There’s something almost poetic about the fact that Fela Kuti’s story is being told through podcasting in 2026. A man who weaponized sound waves against tyranny now lives on through earbuds and speakers, reaching audiences who weren’t even born when he died in 1997.
Jad Abumrad, the mind behind Radiolab, has taken on the massive task of chronicling Kuti’s life in “Fear No Man.” And honestly, if anyone can handle the complexity of a man who married 27 women in one day while fighting military dictatorships, it’s probably the guy who made science podcasts cool.
When Music Becomes Resistance
Fela Kuti didn’t just make music. He made statements. Every saxophone riff, every drum pattern, every lyric was a middle finger to the establishment. In 1970s Nigeria, when military boots were stomping on democracy and colonial hangovers still poisoned the culture, Kuti turned his compound into a republic and his concerts into political rallies.
The beauty of Afrobeat was that it couldn’t be ignored. It was too loud, too insistent, too damn funky. You couldn’t ban it without admitting you were scared of a guy with a saxophone and some seriously tight rhythm sections.
The Man Who Wouldn’t Bow
What makes Kuti’s story podcast-worthy isn’t just the music. It’s the audacity. The Nigerian government raided his compound multiple times. They arrested him repeatedly. They literally threw his mother out of a window during one raid, leading to her death. And still, he kept playing. Kept singing. Kept calling out corruption and oppression by name.
That’s the kind of stubbornness that doesn’t translate well to history textbooks but makes for compelling audio storytelling. Abumrad has a knack for finding the human moments inside larger-than-life figures, and Kuti gave him plenty of material to work with.
The timing of this podcast series feels particularly sharp right now. When artists everywhere are being asked to shut up and dribble, or sing, or act, Kuti’s legacy reminds us that silence has never been neutral. He understood that entertainment without a point of view is just noise, and noise without purpose is just distraction.
