title: Jeremy Bentham

text: The Faculty of Laws at University College London occupies Bentham House, next to the main UCL campus.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's name was adopted by the Australian litigation funder IMF Limited to become Bentham IMF Limited on 28 November 2013, in recognition of Bentham being "among the first to support the utility of litigation funding".


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham today is considered as the "Father of Utilitarianism". His ambition in life was to create a "Pannomion", a complete utilitarian code of law. He not only proposed many legal and social reforms, but also expounded an underlying moral principle on which they should be based. This philosophy of utilitarianism took for its "fundamental axiom" to be the notion that "it is the greatest happiness of the greatest number that is the measure of right and wrong". Bentham claimed to have borrowed this concept from the writings of Joseph Priestley, although the closest that Priestley in fact came to expressing it was in the form "the good and happiness of the members, that is the majority of the members of any state, is the great standard by which relating to that state must finally be determined."


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham was a rare major figure in the history of philosophy to endorse psychological egoism. He was also a determined opponent of religion, as Crimmins observes: "Between 1809 and 1823 Jeremy Bentham carried out an exhaustive examination of religion with the declared aim of extirpating religious beliefs, even the idea of religion itself, from the minds of men."


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham also suggested a procedure for estimating the moral status of any action, which he called the hedonistic or felicific calculus.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: The principle of utility, or "greatest happiness principle", forms the cornerstone of all Bentham's thought. By "happiness", he understood a predominance of "pleasure" over "pain". He wrote in "An Introduction to the Principles of Morals and Legislation":


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's "Principles of Morals and Legislation" focuses on the principle of utility and how this view of morality ties into legislative practices. His principle of utility regards "good" as that which produces the greatest amount of pleasure and the minimum amount of pain and "evil" as that which produces the most pain without the pleasure. This concept of pleasure and pain is defined by Bentham as physical as well as spiritual. Bentham writes about this principle as it manifests itself within the legislation of a society.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: In order to measure the extent of pain or pleasure that a certain decision will create, he lays down a set of criteria divided into the categories of intensity, duration, certainty, proximity, productiveness, purity, and extent. Using these measurements, he reviews the concept of punishment and when it should be used as far as whether a punishment will create more pleasure or more pain for a society.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: He calls for legislators to determine whether punishment creates an even more evil offence. Instead of suppressing the evil acts, Bentham argues that certain unnecessary laws and punishments could ultimately lead to new and more dangerous vices than those being punished to begin with, and calls upon legislators to measure the pleasures and pains associated with any legislation and to form laws in order to create the greatest good for the greatest number. He argues that the concept of the individual pursuing his or her own happiness cannot be necessarily declared "right", because often these individual pursuits can lead to greater pain and less pleasure for a society as a whole. Therefore, the legislation of a society is vital to maintain the maximum pleasure and the minimum degree of pain for the greatest number of people.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: In his exposition of the felicific calculus, Bentham proposed a classification of 12 pains and 14 pleasures, by which we might test the "happiness factor" of any action. For Bentham, according to P. J. Kelly, the law "provides the basic framework of social interaction by delimiting spheres of personal inviolability within which individuals can form and pursue their own conceptions of well-being". It provides security, a precondition for the formation of expectations. As the hedonic calculus shows "expectation utilities" to be much higher than natural ones, it follows that Bentham does not favour the sacrifice of a few to the benefit of the many. Law professor Alan Dershowitz has quoted Bentham to argue that torture should sometimes be permitted.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Utilitarianism was revised and expanded by Bentham's student John Stuart Mill, who sharply criticized Bentham's view of human nature, which failed to recognize conscience as a human motive. Mill considered Bentham's view "to have done and to be doing very serious evil." In Mill's hands, "Benthamism" became a major element in the liberal conception of state policy objectives.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's critics have claimed that he undermined the foundation of a free society by rejecting natural rights. Historian Gertrude Himmelfarb wrote "The principle of the greatest happiness of the greatest number was as inimical to the idea of liberty as to the idea of rights."


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's "hedonistic" theory (a term from J. J. C. Smart) is often criticised for lacking a principle of fairness embodied in a conception of justice. In "Bentham and the Common Law Tradition", Gerald J. Postema states: "No moral concept suffers more at Bentham's hand than the concept of justice. There is no sustained, mature analysis of the notion." Thus, some critics object, it would be acceptable to torture one person if this would produce an amount of happiness in other people outweighing the unhappiness of the tortured individual. However, as P. J. Kelly argued in "Utilitarianism and Distributive Justice: Jeremy Bentham and the Civil Law", Bentham had a theory of justice that prevented such consequences.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's opinions about monetary economics were completely different from those of David Ricardo; however, they had some similarities to those of Henry Thornton. He focused on monetary expansion as a means of helping to create full employment. He was also aware of the relevance of forced saving, propensity to consume, the saving-investment relationship, and other matters that form the content of modern income and employment analysis. His monetary view was close to the fundamental concepts employed in his model of utilitarian decision making. His work is considered to be an early precursor of modern welfare economics.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham stated that pleasures and pains can be ranked according to their value or "dimension" such as intensity, duration, certainty of a pleasure or a pain. He was concerned with maxima and minima of pleasures and pains; and they set a precedent for the future employment of the maximisation principle in the economics of the consumer, the firm and the search for an optimum in welfare economics.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham was the first person to be an aggressive advocate for the codification of "all" of the common law into a coherent set of statutes; he was actually the person who coined the verb "to codify" to refer to the process of drafting a legal code. He lobbied hard for the formation of codification commissions in both England and the United States, and went so far as to write to President James Madison in 1811 to volunteer to write a complete legal code for the young country. After he learned more about American law and realised that most of it was state-based, he promptly wrote to the governors of every single state with the same offer.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: During his lifetime, Bentham's codification efforts were completely unsuccessful. Even today, they have been completely rejected by almost every common law jurisdiction, including England. However, his writings on the subject laid the foundation for the moderately successful codification work of David Dudley Field II in the United States a generation later.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham is widely regarded as one of the earliest proponents of animal rights. He argued and believed that the ability to suffer, not the ability to reason, should be the benchmark, or what he called the "insuperable line". If reason alone were the criterion by which we judge who ought to have rights, human infants and adults with certain forms of disability might fall short, too. In 1780, alluding to the limited degree of legal protection afforded to slaves in the French West Indies by the Code Noir, he wrote:Earlier in the paragraph, Bentham makes clear that he accepted that animals could be killed for food, or in defence of human life, provided that the animal was not made to suffer unnecessarily. Bentham did not object to medical experiments on animals, providing that the experiments had in mind a particular goal of benefit to humanity, and had a reasonable chance of achieving that goal. He wrote that otherwise he had a "decided and insuperable objection" to causing pain to animals, in part because of the harmful effects such practices might have on human beings. In a letter to the editor of the "Morning Chronicle" in March 1825, he wrote:


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham said that it was the placing of women in a legally inferior position that made him choose in 1759, at the age of eleven, the career of a reformist, though American critic John Neal claimed to have convinced him to take up women's rights issues during their association between 1825 and 1827. Bentham spoke for a complete equality between the sexes, arguing in favour of women's suffrage, a woman's right to obtain a divorce, and a woman's right to hold political office.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: The c. 1785 essay "Paederasty (Offences Against One's Self)" argued for the liberalisation of laws prohibiting homosexual sex. The essay remained unpublished during his lifetime for fear of offending public morality. Some of Bentham's writings on "sexual non-conformity" were published for the first time in 1931, but "Paederasty" was not published until 1978. Bentham does not believe homosexual acts to be unnatural, describing them merely as "irregularities of the venereal appetite". The essay chastises the society of the time for making a disproportionate response to what Bentham appears to consider a largely private offence—public displays or forced acts being dealt with rightly by other laws. When the essay was published in the "Journal of Homosexuality" in 1978, the abstract stated that Bentham's essay was the "first known argument for homosexual law reform in England".


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's writings in the early 1790s onwards expressed an opposition to imperialism. His 1793 pamphlet "Emancipate Your Colonies!" critiqued French colonialism. In the early 1820s, he argued that the liberal government in Spain should emancipate its New World colonies. In the essay "Plan for an Universal and Perpetual Peace", Bentham argued that Britain should emancipate its New World colonies and abandon its colonial ambitions. He argued that empire was bad for the greatest number in the metropole and the colonies. According to Bentham, empire was financially unsound, entailed taxation on the poor in the metropole, caused unnecessary expansion in the military apparatus, undermined the security of the metropole, and were ultimately motivated by misguided ideas of honor and glory.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: For Bentham, transparency had moral value. For example, journalism puts power-holders under moral scrutiny. However, Bentham wanted such transparency to apply to everyone. This he describes by picturing the world as a gymnasium in which each "gesture, every turn of limb or feature, in those whose motions have a visible impact on the general happiness, will be noticed and marked down". He considered both surveillance and transparency to be useful ways of generating understanding and improvements for people's lives.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham distinguished among fictional entities what he called "fabulous entities" like Prince Hamlet or a centaur, from what he termed "fictitious entities", or necessary objects of discourse, similar to Kant's categories, such as nature, custom, or the social contract.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham died on 6 June 1832 aged 84 at his residence in Queen Square Place in Westminster, London, England. He had continued to write up to a month before his death, and had made careful preparations for the dissection of his body after death and its preservation as an auto-icon. As early as 1769, when Bentham was 21 years old, he made a will leaving his body for dissection to a family friend, the physician and chemist George Fordyce, whose daughter, Maria Sophia (1765–1858), married Jeremy's brother Samuel Bentham. A paper written in 1830, instructing Thomas Southwood Smith to create the auto-icon, was attached to his last will, dated 30 May 1832. It stated:


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham's wish to preserve his dead body was consistent with his philosophy of utilitarianism. In his essay "Auto-Icon, or the Uses of the Dead to the Living", Bentham wrote, "If a country gentleman has rows of trees leading to his dwelling, the auto-icons of his family might alternate with the trees; copal varnish would protect the face from the effects of rain." On 8 June 1832, two days after his death, invitations were distributed to a select group of friends, and on the following day at 3 p.m., Southwood Smith delivered a lengthy oration over Bentham's remains in the Webb Street School of Anatomy & Medicine in Southwark, London. The printed oration contains a frontispiece with an engraving of Bentham's body partly covered by a sheet.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Afterward, the skeleton and head were preserved and stored in a wooden cabinet called the "Auto-icon", with the skeleton padded out with hay and dressed in Bentham's clothes. From 1833 it stood in Southwood Smith's Finsbury Square consulting rooms until he abandoned private practice in the winter of 1849–50 when it was moved to 36 Percy Street, the studio of his unofficial partner, the painter Margaret Gillies, who made studies of it. In March 1850 Southwood Smith offered the auto-icon to Henry Brougham who readily accepted it for UCL.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: It is kept on public display at the main entrance of the UCL Student Centre. It was previously displayed at the end of the South Cloisters in the main building of the college until it was moved in 2020. Upon the retirement of Sir Malcolm Grant as provost of the college in 2013, however, the body was present at Grant's final council meeting. As of 2013, this was the only time that the body of Bentham has been taken to a UCL council meeting. (There is a persistent myth that the body of Bentham is present at all council meetings.)


