity, Yele Haiti, founded in the wake of the aforementioned earthquake. But those slight discrepancies in experience have never prevented Clef from putting his experience in direct conversation with Fela’s, as he does here explicitly, in this bid for a spring break anthem named after Fela that appropriately, and perhaps lazily, name-checks the legend. 

“Na Poi,” 'Na Poi' (1972)

Nas featuring Alicia Keys - “Warrior Song” (2012)

As far as I can tell this is the only rap song Keys has ever produced, which takes its clattering drums from a brief percussive digression near the beginning of the early '70s Fela classic. Nas follows what the sample source suggests with his standard “Looking upon the Queensbridge Pyramids with third eye fully open, God” approach that was baked into his rhymes circa this era. 

“Gentleman,” from 'Gentleman' (1973)

J. Cole - “Let Nas Down” (2013)

Of the many very funny songs Jermaine Cole has made, this is probably the funniest, with all due respect to “Wet Dreamz.” It’s a kind of diary entry, fanmail, or a thought experiment that arguably should’ve been left in the drafts. However, the self-produced beat is built around a sick horn riff in one of Fela’s greatest songs, a fascinating declaration of self-standing in contrast to the European/colonialist’s standard of manhood and decorum. I would guess somewhere in academia the most annoying hip-hop doctorate student who ever lived is polishing some thesis that does a back handspring into a split claiming “Let Nas Down” knew exactly what it was doing with its use of “Gentleman” and its themes, in the form of this song length letter it drops into Nas’ locker during recess, but I’m not buying it. Instead, this is the sort of decontextualized crate digging sound mining from Fela’s library I’m surprised there isn’t more of.

“Fefe Naa Efe,” from Gentleman (1973)

Afu-Ra - “Poisonous Taoist” (2005)

Similar to “Let Nas Down”, the original uses a Ghanaian saying to suggest beauty should be appreciated rather than guarded. I suppose someone rocking a Fidel cap waiting on a turkey bacon egg and cheese at my bodega right now would argue this is Afu-Ra’s point exactly, but it sounds more like a standard lyrical miracle conscious rap punchline exhibition (but to be clear, dope beat).

“Water Get No Enemy,” from 'Expensive Shit' (1975)

Common - “Pops Raps III (All My Children)” (2000)

This is probably the single most fascinating entry on this list for a few reasons. Like Water for Chocolate is an album that ages with you because you can now see it as an expression of that moment in all of our lives that Common nailed. It lives in history as a wonderful expression of a voracious intellect and curiosity on the cusp of 30, at the peak of Lonnie’s powers as a writer and rapper and citizen of the world, in love with art and research, desperate to share every book he’s ever read and every record he’s ever listened to with his audience. It’s also the first album I thought of when I dove into this exercise because of its intro, “Time Travelin (A Tribute to Fela),” which I was stunned to learn, apparently is an original production featuring Femi, Vinia Mojica, and Roy Hargrove (produced by Dilla). The actual Fela sample is reserved for the third installment of “Pops Raps,” a perennial delight for all the longtime Common fans who love listening to his dad muse while using his distinct blend of Southside street corner, beer in a brown paper bag, well-read street mysticism. What I found wild is if you haven’t given this a spin in a while, you could swear this whole album, recorded just two years after Fela passed, has his fingerprints all over it. It feels more Fela-inspired than a lot of the jazz/rap tribute tracks/remixes that have come out since the legend passed. The Like Water For Chocolate album cover and the memories and sounds the image provokes are all warm, swelling horns and busy, clicking drums. I promise I’m listening to this shit as soon as I finish writing. 

INI & Pete Rock - “Grown Man Sport” (2003)

The source material is a Fela classic open to several interpretations, my favorite is that it’s about the dynamism and essentiality of Black power and Black people. So what better expression than a multi-lingual pan Black cypher, over an incredible Pete Rock loop rife with references to Jah and Haile Selassie and the wisdom of a Black Israelite folding table laden with alt-political literature on Fulton Street? 

“Mr Grammarticalogylisationalism Is the Boss,” from 'Excuse-O' (1976)

The Roots featuring Talib Kweli, Dice Raw, & P.O.R.N. - “I Will Not Apologize” (2008)

Fela’s mouthful sample source is focused on a pet subject of his, the insufficiency of the African school curriculum, particularly one set by Europeans. A cypher-style track, the finger-picking sample the song is built around speaks specifically to authenticity and not buying into bullshit, a tenet of both Fela’s work and many hip-hop songs, which is why the artist and genre go so well together. 

“Sorrow, Tears and Blood,” from 'Sorrow, Tears and Blood' (1977)

X-Clan - “Grand Verbalizer, What Time is It?” (1990)

A really interesting use of Fela here, from the militant Afrocentric crew who — with the Jungle Brothers and Brand Nubian — defined the “wooden Africa medallion era” of rap with their classic debut To The East, Blackwards. The melody of the beat was popularized by Eric B. & Rakim two years earlier on “Microphone Fiend,” which was a sped-up version of Average White Band’s “School Boy Crush” intro riff. What the self-produced track pulls from “Sorrow, Tears and Blood” is its choral, repetitive, “Eh-ya!” that punctuates “the 1.” There’s a chance that this is Nigerian Pidgin English, that means “sorry” or expresses empathy, but there’s also a chance someone in X-Clan just thought it was “Yeah!” with an accent that worked to break up the repetition of the loop. It doesn’t really matter because it captures a quality of Fela’s music we haven’t really seen on this list, which complements and drives home the point of this song: that sense of the collective community of Black people, celebrating and supporting one another. It is a beautiful and incredibly efficient work of sampling, to be able to transport that communal quality of live call and response with a simple, repetitive cheer. 

