Yabis: A phenomenon in contemporary Nigerian music

Since the early 1970’s when the late Nigerian Afro-beat proponent, Fela Anikulapo-Kuti (formerly known as Fela Ransome-Kuti) returned from a tour of the United States of America, his music had witnessed a lot of transformation. First, he discarded with his erstwhile jazz-highlife style and came up with a new style he christened “Afro-beat”, a mixture of American jazz and Yoruba folk music. Secondly, the content of his vocal music changed tremendously from abstract themes to day-to-day happenings among the common people (the masses) in Nigerian populace. However, the protracted military rule in Nigeria coupled with the large scale embezzlement and looting of the nation’s treasury, undermining democratic processes as well as the promotion of large scale violence among other things, by the nation’s military junta provided a new theme for Fela’s vocal music from the mid 1970’s. Thus the stage was set for a new phenomenon among the Nigerian popular music known as the Yabis music, through which those who governed through coercion were ridiculed and their bad policies subjected to derision in several lyrics of many Nigerian popular music who later joined Fela in the 1980’s and after. This paper examines the role and impact of Yabis music on both the contemporary Nigerian music and political scenes