ACL Fest Friday Interviews

Antibalas

Horns blazing and drums rattling, Antibalas has relentlessly preached the gospel of Afrobeat for a full decade now. With 2007's Security (Anti-), the Brooklyn-based dirty dozen dropped the titular "Afrobeat Orchestra" from its name and busted beyond the borders of Fela Kuti, the late Nigerian rabble-rouser who pioneered the funky hybrid sound.

"Afrobeat is a language," explains Antibalas founder and saxophonist Martín Perna. "There's a classical form, Fela's compositions, but it's also a living language, so it's always changing." The band adds a Latin dialect to the genre on songs like Willie Colon's blistering "Che Che Cole," while Security expands the idiom to include industrial, electronic, and altogether experimental sounds from hammered dulcimers to bits of clanging metal.

"There are too many rough edges for it to fit comfortably in the mainstream," explains Perna, who was also a founding member of an early Dap-Kings incarnation known as the Soul Providers. "In Nigeria and throughout West Africa, Fela was a top-selling artist, so even though he wasn't a pop artist, he was a household name. In the U.S., I think Afrobeat will permeate into pop music as an influence, but probably never in its uncut form."

While Antibalas still represents Brooklyn, Perna now calls Austin home, which means he'll be running a makeshift hostel for his extended musical family this weekend. "We had seven or eight here for South by Southwest in 2007, and I expect that many this weekend," he exclaims. "Plus the Dap-Kings are in town!"