To recharge his batteries and find new creative inspiration, rapper Tommy Kuti returned to his origins: “This summer I was in Nigeria, now I’m working on a new record. It’s going to show my roots, an all-new album but always Afrobeat». Tolulope Olabode Kuti, aka Tommy Kuti, who has been in Italy since he was two years old, first in Mantova, then Brescia and finally settling in Milan, is one of the protagonists of the Italian music scene. He was discovered by Fabri Fibra in 2017 and since then he has never stopped.
With #Afroitaliano Tommy Kuti became a cult
“Our nation is written in the heart”. The rapped refrain is almost a political manifesto for a generation of new Italians. Having him at NuoveRadici.world’s workshop, which took place on October 29th at the Catella Foundation in Milan, was an obligation. The title of the event seems sewn on his skin: Diversity Leadership in Art. We asked him directly “How much do you feel like a leader?” The answer is measured:
I know many of these artists who are emerging. I feel like a forerunner. I make records, I go on television, I recognize that I was the first to navigate this universe
There are many young Afro-Italians who choose music to express themselves, perhaps at a higher ratio than “just Italians”, a bad definition but it explains it clearly. “For some years now, there has been a new urgency in wanting to tell their stories. It applies to music as well as to literature.”
Tommy Kuti and a book to laugh about it
Tommy Kuti did it. He also wrote a book about his story, I Laugh At It. Growing up with black skin in Salvini’s Italy, published by Rizzoli. A book in which he says what it means to be born in Nigeria and live as a young teenager in Castiglione dello Stiviere, between Mantua and Brescia. Now when he speaks his accent is a more international Milanese, but when he begins to speak passionately his original Brescia accent comes back. He has learned to answer those who ask him, like a broken record, if he feels more African or more Italian:
I’m sick and tired that people still ask me this. I was born in Nigeria, grew up in Italy where I live, graduated in Great Britain and lived in the United States. It is unreasonable to think these days that someone like me, with my path, can be pigeonholed into only one nationality. I have many roots, I am the son of many cultures. In the end I am Afro-Italian
After #Afroitaliano came #Prendiamo la parola, a sort of claim to one’s identity, born on the wave of what was happening in the United States following the death of George Floyd. It has been said that he has become an artist who mixes politics with his art. Tommy Kuti does not shy away, saying: “Every choice is political, even when you fill the supermarket cart. I made this video to say that too many times we Afro-descendants don’t make ourselves heard because we don’t use the word. I decided to put my face in this.”
There is a need to speak and to be heard. It is like an urgency that cannot be avoided. In the end it’s as if I came out of my ideas. Certain things are no longer essential, it is these generations that build the future
Clearly words of a leader
In fact, pigeonholing Tommy Kuti as one of the most famous rappers on the Italian scene is definitely reductive. Although he is just over 30 years old, he has, in his own words, an uncommon maturity. He explains this as a journey, but definitely not a point of arrival, due to the many things done in his young life. “My experiences should be a motivating element for those who are yet to start. You have to learn to believe in yourself. At school no one teaches us to think and then live our thoughts. Even the teachers, it’s not like they made a big effort to try to explain diversity. And then in Italy there is this habit of taking liberties that is definitely not ok. We only talk about boat landings and crime. The many talents that are expressed by those who do not have white skin are not valued. And that’s another problem.” And then, as he says in the video he shot for our workshop, and that you can find on all the social networks of NuoveRadici.world: “Hello people … Stay tuned.”
Translated by Adam Clark