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham had intended the auto-icon to incorporate his actual head, mummified to resemble its appearance in life. Southwood Smith's experimental efforts at mummification, based on practices of the indigenous people of New Zealand and involving placing the head under an air pump over sulfuric acid and drawing off the fluids, although technically successful, left the head looking distastefully macabre, with dried and darkened skin stretched tautly over the skull.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: The auto-icon was therefore given a wax head, fitted with some of Bentham's own hair. The real head was displayed in the same case as the auto-icon for many years, but became the target of repeated student pranks. It was later locked away. In 2017, plans were announced to re-exhibit the head and at the same time obtain a DNA sample for sequencing with the goal of identifying genetic evidence of autism.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: In 2020, the auto-icon was put into a new glass display case and moved to the entrance of UCL's new Student Centre on Gordon Square.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham is widely associated with the foundation in 1826 of London University (the institution that, in 1836, became University College London), though he was 78 years old when the university opened and played only an indirect role in its establishment. His direct involvement was limited to his buying a single £100 share in the new university, making him just one of over a thousand shareholders.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham and his ideas can nonetheless be seen as having inspired several of the actual founders of the university. He strongly believed that education should be more widely available, particularly to those who were not wealthy or who did not belong to the established church; in Bentham's time, membership of the Church of England and the capacity to bear considerable expenses were required of students entering the Universities of Oxford and Cambridge. As the University of London was the first in England to admit all, regardless of race, creed or political belief, it was largely consistent with Bentham's vision. There is some evidence that, from the sidelines, he played a "more than passive part" in the planning discussions for the new institution, although it is also apparent that "his interest was greater than his influence". He failed in his efforts to see his disciple John Bowring appointed professor of English or History, but he did oversee the appointment of another pupil, John Austin, as the first professor of Jurisprudence in 1829.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: The more direct associations between Bentham and UCL—the college's custody of his Auto-icon (see above) and of the majority of his surviving papers—postdate his death by some years: the papers were donated in 1849, and the Auto-icon in 1850. A large painting by Henry Tonks hanging in UCL's Flaxman Gallery depicts Bentham approving the plans of the new university, but it was executed in 1922 and the scene is entirely imaginary. Since 1959 (when the Bentham Committee was first established), UCL has hosted the Bentham Project, which is progressively publishing a definitive edition of Bentham's writings.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: UCL now endeavours to acknowledge Bentham's influence on its foundation, while avoiding any suggestion of direct involvement, by describing him as its "spiritual founder".


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Bentham was an obsessive writer and reviser, but was constitutionally incapable, except on rare occasions, of bringing his work to completion and publication. Most of what appeared in print in his lifetime was prepared for publication by others. Several of his works first appeared in French translation, prepared for the press by Étienne Dumont, for example, "Theory of Legislation", Volume 2 ("Principles of the Penal Code") 1840, Weeks, Jordan, & Company. Boston. Some made their first appearance in English in the 1820s as a result of back-translation from Dumont's 1802 collection (and redaction) of Bentham's writing on civil and penal legislation.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: On his death, Bentham left manuscripts amounting to an estimated 30 million words, which are now largely held by University College London's Special Collections ( manuscript folios) and the British Library ( folios).


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: John Bowring, the young radical writer who had been Bentham's intimate friend and disciple, was appointed his literary executor and charged with the task of preparing a collected edition of his works. This appeared in 11 volumes in 1838–1843. Bowring based much of his edition on previously published texts (including those of Dumont) rather than Bentham's own manuscripts, and elected not to publish Bentham's works on religion at all. The edition was described by the "Edinburgh Review" on first publication as "incomplete, incorrect and ill-arranged", and has since been repeatedly criticised both for its omissions and for errors of detail; while Bowring's memoir of Bentham's life included in volumes 10 and 11 was described by Sir Leslie Stephen as "one of the worst biographies in the language". Nevertheless, Bowring's remained the standard edition of most of Bentham's writings for over a century, and is still only partially superseded: it includes such interesting writings on international relations as Bentham's A Plan for an Universal and Perpetual Peace written 1786–89, which forms part IV of the Principles of International Law.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: In 1952–1954, Werner Stark published a three-volume set, "Jeremy Bentham's Economic Writings", in which he attempted to bring together all of Bentham's writings on economic matters, including both published and unpublished material. Although a significant achievement, the work is considered by scholars to be flawed in many points of detail, and a new edition of the economic writings (retitled "Writings on Political Economy") is currently in course of publication by the Bentham Project.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: In 1959, the Bentham Committee was established under the auspices of University College London with the aim of producing a definitive edition of Bentham's writings. It set up the Bentham Project to undertake the task, and the first volume in "The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham" was published in 1968. The "Collected Works" are providing many unpublished works, as well as much-improved texts of works already published. To date, 38 volumes have appeared; the complete edition is projected to total 80. The volume "Of Laws in General" (1970) was found to contain many errors and has been replaced by "Of the Limits of the Penal Branch of Jurisprudence" (2010) In 2017, Volumes 1–5 were re-published in open access by UCL Press.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: To assist in this task, the Bentham papers at UCL are being digitised by crowdsourcing their transcription. Transcribe Bentham is a crowdsourced manuscript transcription project, run by University College London's Bentham Project, in partnership with UCL's UCL Centre for Digital Humanities, UCL Library Services, UCL Learning and Media Services, the University of London Computer Centre, and the online community. The project was launched in September 2010 and is making freely available, via a specially designed transcription interface, digital images of UCL's vast Bentham Papers collection—which runs to some 60,000 manuscript folios—to engage the public and recruit volunteers to help transcribe the material. Volunteer-produced transcripts will contribute to the Bentham Project's production of the new edition of "The Collected Works of Jeremy Bentham", and will be uploaded to UCL's digital Bentham Papers repository, widening access to the collection for all and ensuring its long-term preservation. Manuscripts can be viewed and transcribed by signing-up for a transcriber account at the Transcription Desk, via the Transcribe Bentham website.


title: Jeremy Bentham

text: Free, flexible textual search of the full collection of Bentham Papers is now possible through an experimental handwritten text image indexing and search system, developed by the PRHLT research center in the framework of the READ project.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Fela Aníkúlápó Kuti (born Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti; 15 October 1938 – 2 August 1997), also known as Abami Eda, was a Nigerian musician, bandleader, composer, political activist, and Pan-Africanist. He is regarded as the pioneer of Afrobeat, a Nigerian music genre that combines West African music with American funk and jazz. At the height of his popularity, he was referred to as one of Africa's most "challenging and charismatic music performers". AllMusic described him as a musical and sociopolitical voice of international significance.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti was the son of Nigerian women's rights activist Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti. After early experiences abroad, he and his band Africa 70 (featuring drummer and musical director Tony Allen) shot to stardom in Nigeria during the 1970s, during which he was an outspoken critic and target of Nigeria's military juntas. In 1970, he founded the Kalakuta Republic commune, which declared itself independent from military rule. The commune was destroyed in a 1978 raid. He was jailed by the government of Muhammadu Buhari in 1984, but released after 20 months. He continued to record and perform through the 1980s and 1990s. Since his death in 1997, reissues and compilations of his music have been overseen by his son, Femi Kuti.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Olufela Olusegun Oludotun Ransome-Kuti was born into the Ransome-Kuti family, an upper-middle-class Nigerian family, on 15 October 1938 in Abeokuta (the modern-day capital of Ogun State), which at the time was a city in the British Colony of Nigeria. His mother, Chief Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, was an anti-colonial feminist, and his father, Reverend Israel Oludotun Ransome-Kuti, was an Anglican minister, school principal, and the first president of the Nigeria Union of Teachers. Kutis' parents both played active roles in the anti-colonial movement in Nigeria, most notably the Abeokuta Women's Riots which was led by his mother in 1946. His brothers Beko Ransome-Kuti and Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, both medical doctors, were well known nationally. Kuti was a first cousin once removed to the writer and Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka, the first black African to win the Nobel Prize for Literature. They are both descendants of Josiah Ransome-Kuti, who is Kuti's paternal grandfather and Soyinka's maternal great-grandfather.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti attended Abeokuta Grammar School. In 1958, he was sent to London to study medicine but decided to study music instead at the Trinity College of Music, with the trumpet being his preferred instrument. While there, he formed the band Koola Lobitos and played a fusion of jazz and highlife. In 1960, Kuti married his first wife, Remilekun (Remi) Taylor, with whom he had three children (Femi, Yeni, and Sola). In 1963, Kuti moved back to the newly independent Federation of Nigeria, re-formed Koola Lobitos, and trained as a radio producer for the Nigerian Broadcasting Corporation. He played for some time with Victor Olaiya and his All-Stars.


