Fela Anikulapo Kuti (1938 to 1997) was a Nigerian multi-instrumentalist, bandleader, composer and political activist, best known as the creator of Afrobeat, a blend of Yoruba and Afro-Cuban traditions with funk and jazz, built on hypnotic grooves that could stretch a single song past twenty minutes. His bands Africa 70 and Egypt 80, with the drummer Tony Allen, were formidable machines. His music was inseparable from his politics: he declared his Lagos compound the independent Kalakuta Republic, ran the Shrine nightclub, and attacked the Nigerian military government so directly that he was beaten and jailed and his mother thrown from a window during an army raid.