“Colonial Mentality,” from 'Sorrow, Tears and Blood' (1977)

Missy Elliot featuring Timbaland - “What’cha Gon’ Do” (2001)

An artifact from a moment when Tim briefly went through his own Fela phase, using a snippet of a Fela speech in a Torrey “T.C.” Carter song and flipping “Lover” off The ‘69 Los Angeles Sessions for a Ms. Jade interlude. There is nothing overtly political about this party jam/shit talking exhibition, but it’s a typically layered masterwork from a period in which Tim couldn’t miss, hiding in plain sight as a Missy album track that takes Fela and dresses him in Ryan Coogler’s Afro-futurist Wakanda garb. There’s also at least a possibility Tim is referencing another song on this list we’ll get to shortly, which would be extremely galaxy-brained, but this was pre-AI, mad genius Tim, when all things were possible.

Homeboy Sandman - “Oh, the Horror” (2013)

A fed-up rant from the genius Elmhurst rapper about racial profiling, with roots in one of Fela’s most powerful songs, that he made in response to the Nigerian army’s assault on the Kalakuta commune that led to the death of his mom. Fela’s song is about solidarity and resisting the many insidious forms of physical, cultural and spiritual oppression, and there’s something poetic in the half Dominican and half Puerto Rican Homeboy spitting the chorus/incantation in Spanish: “¡Que horror! Están pensando soy un animal.”

“Fear Not For Man,” from 'Fear Not For Man' (1977)

Mos Def - “Fear Not of Man” (1999)

A rabbithole I can’t recommend going down because it has been fucking with me for several decades is the question of why Mos decided to subtly change the wording of the title of Fela’s song and what that shift means to him. Both titles are hopeful, both songs are grounded in a belief of the collective. What I find fascinating is Mos, on the perfect, self-produced intro to one of the great conscious rap albums ever made, chooses framing that is adversarial; it’s a collective under fire. The theory I like, that I’m blatantly stealing from this fantastic 90-minute conversation about the album, comes courtesy of UC Irvine professor, author and culture writer Sohail Dualatzai, who contrasts Mos opening his song with the Muslim prayer to Fela quoting Kwame Nkrumah, the former prime minister of Ghana and the father of Pan Africanism. He suggests the difference lies in Fela's belief in a Black Power grounded in political unification, and Mos’ belief in a spiritual unification. Mos’ conclusion, which despite its semantic shift is torn directly from Fela’s life and work, is that the key to salvation lies in knowledge of self. 

“No Agreement,” from 'No Agreement' (1977)

Shabba Ranks featuring Queen Latifah - “What’cha Gonna Do?” (1992)

This was the song with the same title I was referring to with Missy and Timbaland above, but the two tracks could not be more different, and not just because they sample different Fela songs. “No Agreement” is Fela’s way of saying that he won’t sell out to the imperial forces ruling Nigeria because his people mean too much to him. To paraphrase, he says, “I no agree to make my brother go hungry/jobless/homeless.” A riff from “No Agreement” is brought in as dope melodic fill on beatbreaks in the early '90s Shabba and Latifah link. It’s both a song made in the style of, and about ragga, a blend of hip-hop and reggae that was bubbling at the time, presented by the two artists, one Caribbean, one American, as a radical act of pan Black sonic unity. 

“Coffin For Head of State,” from 'Coffin For Head of State' (1980)

Bilal featuring Common & Zap Mama - “Sorrow, Tears & Blood” (2006)

Things are a little dodgy here because it comes from Bilal and what’s thought of as the Soulquarian’s great unreleased masterpiece Love for Sale, recorded in the West Village in the early aughts. The closest thing I could find to a production credit for this song is Dilla, but feel free to take that with a grain of salt. Interesting song because it is named after one Fela classic but samples another, the song he made about delivering a coffin representing his mother’s body to a barracks where the Nigerian general in power at the time and his vice president were camped out. Bilal’s take doesn’t just flip the production, but mimes Fela’s style of writing and delivery on the version of “Coffin for Head of State” with vocals (there’s also a wordless instrumental version), while both songs are about pain and dissent and resistance.

“Teacher Don’t Teach Me Nonsense,” from Teacher Don’t Teach Me Nonsense (1986)

Leaders of the New School - “Teachers, Don’t Teach Us Nonsense” (1991)

Only five years apart from each other, it’s a subtle quote on the self-produced L.O.N.S. song that brings in the double-timed wood block hit from Fela’s original a minute and change into the song during a beat break. But the vibe of the song, with its horn stabs, feels like a melding of New Jack Swing and Afrobeat that is more comfortable and intuitive than I thought possible. This is a classic, standard issue early-90s concept song that starts with the title as a prompt, here using Fela’s rejection of the colonial curriculum for the group (that delivered Busta Rhymes to the world) to fairly posit that school stinks. It is a global, universal, and eternal critique we can all relate to.