title: Fela Kuti

text: He called his style Afrobeat, a combination of Fuji music, funk, jazz, highlife, salsa, calypso, and traditional Yoruba music. In 1969, Kuti took the band to the United States and spent ten months in Los Angeles. While there, he discovered the Black Power movement through Sandra Smith (now known as Sandra Izsadore or Sandra Akanke Isidore), a partisan of the Black Panther Party. This experience heavily influenced his music and political views. He renamed the band Nigeria 70. Soon after, the Immigration and Naturalization Service was tipped off by a promoter that Kuti and his band were in the US without work permits. The band performed a quick recording session in Los Angeles that would later be released as "Fela Fela Fela".


title: Fela Kuti

text: After Kuti and his band returned to Nigeria, the group was renamed (the) Africa '70 as lyrical themes changed from love to social issues. He formed the Kalakuta Republic—a commune, recording studio, and home for many people connected to the band—which he later declared independent from the Nigerian state.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti set up a nightclub in the Empire Hotel, first named the Afro-Spot and later the Afrika Shrine, where he both performed regularly and officiated at personalised Yoruba traditional ceremonies in honor of his nation's ancestral faith. He also changed his name to Anikulapo (meaning "He who carries death in his pouch", with the interpretation: "I will be the master of my own destiny and will decide when it is time for death to take me"). He stopped using the hyphenated surname "Ransome" because he considered it a slave name.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's music was popular among the Nigerian public and Africans in general. He decided to sing in Pidgin English so that individuals all over Africa could enjoy his music, where the local languages they speak are diverse and numerous. As popular as Kuti's music had become in Nigeria and elsewhere, it was unpopular with the ruling government, and raids on the Kalakuta Republic were frequent. During 1972, Ginger Baker recorded "Stratavarious," with Kuti appearing alongside vocalist and guitarist Bobby Tench. Around this time, Kuti became even more involved with the Yoruba religion.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1977, Kuti and Africa 70 released the album "Zombie", which heavily criticized Nigerian soldiers, and used the zombie metaphor to describe the Nigerian military's methods. The album was a massive success and infuriated the government, who raided the Kalakuta Republic with 1,000 soldiers. During the raid, Kuti was severely beaten, and his elderly mother was fatally injured after being thrown from a window. The commune was burnt down, and Kuti's studio, instruments, and master tapes were destroyed. Kuti claimed that he would have been killed had it not been for a commanding officer's intervention as he was being beaten. Kuti's response to the attack was to deliver his mother's coffin to the Dodan Barracks in Lagos, General Olusegun Obasanjo's residence, and to write two songs, "Coffin for Head of State" and "Unknown Soldier," referencing the official inquiry that claimed an unknown soldier had destroyed the commune.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti and his band took up residence in Crossroads Hotel after the Shrine had been destroyed along with the commune. In 1978, he married 27 women: Kikelomo Oseyni, Folake Oladejo, Tejumade Adebiyi, Naa Lamiley, Sewaa Kuti, Omotola Osaeti, Omowunmi Oyedele, Alake Anikulapo Kuti, Shade Shodeinde, Adeola Williams, Najite Kuti, Emaruagheru Osawe, Kevwe Oghomienor, Ihase Anikulapo, Adejonwo Iyabode Ogunitro, Bose Anikulapo Kuti, Lara Anikulapo Kuti, Suru Eriomola, Tokunbo Akran, Funmi Kuti, Omowunmi Afesumo, Laide Anikulapo Kuti, Ronke Edason, Damiregba Anikulapo Kuti, Aduni Idowu, and Omolara Shosanya Remilekun Taylor. Many of them were dancers, composers, and singers with whom he worked. The marriage served not only to mark the anniversary of the attack on the Kalakuta Republic but also to protect Kuti and his wives from authorities' false claims that Kuti was kidnapping women. Later, he adopted a rotation system of maintaining 12 simultaneous wives. There were also two concerts in the year: the first was in Accra, in which rioting broke out during the song "Zombie", which caused Kuti to be banned from entering Ghana; the second was after the Berlin Jazz Festival when most of Kuti's musicians deserted him due to rumours that he planned to use all of the proceeds to fund his presidential campaign.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1979, Kuti formed his political party, which he called Movement of the People (MOP), to "clean up society like a mop", but it quickly became inactive due to his confrontations with the government of the day. MOP preached Nkrumahism and Africanism.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1983, Kuti nominated himself for president in Nigeria's first elections in decades, but his candidature was refused. At this time, Kuti created a new band, Egypt 80, which reflected the view that Egyptian civilization, knowledge, philosophy, mathematics, and religious systems are African and must be claimed as such. Kuti stated in an interview: "Stressing the point that I have to make Africans aware of the fact that Egyptian civilization belongs to the African. So that was the reason why I changed the name of my band to Egypt 80." Kuti continued to record albums and tour the country. He further infuriated the political establishment by implicating ITT Corporation's vice-president, Moshood Abiola, and Obasanjo in the popular 25-minute political screed entitled "I.T.T. (International Thief-Thief)".


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1984, Muhammadu Buhari's government, of which Kuti was a vocal opponent, jailed him on a charge of currency smuggling. Amnesty International and others denounced the charges as politically motivated. Amnesty designated him a prisoner of conscience, and other human rights groups also took up his case. After 20 months, General Ibrahim Babangida released him from prison. On his release, Kuti divorced his 12 remaining wives, citing "marriage brings jealousy and selfishness" since his wives would regularly compete for superiority.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti continued to release albums with Egypt 80 and toured in the United States and Europe while continuing to be politically active. In 1986 he performed in Giants Stadium in New Jersey as part of Amnesty International's A Conspiracy of Hope concert along with Bono, Carlos Santana, and the Neville Brothers. In 1989, Kuti and Egypt 80 released the anti-apartheid album "Beasts of No Nation" that depicted U.S. President Ronald Reagan, UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, and South African State President Pieter Willem Botha on its cover. The title of the composition evolved out of a statement by Botha: "This uprising [against the apartheid system] will bring out the beast in us."


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's album output slowed in the 1990s, and eventually, he ceased releasing albums altogether. On 21 January 1993, he and four members of Africa 70 were arrested and were later charged on 25 January for the murder of an electrician. Rumours also speculated that he was suffering from an illness for which he was refusing treatment. However, there had been no confirmed statement from Kuti about this speculation.


title: Fela Kuti

text: On 3 August 1997, Kuti's brother Olikoye Ransome-Kuti, already a prominent AIDS activist and former Minister of Health, announced that Kuti had died on the previous day from complications related to AIDS. Kuti had been an AIDS denialist, and his widow maintained that he did not die of AIDS. His youngest son Seun took the role of leading Kuti's former band Egypt 80. , the band is still active, releasing music under the moniker Seun Kuti & Egypt 80"."


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's musical style is called Afrobeat. It is a style he largely created, and is a complex fusion of jazz, funk, highlife, and traditional Nigerian, African chants and rhythms. It contains elements of psychedelic soul and has similarities to James Brown's style of composition. Afrobeat also borrows heavily from the native "tinker pan". Tony Allen (Kuti's drummer of twenty years) was instrumental in the creation of Afrobeat. Kuti once stated that "there would be no Afrobeat without Tony Allen".


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's band was notable for featuring two baritone saxophones when most groups only used one. This is a common technique in African and African-influenced musical styles and can be seen in funk and hip hop. His bands sometimes performed with two bassists at the same time both playing interlocking melodies and rhythms. There were always two or more guitarists. The electric West African style guitar in Afrobeat bands is a key part of the sound, and is used to give basic structure, playing a repeating chordal/melodic statement, riff, or groove.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Some elements often present in Kuti's music are the call-and-response within the chorus and figurative but simple lyrics. His songs were also very long, at least 10–15 minutes in length, and many reached 20 or 30 minutes, while some unreleased tracks would last up to 45 minutes when performed live. Their length was one of many reasons that his music never reached a substantial degree of popularity outside Africa. His LP records frequently had one 30-minute track per side. Typically there is an "Instrumental Introduction" jam part of the song roughly 10–15 minutes long before Kuti starts singing the "main" part of the song, featuring his lyrics and singing, for another 10–15 minutes. On some recordings, his songs are divided into two parts: Part 1 being the instrumental, and Part 2 adding in vocals.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's songs are mostly sung in Nigerian pidgin English, although he also performed a few songs in the Yoruba language. His main instruments were the saxophone and the keyboards, but he also played the trumpet, electric guitar, and the occasional drum solo. Kuti refused to perform songs again after he had already recorded them, which hindered his popularity outside Africa.


