Rhythm Revolution

This album of raw, garage-tinged 1970s Afro-funk comes with the most extraordinary back story. Born Jean Maurille Ogoudjobi in 1939 in French Dahomey (now Benin), Ferry Djimmy earned his nickname from the Yoruba phrase for ‘please forgive me,’ which his unruly antics as a child meant he was forever uttering. After an early career as a school teacher and a boxer, he relocated to Paris, where he joined the French police and worked as a bodyguard to Jacques Chirac. On his return to Africa in 1974, Benin’s Marxist-Leninist president funded him to start a record company called Revolution Records.

The result was this explosive album, drawing on a range of influences from Fela Kuti (‘Carry Me Blak’) to James Brown (‘When I Come in the Road’) via George Clinton (‘A Were We Coco’) and Hendrix (‘Be Free’) with Ferry playing most of the instruments, including guitar, saxophone, drums and keyboards. The album sold minimally and was soon forgotten after Ferry moved to Lagos, where he lived for two decades until his death in 1996. Its rediscovery must have taken some serious crate-digging and one presumes the original vinyl album is augmented by bonus tracks for there is an hour’s worth of music here. Congratulations to those who tracked it down, for it has to be one of the toughest, funkiest records to come out of 1970s West Africa.