Review of two new releases     Fela Kuti Shuffering and Smiling/No Agreement; Confusion/Gentleman; Stalemate/Fear Not for Man; Original Suffer Head/I. T. T. MCA Of related interest: Femi Kuti; James Brown; '70s-era Miles Davis   Fela Kuti says it himself, right at the start of "Fear Not For Man": "The secret of life is to have no fear." This is, without a doubt, fearless music. These four reissues capture a flicker of the kinetic performer who was to his native Nigeria what Bob Marley was to Jamaica, an artist who transcended music and became an agitator and international spokesman for black freedom. Despite bannings, imprisonment, beatings and the murders of family members brought on by his political beliefs, Fela continued his consciousness-raising antics through three roiling decades of agony and victory, never surrendering to either repression or complacency. Even his tragic death from AIDS in 1997 made a political statement of sorts, heightening awareness of the disease's death-grip on his continent. All of this agit-prop strengthened Fela's music. Like Marley, his message added weight to the vibe. The first hot blast of Fela's music packs immediacy and drive, the sexual energy of a satyr and the monomania of a zealot. Merge the sweat, power and natural mystic measure of James Brown, John Coltrane and Marley and you get a taste of the man's mojo. In the studio, Fela tended to a distinctive M.O., cutting instrumentals on one side of an album and a vocal take on the other. Each one of these reissues sandwiches a pair of LPs, providing hour-long tours of Fela's milieu. My personal favorite is Original Suffer Head/ I.T.T. with "Suffer Head" and its skittering horns, swirling organ and wild vocal, "Power Show," one of Fela's sunniest grooves, and his anti-imperialist exorcism "International Thief Thief." But all have their moments, immersing you in Fela's world of defiance, anger, sarcasm and brutal funk, jazz and dance music. Rather than JB's sonic stops and starts, Fela favored dense trance grooves. A piece often starts with a taut strut right out of the box: a chunky, scratched guitar figure, loping bass, woodblock, trap and percussion piled like an orgy. A simple electric piano or organ riff follows, signaling Fela's bottom-heavy tenor sax, which swaggers, atavistic and soulful, atop the sinuous groove. The lyrics mix his native Yoruba tongue with French patois and infectious Pidgin English. Fela knew that to be understood throughout Africa--and the world--he would have to sing in English. He does so with a voice Muddy Waters-deep and cocky as sin, eliciting ecstatic call-and-response from his chorus of wives and children. Unlike his fellow revolutionaries in Jamaica, Fela didn't believe in dub magic--no studio short-cuts or gimmickry. If he wanted more sound or depth, he simply added musicians. On tour, his 70-strong Africa 70, complete with his 20-plus wives, stormed stages. As the music pulsed and shimmied, the line between artist and audience became irrelevant. There was just the throb of rhythm and the mad, undulating crush. As Fela foments his 20 minutes of musical rebellion and the Africa 70 horn section fuels him with staccato chants, you'd swear governments could tumble. Bill Smith