title: Fela Kuti

text: The subject of Kuti's songs tended to be very complex. They regularly challenged common received notions in the manner of political commentary through song. Many of his songs also expressed a form of parody and satire. The main theme he conveyed through his music was the search for justice through exploration of political and social topics that affected the common people.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti was known for his showmanship, and his concerts were often outlandish and wild. He referred to his stage act as the "Underground Spiritual Game". Many expected him to perform shows like those in the Western world, but during the 1980s, he was not interested in putting on a "show". His European performance was a representation of what was relevant at the time and his other inspirations. He attempted to make a movie but lost all the materials to the fire that was set to his house by the military government in power. He thought that art, and thus his own music, should have political meaning.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's concerts also regularly involved female singers and dancers, later dubbed as "Queens." The Queens were women who helped influence the popularization of his music. They were dressed colorfully and wore makeup all over their bodies that expressed their visual creativity. The singers of the group played a backup role for Kuti, usually echoing his words or humming along, while the dancers would put on a performance of an erotic manner. This began to spark controversy due to the nature of their involvement with Kuti's political tone, along with the reality that a lot of the women were young.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti was part of an Afro-Centric consciousness movement that was founded on and delivered through his music. In an interview included in Hank Bordowitz's "Noise of the World", Kuti stated:Music is supposed to have an effect. If you're playing music and people don't feel something, you're not doing shit. That's what African music is about. When you hear something, you must move. I want to move people to dance, but also to think. Music wants to dictate a better life, against a bad life. When you're listening to something that depicts having a better life, and you're not having a better life, it must have an effect on you.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti was highly engaged in political activism in Africa from the 1970s until his death. He criticized the corruption of Nigerian government officials and the mistreatment of Nigerian citizens. He spoke of colonialism as the root of the socio-economic and political problems that plagued the African people. Corruption was one of the worst political problems facing Africa in the 1970s and Nigeria was among the most corrupt countries. Its government rigged elections and performed coups that ultimately worsened poverty, economic inequality, unemployment, and political instability, further promoting corruption and crime. Kuti's protest songs covered themes inspired by the realities of corruption and socio-economic inequality in Africa. Kuti's political statements could be heard throughout Africa.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's open vocalization of the violent and oppressive regime controlling Nigeria did not come without consequence. He was arrested on over 200 different occasions and spent time in jail, including his longest stint of 20 months after his arrest in 1984. On top of jail time, the corrupt government sent soldiers to beat Kuti, his family and friends, and destroy wherever he lived and whatever instruments or recordings he had.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In the 1970s, Kuti began to run outspoken political columns in the advertising space of daily and weekly newspapers such as "The Daily Times" and "The Punch", bypassing editorial censorship in Nigeria's predominantly state-controlled media. Published throughout the 1970s and early 1980s under the title "Chief Priest Say", these columns were extensions of Kuti's famous Yabi Sessions—consciousness-raising word-sound rituals, with himself as chief priest, conducted at his Lagos nightclub. Organized around a militantly Afrocentric rendering of history and the essence of black beauty, "Chief Priest Say" focused on the role of cultural hegemony in the continuing subjugation of Africans. Kuti addressed many topics, from fierce denunciations of the Nigerian Government's criminal behavior, Islam and Christianity's exploitative nature, and evil multinational corporations; to deconstructions of Western medicine, Black Muslims, sex, pollution, and poverty. "Chief Priest Say" was eventually canceled by "The Daily Times" and "The Punch". Many have speculated that the paper's editors were pressured to stop publication, including threats of violence.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's lyrics expressed his inner thoughts. His rise in popularity throughout the 1970s signaled a change in the relation between music as an art form and Nigerian socio-political discourse. In 1984, he critiqued and insulted the authoritarian then-president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Muhammadu Buhari. "Beast of No Nation", one of his most popular songs, refers to Buhari as an "animal in a madman's body"; in Nigerian Pidgin: "No be outside Buhari dey ee / na craze man be dat / animal in craze man skini." Kuti strongly believed in Africa and always preached peace among its people. He thought the most important way for them to fight European cultural imperialism was to support traditional religions and lifestyles in their continent. The American Black Power movement also influenced Kuti's political views; he supported Pan-Africanism and socialism and called for a united, democratic African republic. African leaders he supported during his lifetime include Kwame Nkrumah and Thomas Sankara. Kuti was a candid supporter of human rights, and many of his songs are direct attacks against dictatorships, specifically the militaristic governments of Nigeria in the 1970s and 1980s. He also criticized fellow Africans (especially the upper class) for betraying traditional African culture.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1978 Kuti became a polygamist when he simultaneously married 27 women. The highly publicized wedding served many purposes: it marked the one-year anniversary of Kuti and his wives surviving the Nigerian government's attack on the Kalakuta Republic in 1977, and also formalized Kuti's relationships with the women living with him; this legal status prevented the Nigerian government from raiding Kuti's compound on the grounds that Kuti had kidnapped the women. Kuti also described polygamy as logical and convenient: "A man goes for many women in the first place. Like in Europe, when a man is married when the wife is sleeping, he goes out and sleeps around. He should bring the women in the house, man, to live with him, and stop running around the streets!" Some characterize his views towards women as misogyny and typically cite songs like "Mattress" as further evidence. In a more complex example, he mocks African women's aspiration to European standards of ladyhood while extolling the values of the market woman in "Lady". However, Kuti also critiqued what he considered aberrant displays of African masculinity. In his songs "J.J.D. (Johnny Just Drop)" and "Gentleman", Kuti mocks African men's culturally and politically inappropriate adoption of European standards and declares himself "African man: Original".


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti was also an outspoken critic of the United States. At a meeting during his 1981 Amsterdam tour, he "complained about the psychological warfare that American organizations like ITT and the CIA waged against developing nations in terms of language". Because terms such as Third World, undeveloped, or non-aligned countries imply inferiority, Kuti felt they should not be used.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti is remembered as an influential icon who voiced his opinions on matters that affected the nation through his music. Since 1998, the Felabration festival, an idea pioneered by his daughter Yeni Kuti, is held each year at the New Afrika Shrine to celebrate the life of this music legend and his birthday. Since Kuti's death in 1997, there has been a revival of his influence in music and popular culture, culminating in another re-release of his catalog controlled by UMG, Broadway and off-Broadway biographically based shows, and new bands, such as Antibalas, who carry the Afrobeat banner to a new generation of listeners.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 1999, Universal Music France, under Francis Kertekian, remastered the 45 albums that it owned and released them on 26 compact discs. These titles were licensed globally, except in Nigeria and Japan, where other companies owned Kuti's music. In 2005, the American operations of UMG licensed all of its world-music titles to the UK-based label Wrasse Records, which repackaged the same 26 discs for distribution in the United States (where they replaced the titles issues by MCA) and the UK. In 2009, Universal created a new deal for the US and Europe, with Knitting Factory Records and PIAS respectively, which included the release of the Broadway cast recording of the musical "Fela!" In 2013, FKO Ltd., the entity that owned the rights to all of Kuti's compositions, was acquired by BMG Rights Management.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 2003, the "Black President" exhibition debuted at the New Museum for Contemporary Art, New York, and featured concerts, symposia, films, and 39 international artists' works.


title: Fela Kuti

text: American singer Bilal recorded a remake of Kuti's 1977 song "Sorrow Tears and Blood" for his second album, "Love for Sale", featuring a guest rap by Common. Bilal cited Kuti's mix of jazz and folk tastes as an influence on his music.


title: Fela Kuti

text: The 2007 film "The Visitor", directed by Thomas McCarthy, depicted a disconnected professor (Richard Jenkins) who wanted to play the djembe; he learns from a young Syrian (Haaz Sleiman) who tells the professor he will never truly understand African music unless he listens to Kuti. The film features clips of Kuti's "Open and Close" and ""Je'nwi Temi" (Don't Gag Me)".


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 2008, an off-Broadway production about Kuti's life, entitled "Fela!" and inspired by the 1982 biography "Fela, Fela! This Bitch of a Life" by Carlos Moore, began with a collaborative workshop between the Afrobeat band Antibalas and Tony award-winner Bill T. Jones. The production was a massive success, and sold-out performances during its run and gained critical acclaim. On 22 November 2009, "Fela!" began a run on Broadway at the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. Jim Lewis helped co-write the script (along with Jones) and obtained producer backing from Jay-Z and Will Smith, among others. On 4 May 2010, "Fela!" was nominated for 11 Tony Awards, including Best Musical, Best Book of a Musical, Best Direction of a Musical for Bill T. Jones, Best Leading Actor in a Musical for Sahr Ngaujah, and Best Featured Actress in a Musical for Lillias White. In 2011, the London production of "Fela!" (staged at the Royal National Theatre) was filmed. On 11 June 2012, it was announced that "Fela!" would return to Broadway for 32 performances.


title: Fela Kuti

text: On 18 August 2009, DJ J.Period released a free mixtape to the general public, entitled "The Messengers". It is a collaboration with Somali-born hip-hop artist K'naan paying tribute to Kuti, Bob Marley, and Bob Dylan.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Two months later, Knitting Factory Records began re-releasing the 45 titles controlled by UMG, starting with yet another re-release in the US of the compilation "The Best of the Black President", which was completed and released in 2013.


title: Fela Kuti

text: "Fela Son of Kuti: The Fall of Kalakuta" is a stage play written by Onyekaba Cornel Best in 2010. It has had triumphant acclaim as part of that year's Felabration and returned in 2014 at the National Theatre and Freedom Park in Lagos. The play deals with events in a hideout, a day after the fall of Kalakuta.


title: Fela Kuti

text: The full-length documentary film "Finding Fela", directed by Alex Gibney, premiered at the 2014 Sundance Film Festival.


title: Fela Kuti

text: A biographical film by Focus Features, directed by Steve McQueen and written by Biyi Bandele, was rumoured to be in production in 2010, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the lead role. However, by 2014, the proposal was no longer produced under Focus Features, and while he maintained his role as the main writer, McQueen was replaced by Andrew Dosunmu as the director. McQueen told "The Hollywood Reporter" that the film was "dead".


title: Fela Kuti

text: The 2019 documentary film "My Friend Fela" ("Meu amigo Fela"), made by Joel Zito Araújo, explores the complexity of Kuti's life "through the eyes and conversations" of his biographer Carlos Moore.


title: Fela Kuti

text: The collaborative jazz/afrobeat album "Rejoice" by Tony Allen and Hugh Masekela, released in 2020, includes the track "Never (Lagos Never Gonna Be the Same)", a tribute to Kuti, through whom Allen and Masekela first met in the 1970s.


title: Fela Kuti

text: Kuti's song "Zombie" has appeared in the video game "", and he was posthumously nominated to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame in 2021.


title: Fela Kuti

text: In 2021, Hulu released a six-episode documentary entitled "McCartney 3, 2, 1," in which Paul McCartney is quoted as saying of a visit to see Fela Kuti at the African Shrine, Kuti's club outside of Lagos, in the early 1970s: "The music was so incredible that I wept. Hearing that was one of the greatest music moments of my life."


title: Fela Kuti

text: On 1 November 2021, a blue plaque was unveiled by the Nubian Jak Community Trust at 12 Stanlake Road, Shepherd's Bush, where Kuti first lived when he came to London in 1958 and was studying music at Trinity College. The event included tributes from Kuti's daughter Shalewa Ransome-Kuti, Resonance FM broadcaster Debbie Golt, Kuti's former manager Rikki Stein, cover artist Lemi Ghariokwu, and others.


