Tony Allen & Africa 70 – Jealousy album art

Released in 1975, Jealousy is Tony Allen’s first solo album. The cover design was provided by Remi Olowookere, with photography by Bankole Osunle, and a razzmatazz typography composed from a number of period typefaces. The title is rendered in bichromatic Oxford (1970) which was further jazzed up by a double drop shadow. For Tony Allen’s name, Olowookere chose a face that’s rarely seen in all caps: It’s the swash-laden Lazybones (1972). For some reason, the initial T is the only letter in lowercase. Maybe all cap T’s on the sheet of rubdown letters were already used up? A yellow contour makes sure that the words don’t fall apart.

The typeface used for “Hits With The Africa 70” is the outlier, in terms of design date: Motto goes back all the way to 1915, when it was first issued by ATF. Like Oxford and Lazybones (and Celtic / Forum Flair / University Roman from 1972 which appears on the back cover), it was available from Letraset, too – as Runnymede, which was the name used by British type foundry Stephenson Blake for their version of Motto.

On the Surfing the Odyssey blog, Zen Archer comments:

Drummer Tony Allen has died at age 79. He is widely hailed as one of the founders of Afrobeat alongside his longtime musical partner Fela Kuti, with whom he played for 15 years. […]

This is the first of three of Tony Allen’s solo albums produced by Fela Kuti! Originally released on the private imprint Soundworkshop Records. Arguably one of this best albums with these two killer funky afro-beat gems “Jealousy” and “Hustler”!!!

Aside from playing drums and arranging six of Fela Kuti’s albums in 1975 (!) Tony Allen managed to put out this very short album under his own name. “Jealousy” is pretty similar to Kuti’s work without of course Kuti. Just instrumentation and group vocals. “Hustler” though is the highlight with stabbing horn lines and a great percussion breakdown. Good stuff.