For many years, the term Afrobeats, referring to a West African pop style that integrates dancehall, rap, and R. & B. with traditional African rhythms, was controversial, rejected by some artists for being overly broad. Afrobeats—distinct from the sixties and seventies genre Afrobeat, pioneered by Fela Kuti, which blended Yoruba music and Ghanaian highlife with American funk and jazz—had been defined primarily by an assimilating nature, drawing sounds from across the African diaspora into a composite with a contemporary feel. The…