title: Dark Souls III

text: "Dark Souls III" was critically and commercially successful, with critics calling it a worthy and fitting conclusion to the series. It shipped over three million copies within its first two months and over 10 million by 2020. Two downloadable content (DLC) expansions, "Ashes of Ariandel" and "The Ringed City", were also made. Dark Souls III: The Fire Fades Edition, containing the base game and both expansions, was released in April 2017.


title: Dark Souls III

text: "Dark Souls III" is an action role-playing game played in a third-person perspective. According to lead director and series creator Hidetaka Miyazaki, the game's gameplay design followed "closely from "Dark Souls II"". Players are equipped with various weapons to fight against enemies, such as bows, throwable projectiles, and swords. Shields can act as secondary weapons, but they are mainly used to deflect enemies' attacks and protect the player from suffering damage. Each weapon has two basic types of attack, one being a standard attack and the other being slightly more powerful that can be charged up, similar to FromSoftware's previous game, "Bloodborne". In addition, attacks can be evaded through dodge-rolling. Bonfires, which serve as checkpoints, return from previous instalments. Ashes, according to Miyazaki, play an important role in the game.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Magic is featured in the game, with a returning magic system from "Demon's Souls", now known as "focus points" (FP). When performing spells, the player's focus points are consumed. There are two types of Estus Flasks in the game, which can be allotted to fit a player's particular play style. One refills hit points like previous games in the series, while the other refills focus points, a feature new to the game. Combat and movements were made faster and more fluid than in "Dark Souls II". Several player movements are performed more rapidly, allowing more damage to be done in a shorter period.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Players encounter different enemies throughout the game, each with different behaviours. Some of them change their combat pattern during battles. New combat features are introduced in "Dark Souls III", including weapon and shield "Skills", which are special abilities that vary from weapon to weapon and enable special attacks and features at the cost of focus points. The game focuses more on role-playing; the expanded character builder and improved weapons provide more tactical options. The game features fewer overall maps than its predecessor "Dark Souls II", but they are larger and more detailed, encouraging exploration. The adaptability stat from "Dark Souls II" was removed in "Dark Souls III", with other stats being adjusted alongside the introduction of the luck stat. The game features multiplayer elements like the previous games in the series.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Set in the Kingdom of Lothric, a bell has rung to signal that the First Flame, responsible for maintaining the Age of Fire, is dying out. As has happened many times before, the coming of the Age of Dark produces the undead: cursed beings that rise after death. The Age of Fire can be prolonged by linking the fire, a ritual in which great lords and heroes sacrifice their souls to rekindle the First Flame. However, Prince Lothric, the chosen linker for this age, abandoned his duty and chose to watch the flame die from afar. The bell is the last hope for the Age of Fire, resurrecting previous Lords of Cinder (heroes who linked the flame in past ages) to attempt to link the fire again; however, all but one Lord shirk their duty. Meanwhile, Sulyvahn, a sorcerer from the Painted World of Ariandel, wrongfully proclaims himself Pontiff and seizes power over Irithyll of the Boreal Valley and the returning Anor Londo cathedral from "Dark Souls" as a tyrant.


title: Dark Souls III

text: The Ashen One, an Undead who failed to become a Lord of Cinder and thus called an Unkindled, rises and must link the fire by returning Prince Lothric and the defiant Lords of Cinder to their thrones in Firelink Shrine. The Lords include the Abyss Watchers, a legion of warriors sworn by the Old Wolf's Blood which linked their souls into one to protect the land from the Abyss and ultimately locked in an endless battle between each other; Yhorm the Giant, who was once a conqueror of the very people for whom he then sacrificed his life; and Aldrich, who became a Lord of Cinder despite his ravenous appetite for both men and gods. Lothric himself was raised to link the First Flame but shirked his duties and chose instead to watch the fire fade.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Once the Ashen One succeeds in returning Lothric and the Lords of Cinder to their thrones, they travel to the ruins of the Kiln of the First Flame. There, they encounter the Soul of Cinder, an amalgamation of all the previous Lords of Cinder who had linked the flame in the past. Once the Soul of Cinder is defeated, four endings are made possible based on the player's actions during the game. The player can attempt to link the fire, summon the Fire Keeper to extinguish the flame and begin an age of Dark, or kill her. A fourth ending consists of the Ashen One taking the flame for their own and becoming the Lord of Hollows.


title: Dark Souls III

text: "Ashes of Ariandel" introduces a new area, the Painted World of Ariandel. On arriving at the Cathedral of the Deep in the base game, the Ashen One meets a wandering knight, Gael, who implores them to enter the Painted World and fulfil a prophecy to bring "Fire for Ariandel." Inhabitants of this world variously beg the Ashen One to burn the Painted World per the prophecy or leave it to its slow rot. A painter girl tells the Ashen One of "Uncle Gael"'s promise to find her dyes to paint a new world. The player's decision to proceed elicits first coldness from the world's self-appointed guardian and then a boss fight, in which Ariandel is ultimately set on fire. The painter thanks the player for showing her flame and awaits Gael for the Dark Soul, which she can use to paint a new world for humanity.


title: Dark Souls III

text: In keeping with previous franchise DLC, "Ashes of Ariandel" introduces a substantial new area, two boss fights and several new weapons, spells, and armour pieces.


title: Dark Souls III

text: In "The Ringed City", the Ashen One begins their journey to an area known as "The Dreg Heap", where ruined kingdoms of different eras are piled upon each other as the world draws to a close. From the Dreg Heap, after battling through the ruins of Lothric Castle, the Ashen One encounters the amnesiac knight Lapp, who cannot remember his past. Throughout the Dreg Heap, messages from Gael from "Ashes of Ariandel" guide the player. The Ashen One traverses the remnants of Earthen Peak, an area encountered in "Dark Souls II", before fighting the last remnant of the demon race, the Demon Prince, in the base of an Archtree that contains the ruins of Firelink Shrine from "Dark Souls". Victorious, the player travels to the Ringed City, an ancient city of Pygmies, the ancestors of humanity, which has fallen into the Abyss. After defeating the guardian of the Church of Filianore, the player awakens Filianore, the daughter of Lord Gwyn, who was entrusted to the Ringed City as a token of peace between Gwyn and the Pygmy Lords. This transports them to a ruined wasteland of ash, which can be interpreted as either a skip forward in time or the lifting of an illusion cast by Filianore. There, the Ashen One meets a dishevelled Gael, who has begun killing the Pygmy Lords to gain the blood of the Dark Soul from the Pygmies for the painter girl in Ariandel to use as ink. After consuming the Dark Soul, Gael has been fully corrupted by its power and demands the Ashen One's portion of it. He is finally struck down, allowing the Ashen One to obtain his blood (which contains the Dark Soul). The Ashen One then gives the Blood of the Dark Soul to the painter in Ariandel, who uses it to paint a new world for humanity.


title: Dark Souls III

text: The game's development began in mid-2013, before the release of "Dark Souls II", whose development was handled by Tomohiro Shibuya and Yui Tanimura instead of the series creator, Hidetaka Miyazaki. The game was developed alongside "Bloodborne" but was handled by two mainly separate teams. Miyazaki also returned to direct "Dark Souls III." Isamu Okano and Tanimura, the directors of "" and "Dark Souls II", respectively, served as co-directors for the game. Despite Miyazaki initially believing that the series would not have many sequels, Miyazaki later added that the game would not be the last in the series. Instead, it would serve as a "turning point" for both the franchise and the studio, as it was the last project by FromSoftware before Miyazaki became the company's president. The game's gameplay was then first shown at Gamescom 2015 in August.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Miyazaki said that "Bloodborne" limitations made him want to return to the "Dark Souls" series. The game's level design was created to become more of another "enemy" the player must face. However, just as the former "Souls" games narrate their stories, "Dark Souls III" unfolds the plot with strong vagueness: players can learn the storyline merely through the conversation with non-player characters (NPCs), art design, and item flavour text. Due to this, Miyazaki states that there is no official and unique story. His intention in designing this game was to not impose his viewpoint, with him stating that any attempts to discover and understand the plot and that world are encouraged. The improvement to archery, specifically draw speed, was inspired by Legolas from "The Lord of the Rings" franchise. The game's visual design focuses on "withered beauty", with ember and ash scattered throughout the game's world. The game's original score was primarily written by "Dark Souls II" and "Bloodborne" composer Yuka Kitamura and performed by the Tokyo Philharmonic Orchestra. Additional music was written by "Dark Souls" composer Motoi Sakuraba, with a single boss theme each by Tsukasa Saitoh and Nobuyoshi Suzuki.


title: Dark Souls III

text: "Dark Souls III" was released in Japan for PlayStation 4 and Xbox One on March 24, 2016, and released worldwide, along with the Windows version, on April 12, 2016. A stress test for the game, which allowed players selected by Bandai Namco to test the game's network functionality before release, was available for three days in October 2015. The game has three special editions for players to purchase, which cost more than the base game. Players who pre-ordered the game had their game automatically upgraded to the "Apocalypse Edition", which has a special case and the game's original soundtrack. "The Collector's Edition" contains physical items such as the Red Knight figurine, an artbook, a new map, and special packaging. "The Prestige Edition" features all the content in "The Collector's Edition" but has an additional Lord of Cinder resin figurine, which can form a pair with the Red Knight figurine.


title: Dark Souls III

text: The game's first downloadable content (DLC) expansion, titled "Ashes of Ariandel", was released on October 24, 2016. The second and final DLC, "The Ringed City", was released on March 28, 2017. Both DLCs added new locations, bosses, armours, and weapons to the game. A complete version containing the base game and both DLCs, titled "Dark Souls III: The Fire Fades Edition", was released on April 21, 2017.


title: Dark Souls III

text: "Dark Souls III" received "generally favorable" reviews according to review aggregator Metacritic, with praise given to the game's visuals and combat mechanics, reminding reviewers of its faster-paced similarity to "Bloodborne".


