When James Brown took funk to the Congo
There was a quip about the influential 1960s/1970s American art-rock band The Velvet Underground I was reminded of when I studied the sleeve notes of the brilliant new compilation, Congo Funk! Sound Madness From the Shores of the Mighty Congo River (Kinshasa / Brazzaville 1969-1982). It notes that although their debut, The Velvet Underground & Nico, didn’t sell many copies, its impact reverberated far beyond a clique.
It was English composer and musician Brian Eno to whom it can be attributed, according the website Quote Investigator. “I was talking to [Velvets singer] Lou Reed the other day, and he said that the first Velvet Underground record sold only 30 000 copies in its first five years,” Eno told the LA Times in 1982.
“Yet, that was an enormously important record for so many people. I think everyone who bought one of those 30000 copies started a band! I console myself in thinking that some
things generate their rewards in second-hand ways.” Congo Funk tells an African version of that story.
It is not only a celebration of astonishing African music, but also reflects the modernisation of Congolese music. In 1974, the Muhammad Ali vs George Foreman boxing match happened in Kinshasa. The promoter of the “Rumble in the Jungle” was the notorious Don King who needed $10 million to get Ali and Foreman into the ring. The only candidate willing to put this kind of cash on the table was Mobutu Sese Seko, president of the then Zaïre.
The megalomaniac dictator also had a soft spot for music and he agreed to a three-day live music festival in Kinshasa prior to the “Rumble”. “Zaïre 74” was meant to hype the boxing match and many stars were invited. Artists like BB King, Bill Withers, Miriam Makeba and Celia Cruz performed.
“That event electrified the whole city and catalysed a stagnant music scene in need of a radical change,” the sleeve notes tell us.
But it was the performance of the godfather of soul, James Brown, on Zaïrian soil that caused havoc among the younger generation. He did the Velvet Underground thing for those young Zaïreans. Brown’s electrifying performance inspired hundreds of would-be musos to take up electric guitars and reverbs cranked to the max in search of a sound in which hyperactive Rumba was blended with elements of psych and funk.
Congo Funk is a meticulously compiled double album with 14 tracks, each a fat funky knockout of Muhammed Ali proportions. They sound as fresh and vital as when they were released between 1969 and 1982. I got my copy early this week, and it hasn’t left my turntable. As James Brown yelped: “I feel good.”