KING SUNNY ADE

AND HIS 17 PIECE BAND!

The following are various reviews:

WEEKLY PLANET

JUNE 4, 1998

 King Sunny Ade Odu

Atlantic/Mesa

 In 1982, Island Records launched the international career of Nigerian juju artist King Sunny Ade by releasing his album Juju Musicand sponsoring his tour of the U.S. It was a significant moment in the development of world beat; probably the first time a major label had put its muscle behind an African based music that was not reggae.  Juju's undulating exoticism stirred an immediate buzz, but sales never took off. After a couple of more albums the experiment was dropped, just a year before Paul Simon stormed the globe with the South African-fused Graceland. Ade remains very much a vital artist, however. Odu was recorded in Louisiana with Ade's 18-man African Beats ensemble and features a similar sensual mix of percussion - highlighted by the swooping sound of talking drums - a slew of intertwining guitars (including smears of pedal steel), spare keyboards and call-and-response vocals (sung in their native Yoruban tongue). Ironically, perhaps, the music suffers from the digitized precision of today's modern recording; the early Nigerian recordings, muddy by comparison, have a more naturally soulful flavor. Even so, Odu proves that Ade's juju is a heady, celebratory brew that is as relevant today as it was 16 years ago. -Eric Snider

UNION NEWS

JULY 1, 1998

 Sunny's king of groove

By JOYCE MARCEL, Music Writer

With King Sunny Ade, it's, all about the groove.

It's that rolling, joyously danceable groove that has propelled his juju music from Nigeria Across the world, even though most people can't understand a word he says. They get the message because the music is also all about joy.

The ever-smiling Ade and his 18-member African Beats have been worldwide superstars for 30 years'. At Pearl Street in North Hampton Sunday night, they kept the groove and the joy flowing for almost. two hours, sweeping up 200 people into the music.

In Nigeria, has channeled. His superstar earnings into an oil firm, a mining company, a nightclub, a film and video production house, and record labels. He also serves as the head of the Musical Copy­right Society of Nigeria. He is in the U.S. to support his new record, "Odu," which is a slang term in, Yoruba for "what's happening."   His troupe includes six percussionists, a keyboardist, two female dancers, four singers, guitarists and bassists. Ade sings and plays electric guitar. His beat is African, but the melodies, harmonics and. improvisations are familiar, a mix of African, R&B, Cuban, blues and rock.

        "Tolon Go" was a fast-paced song in which I counted at least five different rhythms, over which first the pedal steel and then the keyboard soared. "Oshe Oshe" was- earth-shaking, over-the-top happiness. "Ja Fume" was slower, hypnotic, more reggae-influenced and sophisticated, with the, key­board adding a marimba qualiy "Kiti Kiti," from the new record, was just gorgeous.

In "Ara-Ebamiyo," the drums rolled under a stark melody. The centerpiece gong was the beautiful "Aiye Nreti Eleya also on "Odu." For -the finale, the musicians showed off their dancing as more, splendid - melodies flew around the stage and -the drums rolled.

Opening the show was the New Nile Orchestra, a five-piece band of white American musicians fronted by Ethiopian singer Kiflu Kidane, who has taken his country's traditional music and adapted it to Western instrumentation. A charismatic performer, Kidane deserves a wide audience.

TIMES UNION

JUNE 25, 1998

 GREG HAYMES
STAFF WRITER

KING SUNNY ADE

Saturday
Amphitheater

With a career that covers more than 30 years and 100 albums, the Nigerian superstar bandleader and guitarist King Sunny Ade is the acclaimed master of the African pop form known as "juju."  But with his fame and fortune, he has become as much a businessman as a bandleader.  These days there are 22 different companies under his direction and his business -holdings have grown to include a nightclub, a record label representing a dozen artists and a film and video company. In addition  he chairs the board of an oil company and heads the Musical Copyright Society of Nigeria.

But whenever he steps into the spotlight to make music, the business world melts away, and King Sunny Ade and the African Beats conjure up an irresistible, polyrhythmic celebration of  life.

GOOD TIMES

JUNE 18, 1998

 King Sunny Aide

 There's little to say about Afro-pop superstar King Sunny Ade. His music speaks far more eloquently than any words describing his sound. Easily the most revered proponent of West African juju, a bounding musical hybrid of traditional drums, electric guitars and storytelling lyrics, Ade isn't just a striking performer. His mere presence on stage has an electrfying effect, like the Buddha grinning and twirling a lotus flower and invoking spiritual rhapsody. He comes toTalookaville Thursday. The show starts at 8 p.m., and tickets are $12 in advance, $14 at the door. - R.P.

THE BEAT

MAY-JUNE 1998

Plain and simple, King Sunny Ade is a treasure. With the deaths of so many African, music greats

over the last few years, I hold his new releases dear. My nostalgic mood finds reward in Odu (Mesa/Atlantic), a return to form for the Chairman and his Beats rather than the bold experiments of the Mango label years or the

SWING MAGAZINE

JULY 1998

KING SUNNY ADE ODU (Atlantic/Mesa)

Musical Equation: seven percussionists + five vocalists + four guitarists + two bass players + dozens of years of history.

Nigeria's King Sunny Ade is the undisputed world champion of Juju, an African musical form based on ancient proverbs. A juju concert may last over 12 hours, but Odu has been condensed for Western ears. Among its multiple meanings, Odu is a slang term meaning "the latest thing"-ironic in this context since King Sunny Ade's music generally sounds as old as Africa itself Call-and-response vocals soar over guitars and multilayered rhythms, giving the music a celebratory feel.

Dance Music, Even for Dancing

 By PETER WATROUS

Two hours into King Sunny Adé's show at Tramps on Wednesday night, Mr. A& and his 17-piece band had played about all that modem orchestral dance music can do. There were riffs, by talking drums, or guitars, or pedal steel guitar, or by the band's chorus. There were stop-time breaks. Mr. A& layered three or four different types of drums to create waves of sound . There were solos; Mr. Adé sang to the audience, and the people who had space to dance, danced.

Mr. Adé, from Nigeria, doesn't play New York very often, and his shows are events. At every one, people who went to his first concert in New York, sometime in the mists of the early 1980's, muse about the power the music held. When he arrived then, playing an extraordinary and revelatory show, the cultural makeup of music in New York changed. Suddenly world music existed; Mr. A& and the effort that Island Records took in trying to make him the next Bob Marley have plenty to do with the current local interest in pop music from around the world.

It helps that Mr. Adé has one of the great orchestras working, equal to the best bands in the Caribbean. On Wednesday night, it chugged along like an unstoppable and intelligent machine.

The three guitars spewed clanging, metallic riffs that interlocked with the various drums. The chorus chanted bits and pieces, or sang long, gently waving lines. Two talking drums, taking the lead instrument role, plowed up the music. And on tune after tune, the band members, along with Mr. Adé's two female dancers, shaped their bodies to the rhythms, giving a tactile response to music.

Mr. Add was in New York to celebrate the release of a new album, "Odu" (Atlantic), playing tunes from it and older pieces. He sets his material up as suites,

each piece had movement, with drum parts giving way to guitar figures, which gave way to choral sections. Tempos changed and new rhythms flashed abruptly across the music's screen. And during transition sections, new sounds drifted through the music, like fog through reeds.