title: Dark Souls III

text: Chloi Rad of "IGN" awarded the game a 9.5 out of 10, stating she thought that "If "Dark Souls 3" truly is the last in the series as we know it, then it's a worthy send-off." Rich Stanton of "Eurogamer" rated the game as "essential", calling it "fabulous" and that it was "a fitting conclusion" to the "Dark Souls" series. Steven Strom of "Ars Technica" wrote that he thought the title still had the "smooth and impressive rendering of the series' signature style" and some of "the best boss fights in any "Souls" game". Simon Parkin of "The Guardian" gave the game 5 out of 5 stars and wrote that while "Dark Souls III" "may not have the novelty of the first "Dark Souls"", it was "the more pristine and rounded work" of the series.


title: Dark Souls III

text: However, criticism was directed at issues with the game's technical performance, linear map design, and Bandai Namco's handling of the Western launch. Philip Kollar of "Polygon" rated the game a 7 out of 10, bluntly stating disappointment at the lack of surprises and the arbitrary nature of the game's design, writing that "in so many important ways -- its world design, its pacing, the technology powering it - "Dark Souls III" falls short of the mark." A later patch, released on April 9, fixed some of the technical issues reviewers had with the game.


title: Dark Souls III

text: Reception to "Ashes of Ariandel", the game's first downloadable content (DLC) expansion, was generally positive. Brendan Graeber of "IGN" enjoyed what the DLC offered, enjoying the introduction of a dedicated player versus player (PvP) arena, as well as the new enemies and bosses, but criticised the length, stating that "Ashes of Ariandel" served more as "an appetizer than a full course meal". Kollar of "Polygon" considered the content of the DLC to be "great" but agreed with Graeber's criticism of the length, saying that there was not much of it.


title: Dark Souls III

text: In Japan, the PlayStation 4 version sold over 200,000 copies in its first two weeks of release. It became the fastest-selling video game published by Bandai Namco Entertainment America, becoming its most successful day-one launch. It held the record for the fastest-selling Bandai Namco game up until it was surpassed by "Elden Ring" in 2022.


title: Dark Souls III

text: On May 10, 2016, Bandai Namco announced that "Dark Souls III" had reached three million copies shipped worldwide, with 500,000 in Japan and Asia, 1.5 million in North America, and one million in Europe. It was also reported that "Dark Souls III" was the best-selling software in North America in the month of release. By May 2020, the game had sold over 10 million copies.


title: Urethra

text: The urethra (from Greek οὐρήθρα – "ourḗthrā") is a tube that connects the urinary bladder to the urinary meatus for the removal of urine from the body of both females and males. In human females and other primates, the urethra connects to the urinary meatus above the vagina, whereas in marsupials, the female's urethra empties into the urogenital sinus.


title: Urethra

text: Females use their urethra only for urinating, but males use their urethra for both urination and ejaculation. The external urethral sphincter is a striated muscle that allows voluntary control over urination. The internal sphincter, formed by the involuntary smooth muscles lining the bladder neck and urethra, receives its nerve supply by the sympathetic division of the autonomic nervous system. The internal sphincter is present both in males and females.


title: Urethra

text: The urethra is a fibrous and muscular tube which connects the urinary bladder to the external urethral meatus. Its length differs between the sexes, because it passes through the penis in males.


title: Urethra

text: In the human male, the urethra is on average long and opens at the end of the external urethral meatus.


title: Urethra

text: There is inadequate data for the typical length of the male urethra; however, a study of 109 men showed an average length of 22.3 cm (SD = 2.4 cm), ranging from 15 cm to 29 cm.


title: Urethra

text: In the human female, the urethra is about 4 cm long, and exits the body between the clitoris and the vagina, extending from the internal to the external urethral orifice. The meatus is located below the clitoris. It is placed behind the symphysis pubis, embedded in the anterior wall of the vagina, and its direction is obliquely downward and forward; it is slightly curved with the concavity directed forward. The proximal two-thirds of the urethra is lined by transitional epithelial cells, while the distal third is lined by stratified squamous epithelial cells.


title: Urethra

text: Between the superior and inferior fascia of the urogenital diaphragm, the female urethra is surrounded by the urethral sphincter.


title: Urethra

text: The cells lining the urethra (the epithelium) start off as transitional cells as it exits the bladder, which are variable layers of flat to cuboidal cells that change shape depending on whether they are compressed by the contents of the urethra. Further along the urethra there are pseudostratified columnar and stratified columnar epithelia. The lining becomes multiple layers of flat cells near the end of the urethra, which is the same as the external skin around it.


title: Urethra

text: There are small mucus-secreting urethral glands, as well as bulbo-urethral glands of Cowper, that secret mucous acting to lubricate the urethra.


title: Urethra

text: The urethra consists of three coats: muscular, erectile, and mucous, the muscular layer being a continuation of that of the bladder.


title: Urethra

text: Somatic (conscious) innervation of the external urethral sphincter is supplied by the pudendal nerve.


title: Urethra

text: In the developing embryo, at the hind end lies a cloaca. This, over the fourth to the seventh week, divides into a urogenital sinus and the beginnings of the anal canal, with a wall forming between these two inpouchings called the urorectal septum. The urogenital sinus divides into three parts, with the middle part forming the urethra; the upper part is largest and becomes the urinary bladder, and the lower part then changes depending on the biological sex of the embryo. The cells lining the urethra (the epithelium) come from endoderm, whereas the connective tissue and smooth muscle parts are derived from mesoderm.


title: Urethra

text: After the third month, urethra also contributes to the development of associated structures depending on the biological sex of the embryo. In the male, the epithelium multiples to form the prostate. In the female, the upper part of the urethra forms the urethra and paraurethral glands.


title: Urethra

text: The urethra is the vessel through which urine passes after leaving the bladder. During urination, the smooth muscle lining the urethra relaxes in concert with bladder contraction(s) to forcefully expel the urine in a pressurized stream. Following this, the urethra re-establishes muscle tone by contracting the smooth muscle layer, and the bladder returns to a relaxed, quiescent state. Urethral smooth muscle cells are mechanically coupled to each other to coordinate mechanical force and electrical signaling in an organized, unitary fashion.


title: Urethra

text: The male urethra is the conduit for semen during sexual intercourse. Urine is removed before ejaculation by pre-ejaculate fluid – called Cowper's fluid – from the bulbourethral gland.


title: Urethra

text: Infection of the urethra is urethritis, which often causes purulent urethral discharge. It is most often due to a sexually transmitted infection such as gonorrhoea or chlamydia, and less commonly due to other bacteria such as ureaplasma or mycoplasma; trichomonas vaginalis; or the viruses herpes simplex virus and adenovirus. Investigations such as a gram stain of the discharge might reveal the cause; nucleic acid testing based on the first urine sample passed in a day, or a swab of the urethra sent for bacterial culture and sensitivity may also be used. Treatment usually involves antibiotics that treat both gonorrhoea and chlamydia, as these often occur together. A person being treated for urethritis should not have sex until the infection is treated, so that they do not spread the infection to others. Because of this spread, which may occur during an incubation period before a person gets symptoms, there is often contact tracing so that sexual partners of an affected person can be found and treatment offered.


title: Urethra

text: Cancer can also develop in the lining of the urethra. When cancer is present, the most common symptom in an affected person is blood in the urine; a physical medical examination may be otherwise normal, except in late disease. Cancer of the urethra is most often due to cancer of the cells lining the urethra, called transitional cell carcinoma, although it can more rarely occur as a squamous cell carcinoma if the type of cells lining the urethra have changed, such as due to a chronic schistosomiasis infection. Investigations performed usually include collecting a sample of urine for an inspection for malignant cells under a microscope, called cytology, as well as examination with a flexible camera through the urethra, called urethroscopy. If a malignancy is found, a biopsy will be taken, and a CT scan will be performed of other body parts (a CT scan of the chest, abdomen and pelvis) to look for additional lesions. After the cancer is staged, treatment may involve chemotherapy.


title: Urethra

text: Passage of kidney stones through the urethra can be painful. Damage to the urethra, such as by kidney stones, chronic infection, cancer, or from catheterisation, can lead to narrowing, called a urethral stricture. The location and structure of the narrowing can be investigated with a medical imaging scan in which dye is injected through the urinary meatus into the urethra, called a retrograde urethrogram. Additional forms of imaging, such as ultrasound, computed tomography and magnetic resonance imaging may also be used to provide further details.


title: Urethra

text: Foreign bodies in the urethra are uncommon, but there have been medical case reports of self-inflicted injuries, a result of insertion of foreign bodies into the urethra such as an electrical wire.


title: Urethra

text: Hypospadias and epispadias are forms of abnormal development of the urethra in the male, where the meatus is not located at the distal end of the penis (it occurs lower than normal with hypospadias, and higher with epispadias). In a severe chordee, the urethra can develop between the penis and the scrotum.


title: Urethra

text: A tube called a catheter can be inserted through the urethra to drain urine from the bladder, called an indwelling urinary catheter; or, to bypass the urethra, a catheter may be directly inserted through the abdominal wall into the bladder, called a suprapubic catheter. This may be to relieve or bypass an obstruction, to monitor how much urine someone produces, or because a person has difficulty urinating, for example due to a neurological cause such as multiple sclerosis. Complications that are associated with catheter insertion can include catheter-associated infections, injury to the urethra or nearby structures, or pain.


title: Urethra

text: The word "urethra" comes from the Ancient Greek stem "uro" relating to urination, with the structure described as early as the time of Hippocrates. Confusingly however, at the time it was called "ureter". Thereafter, terms "ureter" and "urethra" were variably used to refer to each other thereafter for more than a millennia. It was only in the 1550s that anatomists such as Bartolomeo Eustacchio and Jacques Dubois began to use the terms to specifically and consistently refer to what is in modern English called the ureter and the urethra. Following this, in the 19th and 20th centuries multiple terms relating to the structures such as urethritis and urethrography, were coined.


