"Water No Get Enemy" (Femi Kuti feat. D'Angelo & Macy Gray)

I’d heard the track “Water No Get Enemy” years ago on a 2002 compilation called Red Hot + Riot, one of the Red Hot organization’s AIDS benefit albums, and I only recently stumbled upon it again. 
This version by Afro-beat artist Femi Kuti, backed by (check out this lineup) D’Angelo, Macy Gray, James Poyser, Ahmir "Questlove" Thompson, Nile Rodgers, and Roy Hargrove, is one of the funkiest things that has been put to tape in the new millennium.
But what I love about this groove is that it gives you something for your feet and your brain.
The song originally was written/performed by Kuti’s father, groundbreaking Nigerian musician and activist Fela Kuti, who invented the Afro-beat genre by blending his affection for the funk of James Brown with African and Latin rhythms.
Fela was a controversial, charismatic figure and a hero to the disenfranchised, especially in Nigeria.  He vehemently and frequently spoke out about social injustices and government corruption through his music, which made him a target.  
The album on which “Water No Get Enemy” first appeared was irreverently titled Expensive Shit—an allusion to a 1975 incident where police attempted to arrest Kuti and plant a joint on him.  Thing was, Kuti immediately knew what was transpiring and promptly ate the marijuana to destroy the evidence.  Refusing defeat, the police decided to let him stay in jail and wait until the evidence was (eh-hem) “processed.”  A couple of days later, police found no trace of the weed in the stool sample they'd collected, so they had to drop the charges and let Kuti go.  Thing is, they only thought they had Kuti’s sample; it actually was his cellmate’s poop.  (They pulled a “dookie switcharoo,” you might say.)
Anyway, after the fact, Kuti found the bungled attempt to silence him hilarious; the image of the Nigerian police spending their time rummaging through some random inmate's crap instead of protecting and serving inspired the album’s title. 
But, back to the song at hand.
"Water No Get Enemy" is—in the literal sense—a plea for potable water for Nigeria’s people.  The lyrics point out that, on a basic, molecular level, everyone needs and deserves clean water: to wash in, to make food, to cool oneself, etc.
But there’s a more political statement underneath, as is often the case with Afro-beat and Kuti’s music.  It's a pointed message to the Nigerian government.  Water is a symbol representing the Nigerian people.  Kuti is asking: if you make an enemy of your own people, then what power do you really have?
Anyway, Fela’s 1975 version is classic.  But I have a soft spot for this 2002 Femi + Soultronics collaboration.  The rippling, percussion-driven groove starts from moment one and does not slacken for a solid six minutes, with the voices of Kuti, D'Angelo, and Gray effortlessly blending with the horns.  It's like cool water for the soul.