THE AFRO-JUJU LIBERATION

Lyrics

THE AFRO-JUJU LIBERATION 🔊PREAMBLE (Fela speaks directly to the congregation over the boiling rhythm section): > "Look-and-see! Look-and-see inside the town o! The politician dey build fence, the pastor dey build mansion, But the ancestor dey wait for inside the sub-bass stack! First, we acknowledge GOD of Juju as the GREatEsT because GOD is in love with JiNG & BiNG! I say, make you open your ear-hole clear before you dance this groove. This one no be disco music for gentleman to drink champagne. This one na spiritual audit for the mind! Jaki-jaki! Everybody say Yeah-Yeah!" Choir (The Queens): Yeah-Yeah! Fela: Look-and-see inside the town, Truth dey walk but dem press am down. Fence dey rise on fear and gain, But spirit no fit stay in chain. Power talk with painted face, Holy voice dey sell disgrace. But under noise and human pride, Juju design no fit hide. Before crown learn how to reign, Drum don already mark the vein. Before book learn how to name, Juju rhythm don ignite the flame. VOICE (tight, percussive): Open ear—remove disguise, Juju Continuum no dey compromise. CHOIR (snapped response): Yeah-yeah—system don crack! Yeah-yeah—no go back! COPY-COPY WORLD (BROKEN LOOP AUDIT) (Fela sings the lead verse with a jagged, percussive delivery): Verse 1: Dem go tell you say history don block! (Choir: Ah-Oooooh!) Dem go tell you say future na lock! (Choir: Ah-Oooooh!) Dem say history don close book, But lie still dey inside look. Dem say future be clean design, But cage still dey wear same line. Foreign mind dey run our tone, But rhythm no dey live alone. If your system no fit bend, Juju force go break that end. Dem say follow—follow who? Truth no dey survive the fool. Dem say stand—stand for what? Juju sound go cut through every lock. CHORUS (tight bounce): Fela: I say, look your copy-copy mental! Choir: Follow-follow—break am now! Fela: Look your structural alignment! Choir: System shake—Afro-Juju loud! ATLANTIC MEMORY & THE LEKKI SACRIFICE Verse 2: See the scroll how it unrolls across the middle passage sea, Feel the roll of the percussion working hard to keep us free, Taking total control of the imperial decree, To inject the black soul back inside the history, Making the broken fragments a completed whole for you and me. They traded human time for a capital machine, They labeled it a crime when we tried to intervene, But we drop the heavy rhyme down inside the deep ravine, A steep ancestral climb through the shadows of the scene, Reaching the final goal where the vision is pristine. We document the pain of the transatlantic floor, We break the iron chain at the legislative door, There is no mental gain till we settle up the score, We totally reframe what the system stole before, Executing our role in the center of the war. From nineteen-fourteen dem try to bind our space, Amalgamation lines trying to divide the race, But twenty-ten-twenty at the Lekki Toll-gate place, The martyrs left a name that time cannot erase, Setting the corporate matrix on a fiery flame of grace. AFRO-JUJU CONTINUUM (SYSTEM BREAK MODE) [BRASS EXPLOSION: 12-Piece Horn Wall blasts a 16-bar modal interrogation] [Trumpets tear through legal lies; the Baritone Saxophone anchors the floor] Verse 3: Afro-Juju no be place—na force, Rhythm running sovereign course. Trumpet tear through legal lies, Drum expose disguise in skies. Bassline judge without appeal, Snare reveal what people feel. If oppression stand too tall, Groove go bend am till e fall. Music no dey ask permission, Sound dey break false definition. If law block human tone, Juju system turn law to bone. VOICE (declared, grounded): Weapon of sound—pure and raw, Juju truth dey override the law. CHOIR (sharp hit): Weapon sound—weapon truth! Afro-Juju speak for youth! JUJU LINEAGE ALIGNMENT Verse 4: Now Burg City Records keeps the business clean and tight, With CEO Sunny Burgs executing left and right, From the Galactic JiNG & BiNG Studios we strike the night, Unleashing Juju’s Magnum Poetrium with atomic might, The same eternal power that can activate the sight. [Edo Parable: "Ẹghẹ n'a vbe rhiẹ ẹrhẹn, ọghi rhiẹ, ọghi mọ, ukhu n'ẹ dọmwan i fọ."] LOG-DRUM DECREE [The Amapiano log-drum locks a heavy, industrial 'DUM-pum-pum-TAK' cycle.] VOICE TAG (Deep harmonic recursion collapse): > “OOOOOOH… BLACK RHYTHM… SOULFUL BLUES… THE BLUEPRINT OF JUJU SOUND DECLARED…” Fela: DUM—pum—TAK—truth arise, System crack, disguise demise. Kick drum judge without delay, Bassline clear the crooked way. If rhythm stand, nation stand. If groove breathe, time expand. If Juju call human name, No system fit kill that flame. FINAL CHORUS Choir: Music no be sound for play, Music be the truth pathway. Memory no fit retire, It just change skin to fire. Afro-Juju no dey end, It just bend and re-extend. OUTRO — ECHO INFINITY (Fela chants over the infinite looping stem): > "No ending o. From Amalgamation to Reactivation, the groove can never die. When the music stretch, history dey