title: Urethra

text: Kidney stones have been identified and recorded about as long as written historical records exist. The urinary tract as well as its function to drain urine from the kidneys, has been described by Galen in the second century AD. Surgery to the urethra to remove kidney stones has been described since at least the first century AD by Aulus Cornelius Celsus.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Oleksandr Volodymyrovych Zinchenko (; born 15 December 1996) is a Ukrainian professional footballer who plays as a defender or midfielder for club Arsenal and the Ukraine national team.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko began his career at Russian Premier League team Ufa before joining Manchester City in 2016 for a fee around £1.7 million. A versatile player, he started his career as an attacking midfielder, but eventually converted into a left back or wing back under Pep Guardiola. He has since won four Premier League titles, four League Cups and an FA Cup with the club.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko was born in Radomyshl, Zhytomyr Oblast. He is a product of Youth Sporitve School Karpatiya of his native Radomyshl (with first coach Serhiy Boretskyi), FC Monolit Illichivsk and Shakhtar Donetsk, where he became the captain of the youth team. On 9 December 2013, he scored a goal in a 1–1 draw with Manchester United in the 2013–14 UEFA Youth League.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: He moved with his parents to Russia due to the war in Donbas. Shakhtar Donetsk wanted him back despite offering no playing time, but he did not return for security reasons. He spent between five and six months in the amateur leagues in Moscow. He then trained with Rubin Kazan but the club did not sign him to a contract since Zinchenko was still under contract to Shakhtar, and Rubin would risk incurring a transfer ban if they attempted to sign him.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 12 February 2015, he signed a contract with Ufa. He made his Russian Premier League debut for Ufa on 20 March 2015 in a match against FC Krasnodar. On 25 July 2015, he scored his first goal in a 1–2 defeat against FC Rostov.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 4 July 2016, Zinchenko signed for Premier League club Manchester City for an undisclosed fee believed to be around £1.7 million. The move surprised some. However, he was described by a Russian football scout as a "real talent", with Bundesliga club Borussia Dortmund also monitoring him.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko was loaned to Eredivisie club PSV on 26 August, for the 2016–17 season. He made his debut on 1 October, as a substitute in a 1–1 draw against SC Heerenveen.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko returned to Manchester City for the 2017–18 season, and made his debut on 24 October 2017, playing the full match including extra time in a 0–0 draw with Wolverhampton Wanderers in the EFL Cup. He made his first Premier League appearance on 13 December 2017, coming off the bench in a 4–0 away win at Swansea City.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 18 December 2017, Zinchenko scored the winning penalty kick against Leicester City after a 1–1 stalemate in regulation time, sending Manchester City through to the semi-finals of the EFL Cup.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko gained an extended run in the side following injuries to left backs Benjamin Mendy and Fabian Delph, putting in a number of consistent performances in the position.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko made his first appearance of the 2018–19 season in a 3–0 away win at Oxford United in the EFL Cup. In the same week, he made his first league start of the season in a 2–0 home win against Brighton & Hove Albion, due to injuries to Mendy and Delph.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko scored his first goal for Manchester City in the EFL Cup semi-final against Burton Albion on 9 January 2019, a 9–0 home win.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 25 October 2019, Zinchenko had a knee surgery in Barcelona. Manchester City coach Pep Guardiola told that the recovery from the injury would take from 5 to 6 weeks: "He had a contact with a knee. He felt something in the bone and had to stop. He had something to clean up the knee. It was not a big issue. Five or six weeks." At the beginning of December 2019, Zinchenko returned to full training. On 11 December 2019, he played his first game after the injury against Dinamo Zagreb. On 4 January 2020, he scored his second goal for Manchester City in a 4–1 win over Port Vale in the FA Cup. On 4 May 2021, Zinchenko was a part of the starting XI that saw Manchester City qualify for their first UEFA Champions League Final, after beating Paris Saint-Germain 2–0 on the night and 4–1 on aggregate. On 29 May, he later started that Champions League Final, which his team lost 1–0 against Chelsea.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 22 July 2022, Zinchenko signed for Premier League club Arsenal on a long-term contract for a reported fee of £30 million, potentially rising to £32 million in add-ons. On 5 August, he made his club debut and registered his first assist with the club, in a 2-0 away win against Crystal Palace in the Premier League.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: He made his international debut in a UEFA Euro 2016 qualification match against Spain on 12 October 2015. Zinchenko scored his first international goal in a friendly against neighbours Romania in Turin, which Ukraine won 4–3 on 29 May 2016. He also became Ukraine's youngest player to score an international goal at the age of 19 years and 165 days, beating a record held since 1996 by Andriy Shevchenko.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko was included in Ukraine's squad for Euro 2016, appearing as a substitute for Viktor Kovalenko in both of Ukraine's first two matches, against Germany and Northern Ireland as Ukraine failed to score and were the first team eliminated.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: On 24 March 2021 in the match against France, he became Ukraine's youngest player captain in their history at the age 24 years and 98 days. Later on, he was included in the squad for Euro 2020. On 29 June 2021, he scored the first goal and assisted the second goal in the Euro 2020 round of 16 match against Sweden, which ended in a 2–1 win for Ukraine after extra time, for which he was awarded the Star of the Match.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: In August 2020, Zinchenko married journalist Vlada Sedan. They have one daughter born in August 2021. Zinchenko identifies as an Eastern Orthodox Christian.


title: Oleksandr Zinchenko (footballer)

text: Zinchenko is a native Russian-speaker. He replies in Russian when asked in Ukrainian by Ukrainian journalists.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: Vincent Paul Abbott (March 11, 1964 – June 22, 2018) was an American musician best known for being the drummer and co-founder of the heavy metal band Pantera. He also co-founded Damageplan in 2003 with his younger brother, 'Dimebag' Darrell Abbott, and was a member of Hellyeah for 12 years from 2006 until his death in 2018.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: Vincent Paul Abbott was born in Abilene, Texas, on March 11, 1964. His parents were Jerry, a country music songwriter and producer, and Carolyn Abbott. Abbott originally played the tuba but was directed towards the drums by his father, who said there were no career prospects for a tuba player. His father bought him his first drum kit.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: Abbott formed the heavy metal band Pantera in 1981 with his brother Darrell Abbott and Terry Glaze on guitars, bassist Tommy D. Bradford, and vocalist Donnie Hart. Upon Hart's departure, Terry Glaze assumed vocal duties. In the summer of 1982, Bradford left the band and was succeeded by Rex Brown. The band released three albums with that lineup.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: Pantera recruited vocalist Phil Anselmo in 1987 and released "Power Metal" (album) in 1988. By 1990, the band had been signed to Atco Records and released "Cowboys from Hell", which proved to be the band's turning point. Over the course of four more studio records, a live album and , Anselmo and Pantera were nominated for four best metal performance Grammys for the songs "I'm Broken", "Suicide Note Pt. I", "Cemetery Gates", and "Revolution Is My Name".


title: Vinnie Paul

text: In 2001, Anselmo decided to put Pantera on hold because of back pain while he toured and recorded with his side projects. Pantera's official disbandment took place in 2003 for several reasons, but mainly because of the ongoing dispute between Anselmo and the Abbott brothers, although Rex Brown remained neutral. In the years to follow, animosity would stir up between Abbott and Anselmo although Anselmo had publicly announced that he wished for Abbott to forgive him and reform a friendship. However, Abbott stated that he was not interested in speaking to Anselmo.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: After the breakup of Pantera, the Abbott brothers formed the heavy metal band Damageplan with former tattoo artist Bob Zilla on bass and former Halford guitarist Pat Lachman on lead vocals. Damageplan recorded one album, "New Found Power", which was released on February 10, 2004. The song "Ashes to Ashes", a collaboration with Alice in Chains guitarist/vocalist Jerry Cantrell, was not completed in time to be featured on the album, but it was featured on the soundtrack to the 2004 film "The Punisher", and was a bonus track on the Japanese version of "New Found Power".


title: Vinnie Paul

text: On December 8, 2004, while on tour to support Damageplan's album, Darrell was shot and killed along with three others by Nathan Gale at the Alrosa Villa in Columbus, Ohio. Damageplan disbanded shortly thereafter. In a 2016 interview with Loudwire, Abbott revealed that there are five unreleased Damageplan tracks that were meant for the band's second album that was set to be released in 2005, but that those tracks have no vocals, only him and Darrell playing on them. Abbott said that he didn't know what to do with those tracks, but he often thought about having some of Darrell's favorite singers like Rob Halford of Judas Priest and Chris Cornell of Soundgarden to record vocals for the songs, but he didn't have time to do it because he was focused on his band Hellyeah.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: After the death of Darrell, Abbott formed Big Vin Records in February 2006 and released "Rebel Meets Rebel" and a DVD, "Dimevision, Volume 1". Abbott, along with Cristina Scabbia (co-lead vocalist of Lacuna Coil), wrote a monthly question-and-answer column in "Revolver". Abbott maintained endorsement deals with ddrum, Sabian cymbals, and Vic Firth drumsticks. He previously endorsed Tama, Pearl drums, and Remo drumheads and hardware.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: In June 2006, after an 18-month hiatus, Abbott was not sure if he would return to music, but eventually joined the heavy metal supergroup Hellyeah, which featured vocalist Chad Gray and guitarist Greg Tribbett from Mudvayne, guitarist Tom Maxwell from Nothingface, and bassist Bob Zilla from Damageplan, who was a replacement for original bassist Jerry Montano. Abbott recorded six studio albums with the band. In May 2019, it was announced that Hellyeah would tour for the first time since Abbott's death to support the final album he recorded with the band, "Welcome Home". Stone Sour drummer Roy Mayorga was chosen as Abbott's replacement.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: In November 2008, he handpicked several of his most memorable drum parts to demonstrate in a promotional video for the drum company ddrum: "Use My Third Arm", "Primal Concrete Sledge", "13 Steps to Nowhere", "Domination", and "Becoming".


title: Vinnie Paul

text: In 2009, he started American Drummer Champions with the aide of friend and influence M. Ludowise, former Downset drummer.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: In August 2013, Abbott was featured in a music video for Black Label Society's cover of "Ain't No Sunshine", appearing alongside a horse-masked Zakk Wylde. Wylde and Abbott were well known to be close friends, with Wylde also having been particularly close with Abbott's brother Darrell before his death in 2004.


title: Vinnie Paul

text: For several years, Abbott had been trying to publish a cookbook called "Drumming up an Appetite with Vinnie Paul".


