“Music Is a Universal Language”, But Are We Losing the Language Behind Afrobeats?

Music is a universal language. But as Afrobeats becomes increasingly global, how much of the place that created it can we still hear?

That question is not about whether Afrobeats is changing. It obviously is. The genre has always been shaped by movement, experimentation and exchange. What sounds distinctly Nigerian today would not have existed without the influence of highlife, R&B, hip-hop, dancehall, jazz, funk and other sounds that Nigerian artists absorbed and transformed.

The question is what happens when a sound that was once deeply rooted in a particular place becomes a global product. What happens to the language behind it?

First, Afrobeat is not Afrobeats

Before we get into that, there is an important distinction. Afrobeat ≠ Afrobeats.

Afrobeat, pioneered by Fela Kuti, fused Yoruba musical traditions, highlife, jazz and funk with politically charged songwriting. Afrobeats came later.

Fela’s Afrobeat developed from a deliberate collision of influences. He had studied music in London, encountered jazz, and later absorbed funk and the politics of the Black Power movement in the United States. When he returned to Nigeria, those influences were filtered through West African rhythms, Yoruba musical traditions and the realities of Nigerian life.

That distinction matters because Afrobeats is not simply a continuation of Fela’s Afrobeat. Modern Afrobeats is a much broader umbrella for contemporary African pop sounds, particularly those that emerged from Nigeria and Ghana. And unlike Fela’s politically confrontational Afrobeat, its subject matter can range from romance and nightlife to money, heartbreak, ambition and everyday life.

But there is an important connection between them: both demonstrate what happens when outside influences are passed through a local experience.

The mixing was never the problem

Modern Afrobeats emerged from Nigeria’s pop culture, particularly Lagos, Nigeria, through a generation of artists and producers pulling from R&B, hip-hop, dancehall, highlife, and other sounds. That mixing was never the problem; the mixing created magic.

Afrobeats grew precisely because Nigerian artists were not interested in keeping music in separate boxes. They borrowed, sampled, adapted and experimented. The result was not simply a collection of foreign sounds placed on African beats. Those sounds became something else once they passed through Nigerian musicians and audiences.

And that distinction is important. Because Afrobeats wasn’t simply about the sounds it borrowed. It was about what happened when those sounds passed through us. Our languages, the rhythms, our slang, our stories, our way of seeing love, money and everyday life as  Africans.

Research into Nigerian music has similarly found that the mixing of English, Nigerian Pidgin and indigenous languages has become an important way for artists to express cultural identity. Linguist Kofi Yakpo has even described Pidgin as a major language of cultural industries across Pidgin-speaking countries, including Afrobeats.

So when someone hears Nigerian Pidgin, Yoruba, Igbo, Ghanaian slang or a distinctly West African rhythm in a song, they are not just hearing another musical ingredient; they are hearing context.

You could hear where the music came from

Think about the Afrobeats records that travelled before the genre became a global industry. “African Queen.” “Dami Duro.” “Ojuelegba.” “Bumper to Bumper.” “Personally.” “Ye.” “Wo!” and many more 

They didn’t all sound the same. But they carried something recognisable in the language, the stories, the rhythms, the references and the way they reflected everyday African life.

Spotify’s retrospective on the global rise of Afrobeats identifies 2Baba’s “African Queen,” D’banj’s “Oliver Twist” and Wizkid’s “Ojuelegba” as important milestones in the genre’s international journey. And “Ojuelegba” is particularly interesting because its title alone points to a real place in Lagos. The song was an autobiographical reflection on Wizkid’s journey, named after the busy Lagos mainland neighbourhood where he spent part of his early life. Its story travelled with the song. What makes some of those older records feel so specific is that they carried a world with them. You could hear the language, recognise the references and picture the places and people behind the music.

And you could see it too

Afrobeats has its roots in West Africa, and you didn’t only hear that world. You could see it: the streets, the clothes, the parties, the slang, the people, the places. The music videos gave the songs a sense of place.

Nigeria and Africa at large were not simply backdrops. They were part of the visual language. The streets, cars, clubs, houses, hairstyles, fashion and people helped create a world around the music. Even when the songs were about universal things like love, money or having a good time, the way those things were presented could still feel distinctly Nigerian.

That visual context became part of Afrobeats’ appeal. And interestingly, research on the global circulation of Nigerian music has found that these visual and cultural signifiers have helped artists present Nigerian identity to international audiences. Nigerian music videos, social media content and performances can turn Lagos, Nigeria and Africa into symbols through which artists negotiate their place in the global economy.

Now the music is travelling further

Now Afrobeats is travelling further than anyone could have imagined.It’s crossing genres, countries and audiences. Artists are experimenting with amapiano, R&B, house, dancehall, electronic music and sounds from all over the world. And that is not a bad thing.

