| The Best Best of Fela Kuti | |
| Type: | compilation |
| Artist: | Fela Kuti |
| Cover: | The Best Best of Fela Kuti.jpg |
| Released: | 1999 |
| Recorded: | 1972–89 |
| Genre: | Afrobeat |
| Length: | 157:43 |
| Label: | Barclay, Universal |
| Producer: | Femi Kuti |
The Best Best of Fela Kuti is a 2-CD compilation album by Nigerian Afrobeat artist Fela Kuti, released in 1999 by MCA Records. It was issued in the United States in 2000 as part of a reissue series of Kuti's albums.[1] The album was reissued as The Best of the Black President in 2009 by Knitting Factory Records and received universal acclaim from music critics. A companion 2-CD compilation, also released in 1999, was reissued in the U.S. in 2013 by Knitting Factory as The Best of the Black President 2.
In a contemporary review for The Village Voice, music critic Robert Christgau said that The Best Best of Fela Kuti is the essential album from Kuti and "a masterful piece of compilation for an artist who deserves the best." He applauded the decision to edit or "unceremoniously" reduce the exhaustive lengths of the original songs in half, adding that they feature "top-notch tirades, explosive horn blasts", and riffs Kuti could "never improve no matter how often he [tried]".[2] Christgau named it the fifth best album of 2000 in his list for the Pazz & Jop critics' poll.[3] Vibe magazine's Harry Allen said that it has Kuti's "finest work".[4] In 2005, Spin magazine ranked The Best Best of Fela Kuti the fourth best world music album of all time.[5]
The album's 2009 reissue by Knitting Factory Records received universal acclaim from critics. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from mainstream critics, it received an average score of 93, based on 5 reviews.[6] Allmusic's Thom Jurek recommended the album even for listeners who own all of Kuti's previous music: "this is a killer mix and needs to be in the collection anyway."[7] Michaelangelo Matos of The A.V. Club credited it for doing "the impossible by summing up a singular performer who liked his songs to jam on out to a half-hour or more.[8]
Pitchfork critic Mike Powell wrote that, although it does not have "all of Fela's best material", the album "isn't just a good place for someone starting out, it's probably the only Fela album many will need to own."[9] In a less enthusiastic review, Will Hermes of Rolling Stone magazine said that the music is "killer", but criticized the lack of recording info in the liner notes: "The music speaks for itself, but presidential history deserves better."[10]
Credits (such as they are) for the album are adapted from Allmusic.[11]