title: Vinnie Paul

text: On June 22, 2018, Abbott died at his Las Vegas home at the age of 54. It was later revealed that Abbott had died from "dilated cardiomyopathy and coronary artery disease." News of his death was initially released on the official Pantera Facebook page, stating only his association with the bands Pantera, Damageplan, and Hellyeah, along with a statement requesting that the privacy of his family be respected. Five days before his death, Abbott's final performance took place at The Vinyl at the Hard Rock Hotel and Resort in Las Vegas. Following his death, tributes from all over the metal community began pouring in, including members of Black Sabbath, Guns N' Roses, Metallica, Megadeth, Alice in Chains, Lamb of God, Periphery, Slipknot, the Acacia Strain, In Flames, and many others. He is buried beside his mother, Carolyn, and brother, Darrell, at Moore Memorial Gardens Cemetery in Arlington, Texas. In late 2020, a protective fence was installed around the Abbott burial ground in an effort to stop vandalism; Abbott remarked, following the defacing of his brother's grave, that the vandalism was "a real disrespectful thing".


title: Vinnie Paul

text: Abbott used Tama drums during the "Cowboys from Hell" album and tour from 1990 until 1992. On the "Vulgar Display of Power" and "Far Beyond Driven" albums and tours respectively, he used Remo drums. Abbott endorsed Remo until "The Great Southern Trendkill", when he changed his endorsement to Pearl drums. He endorsed Pearl from 1996 until 2008, when he made his latest change to ddrum. Abbott used Sabian cymbals and Vic Firth drumsticks throughout his career. He was also known for using triggered samples mixed with live-miced drums during live shows. Starting in 2010, he used a ddrum Vinnie Paul signature series drum kit, with Evans drum heads, drum hardware, ddrum and Roland electronics, and Danmar red wood beaters and kick pads.


title: AUKUS

text: AUKUS (, ) is a trilateral security pact between Australia, the United Kingdom, and the United States, announced on 15 September 2021 for the Indo-Pacific region. Under the pact, the US and the UK will help Australia to acquire nuclear-powered submarines.


title: AUKUS

text: The pact also includes cooperation on advanced cyber, artificial intelligence and autonomy, quantum technologies, undersea capabilities, hypersonic and counter-hypersonic, electronic warfare, innovation and information sharing. The pact will focus on military capability, separating it from the Five Eyes intelligence-sharing alliance that also includes New Zealand and Canada.


title: AUKUS

text: The deal has been subject to both praise and disapproval. Caroline Kennedy, the US Ambassador to Australia, called the treaty a "greater and deeper partnership" between the countries and would act as a "lot of deterrence" to China's aggression in the Pacific region. The International Centre for Defence and Security called the pact a "a powerful statement about the priority of the Indo-Pacific" and as a statement "that the larger institutional groupings aren’t acting with the common purpose and speed that the current strategic and technological environment demands" The government of the People's Republic of China (PRC) was vocal in its contempt for the deal, accusing the three western powers of having a "cold-war mentality", as the deal was widely seen as being, at least in part, a response to China's status as an increasingly assertive emerging superpower.


title: AUKUS

text: On 17 September 2021, France, which is an ally of the three countries, recalled its ambassadors from Australia and the US; French foreign minister Jean-Yves Le Drian called the pact a "stab in the back" following Australia's cancellation of a French–Australian submarine deal worth €56 billion (A$90 billion) without notice, ending efforts to develop a deeper strategic partnership between France and Australia. It was also criticised for not involving New Zealand, an important strategic ally in the Pacific region, which was presumed to be because of the country's nuclear-free policy.


title: AUKUS

text: On 10 December 2022, Australia's Minister for Defence has announced their intentions of having Japan to join the pact.


title: AUKUS

text: In 2009, two years after the start of the project to replace the Royal Australian Navy's conventionally-powered submarines, the Australian Defence White Paper stated: "The Government has ruled out nuclear propulsion for these submarines".


title: AUKUS

text: In 2016, Australian prime minister Malcolm Turnbull signed a A$50 billion (€31 billion) deal with the partly French government-owned company Naval Group (known as DCNS until 2017) to design a new generation of submarines, known as the , under the "Future Submarine Program", scheduled to replace the "Collins" class. The design was based on the latest French nuclear-powered attack submarine, the Barracuda class, which required converting the nuclear propulsion to conventional propulsion. Another difference was that Australia chose to equip it with a United States Navy combat system and torpedo with Lockheed Martin Australia selected to integrate them into the design. Australia typically requires that part of their vessels be built there, which increases the cost. In this case it corresponded to 60 per cent of the contract value, with France handling the technology transfer.


title: AUKUS

text: In 2019, Australia signed a strategic partnership agreement with Naval Group to design and construct twelve submarines to be built in Australia. However, the project was beset by delays and cost overruns, leading to uncertainty and tension behind the scenes. The revised cost, including inflation during the length of the program, was A$90 billion (€56 billion).


title: AUKUS

text: In February 2021, an initial design plan was rejected as being too expensive, and Naval Group were given until September to improve their proposal. At a Senate inquiry in early June 2021, with delays ongoing, Defence Secretary Greg Moriarty revealed under questioning that he had considered making contingency plans if the French project was to fail, admitting that there had been ongoing problems for over a year. Two weeks later, Australian prime minister Scott Morrison met French president Emmanuel Macron in Paris and expressed concern about the project going off track, to which Macron replied that France was giving "full and complete" commitment and would proceed "further and faster if possible".


title: AUKUS

text: On 30 August 2021, the French and Australian defence and foreign affairs ministers released a joint statement reaffirming the project, stating that the "Ministers underlined the importance of the Future Submarine program."


title: AUKUS

text: Less than three weeks later, Australia decided to publicly cancel the contract with Naval Group for the "Attack"-class submarines despite having already spent about A$2.4 billion on the French project. It was expected that Australia would have to pay hundreds of millions of euros in penalties for cancelling the contract. The contract contained "control gates" with "off-ramps" at which point Australia could withdraw from the contract.


title: AUKUS

text: The Australian Department of Defence wrote to Naval Group on the same day the security pact was announced. The French Ministry of Defence claim the department told them that "they were satisfied with the submarine's achievable performance and with the progress of the program." Naval Group said that Australia "terminated the contract for convenience".


title: AUKUS

text: Morrison said that Australia now required a nuclear-powered submarine which has the advantages of greater speed, remaining underwater for longer and carrying heavier loads than a conventionally powered submarine, based on a change in the strategic situation in the Indo-Pacific.


title: AUKUS

text: "The Sunday Telegraph" reported that in March 2021 the Australian navy chief Vice Admiral Michael Noonan met in London with his British counterpart Admiral Tony Radakin and requested assistance from the UK and the US in acquiring nuclear-powered submarines. "The Daily Telegraph" reported that British Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab "helped broker the deal". "The New York Times" too reported that Australia first approached the UK for assistance. "Axios" reported that Australia and the UK first approached the US earlier in February. A trilateral discussion was held between Johnson, Biden and Morrison at the June 2021 G7 summit held in Cornwall, England. The talks took place without the knowledge of the French government or Naval Group. This approach was possible as a result of the UK not entering into a formal foreign policy and security treaty in the post-Brexit deal with the EU. As a result, the UK was free to pursue enhanced cooperation with other allies. "Axios" reported that the Biden administration sought assurances from Australia that cancelling the contract was not dependent on the US providing them with assistance and that cancelling was a fait accompli. Morrison said Australia had been considering an alternative to the "Attack"-class submarine deal for the past 18 months.


title: AUKUS

text: Although the joint announcement by Australian prime minister Scott Morrison, British prime minister Boris Johnson and US president Joe Biden did not mention any other country by name, anonymous White House sources have alleged it is designed to counter the influence of Chinese forces in the Indo-Pacific region. However, Johnson later told parliament that the move was not intended to be adversarial toward China.


title: AUKUS

text: US Secretary of State Antony Blinken and US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said that Australia did not have any "reciprocal requirements" as a consequence of the US sharing nuclear submarine propulsion technology such as Australia hosting intermediate-range missiles.


title: AUKUS

text: Under the pact, the US will share nuclear propulsion technology with Australia the same as it has with the UK since 1958 under the US–UK Mutual Defence Agreement as will the UK. The Royal Australian Navy will acquire at least eight nuclear-powered submarines armed with conventional weapons to be built in Australia. The basic design and key technologies will be decided by the Nuclear-Powered Submarine Task Force an 18-month Department of Defence research project headed by Vice Admiral Jonathan Mead, begun in September 2021 with assistance from the US and UK.


title: AUKUS

text: Australia will extend the life of its "Collins"-class submarines that the "Attack" class was due to replace and may consider leasing or buying nuclear-powered submarines from the US or the UK in the interim until the delivery of its future nuclear powered submarines. Also in the interim, Australian Defence Minister Peter Dutton said that Australia will have regular visits by US and UK nuclear-powered submarines. The annual Australia-US Ministerial Consultations (AUSMIN) between the Australian Ministers for Foreign Affairs and Defence and the US Secretaries of State and Defense held in September 2021 endorsed "increasing logistics and sustainment capabilities of U.S. surface and subsurface vessels in Australia."


title: AUKUS

text: Australia considered purchasing French nuclear submarines which use nuclear reactors fuelled by low-enriched uranium at less than 6%. However, French reactor designs have to be refuelled every ten years, and Australia does not have a civil nuclear capability with nuclear energy prohibited. In contrast, American and British designs power the submarines for the expected life of the submarines using nuclear reactors fuelled by highly enriched uranium (HEU) at 93% enrichment.


title: AUKUS

text: Currently, only six countries have nuclear submarines, the five permanent members of the UN Security Council (China, France, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States) and India. The New York Times reported that Australia will probably buy HEU from the US for the nuclear reactor that powers the submarine. The United States' naval reactors are all pressurized water reactors (PWR). The latest UK propulsion system is the Rolls-Royce PWR3 that will power the Royal Navy's new submarines currently being built and is "based on a US design but using UK reactor technology".