Afrobeats has always evolved. In fact, evolution is part of the reason it became what it is today. The global audience did not suddenly discover a completely isolated Nigerian sound. They discovered a genre that was already comfortable with borrowing, collaboration and reinvention. “Afrobeats” itself has become a broad global category, encompassing music that can sound radically different from one artist to another. That diversity is part of its strength. But globalisation changes the question.

What keeps the music connected to where it came from?

When the music is being made for Lagos, London, Accra, Atlanta and everywhere in between, what keeps it connected to its roots? Not every song needs to sound traditionally Nigerian.

But does it still carry something that could only have come from here? That “something” doesn’t necessarily have to be a Yoruba lyric, a talking drum or a Lagos street in the music video.

Culture is more complicated than that. It can exist in the rhythm of a song, the phrasing, the humour, the slang. The way an artist talks about the hustle. The way they celebrate success. The references to family, friendship, faith or everyday life. Even the little details that might seem ordinary to us can tell you where a song comes from. References that make perfect sense to someone who grew up here but might require explanation somewhere else.

It can even be in the attitude. This is why the question isn’t whether Afrobeats sounds “African enough.” That can become an impossible and limiting standard. Africa is not one sound, and Nigerian culture itself is not one fixed thing. The more interesting question is whether the music still has a point of view.

This isn’t about freezing Afrobeats in time

This isn’t about telling artists what Afrobeats is allowed to sound like. Genres are supposed to move. Artists are supposed to experiment; culture itself is never frozen.

The question is what we carry with us when we move. That distinction matters because globalisation can create both opportunity and pressure. On one hand, international audiences have given Nigerian artists an unprecedented platform. Afrobeats has become one of Africa’s most successful cultural exports, and its global growth has created new opportunities for artists, producers, writers, dancers and other creatives.

On the other hand, research into Nigerian pop music has identified a tension between international exposure and cultural authenticity, particularly as global markets encourage hybridisation and new creative directions. And now there is another layer to that conversation: who is the music being made for?

Going Global Doesn’t Mean Leaving Home

In a recent podcast with Afropolitan, WurLD put it simply: trying to go global doesn’t mean leaving your roots behind. His advice is not to dilute what makes your sound yours. The world might listen for the lyrics, while home moves to the rhythm, but the goal is to make both work without losing either.

Sarz’s story raises a different question. The producer, who worked on Drake and Wizkid’s “One Dance,” has been part of some of Afrobeats’ biggest international moments. But global success can come with its own complications, especially when a song travels so far that the people at home begin to experience it differently.

That tension matters. Afrobeats can reach a global audience without becoming distant from the one that first gave it meaning.The question is not whether the music should go global. It’s how it can get there without making home feel further away.

The risk isn’t change. It’s losing the context.

There is a difference between Afrobeats changing and Afrobeats losing its sense of place. The first is inevitable. The second is worth paying attention to.

A song does not become less Nigerian because it has a house influence. An artist does not become less African because they collaborate with an American or British musician. Producers don’t have to recreate the Afrobeats of 2012 for their music to still be Afrobeats. The danger would be reducing the culture to a set of easily recognisable sounds and visuals that can be packaged for international consumption. A Lagos street becomes an aesthetic, Pidgin becomes a catchy phrase, African fashion becomes styling, the Nigerian experience becomes a backdrop.

This is where globalisation becomes more complicated than simply “taking Afrobeats to the world.” Recent research on Afrobeats and social media shows that platforms like TikTok can amplify certain versions of Nigerian identity, while stripping them of the context that gives them meaning. The music can travel further while the context around it becomes thinner and that is the tension.

So, are we losing the language behind Afrobeats?

Maybe the answer is not as simple as yes or no. Afrobeats is still deeply connected to African experiences. Nigerian artists continue to sing in indigenous languages, use Nigerian Pidgin, reference local places and bring elements of everyday life into their music.

The culture has not disappeared. But the more global the genre becomes, the more intentional we may have to be about what remains visible within it.Because global audiences do not need Afrobeats to become less Nigerian in order to understand it.

If anything, its specificity is part of what made people drawn to it in the first place. One of the reasons Afrobeats became global is that Nigerian artists took sounds from everywhere and made them feel like home. That is the part worth protecting. Not a particular beat, not a particular era, not even a particular definition of what Afrobeats should sound like.

The point of view. The sounds can evolve, the audience can get bigger. But it should still feel connected to the people who made it what it is, while leaving room for the music to grow beyond them. Because the goal isn’t to keep Afrobeats the same. It’s to let it grow without making the people it came from feel like strangers to it.