When you hear the Kuti name, you associate it with a certain quality of music and lifestyle. Fela Kuti was known for his political songs, revelry with women, and his penchant for marijuana. For a while, his son, Afrobeat legend, Femi Kuti followed in those steps.
“There are so many places I should have died. I was driving a car at 12; police chased me on the road all the time. I would drive a Range Rover to school. I had a power bike – Harley Davidson. I used to do that express – Maryland to Surulere, in five minutes. Vroom! In five minutes, going 120 on the bike.”
Being Fela’s son gave him a level of street credibility, which he used to the fullest as a young man. Femi Kuti told Netng how he would crash clubs to disrupt parties with his presence then drive away. He even stopped practising music for a while. That was till his grandmother put her foot down.
“I moved back to my mother’s house, and my grandmother gave me the washing of my life. It was my maternal grandmother that saved me. I was so arrogant and such a horrible person. By this time, his fanbase loved me. So I would dress like Fela, do things like Fela. My maternal grandmother told me, ‘I don’t care whose son you are; Fela’s son or no Fela’s son. In this house, you better behave. You bring your silly [redacted]. You call yourself a musician, and you have not picked up your horn in two weeks, and you have [edited]. By this time, she is swearing. She spoke to me so much that day, and everything she said was so true. I cried so much that day.
The next day, I picked up my horn. That was what saved me. By the time she finished with me, I had become humble. I look back, and I would think, ‘what was I even doing?’ That woman saved my life during those years I spent with her. No one would have liked the man I was then.”