The Lion Sleeps Tonight

"Mbube"^[a] is a popular song originally written and composed by the South African musician Solomon Linda in 1939. It was first published in the Union of South Africa and made its way to the United States a decade later. In 1961, the Tokens adapted the melody and added English lyrics to produce "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", lending the song the name by which it is best known today.

Linda, a Zulu migrant worker, led the a capella group the Evening Birds. In 1939, without rehearsal, they recorded "Mbube", which fused traditional Zulu musical elements with Western influences. The recording was then released in the Union of South Africa to widespread popularity. It made Linda a local celebrity and shaped the development of the isicathamiya genre. However, he had sold his rights to "Mbube" to the owner of his parent record company, Eric Gallo, for ten shillings,^[b] unaware of what the transaction implied. This kept Linda from earning royalties. The recording of "Mbube" was then sent to a record label in the US, and upon being unearthed, it passed onto Pete Seeger of the folk group the Weavers. They covered the song in 1951 as "Wimoweh".^[c] A decade later, the Tokens, a doo-wop group, encountered "Wimoweh" and decided to record their own version. After adapting the melody and adding English lyrics, they released "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", although Linda did not receive any credit. It topped the US charts.

By the mid-2000s, around 150 artists across the world had covered the song, and it had been included in the 1994 Disney film The Lion King, earning an estimated $15 million in royalties. Linda, who had died three decades earlier, was yet unrecognised for his contributions to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". His descendants had earned very little and were left destitute. Emboldened, they filed a lawsuit against Disney for copyright violation in 2004. Within two years, they reached an out-of-court settlement with Abilene Music, in which the firm agreed to pay the family a lump sum for past royalties and offer them a share of future revenue. The case drew international attention and bore wider legal implications, such as on British copyright law.

While global commercial success transformed "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" into an iconic pop song, the song is now associated with long-running racial exploitation. The song and Linda's history has been probed in numerous documentaries and is the part-inspiration of the 2020 film Black Is King.

Solomon Linda was born in a rural part of the Colony of Natal, in southern Africa.^[5] During his childhood, he followed the Virginia Jubilee Singers, an American minstrel group that toured South Africa and performed spirituals.^[6] A migrant worker^[7] and beer hall singer,^[8] Linda sang in a short-lived choir named the Evening Birds, which dissolved in 1933. Soon after, he founded a new group under the same name. The group, comprising himself as soprano, Gilbert Madondo as alto, Boy Sibiya as tenor, and Samuel Mlangeni, Gideon Mkhize, and Owen Sikhakhane as basses,^[9] performed a cappella in the weekends and quickly grew a local following.^[10] Working-class culture in South Africa flourished around this time as the nation's manufacturing industry grew.^[5] After moving to Johannesburg,^[10] Linda became a packer at Eric Gallo's local record-pressing plant,^[11][d] the only one in black Africa.^[13] It was not long before the firm's talent scout noticed the Evening Birds and invited them to the recording studio.^[14] Back then, record firms eyed Zulu close-harmony vocal music owing to its appeal to migrant mineworkers.^[15]

The Evening Birds recorded multiple songs at Gallo's studio, and during their second session, in 1939, they recorded "Mbube".^[16][a] It was finished without prior rehearsal after three takes.^[17] Also featured in the recording are Peter Rezant on guitar, Emily Motsieloa on piano, and possibly Willie Gumede on banjo.^[1] Gallo was impressed with "Mbube" and had it converted into 78 rpm records; it then aired on the rediffusion, a landline that transmitted music and news across black neighbourhoods.^[16]

Performed in four-part harmony^[18] with Mlangeni, Mkhize, and Sikhakhane on bass, Madondo and Sibiya on middle tones, and Linda on soprano,^[19] "Mbube" is sung in a call and response format: the phrases of each section overlap with each other. It follows a cyclical structure.^[18] The melody is built over three chords,^[17] and the chord progression borrows from the marabi harmonic cycle common in twentieth-century South African music (I-IV-I^6/4-V⁷-I).^[18]

Journalist Sharon LaFraniere describes the melody as "tender ... almost childish in its simplicity".^[20] In South African author Rian Malan's view, "'Mbube' wasn't the most remarkable tune, but there was something terribly compelling about the underlying chant, a dense meshing of low male voices above which Linda yodeled and howled for two minutes, mostly making it up as he went along".^[17] Of particular interest to commentators are the song's final few seconds,^[21] where Linda breaks out into a brief howl that Malan describes as "a haunting skein of fifteen notes".^[22] This would later become the melodic basis for the Tokens' cover.^[21]

The lyrics, written in Zulu,^[23] are said to document an episode of Linda's childhood when he chased a lion while herding cattle.^[24][e]

The chorus "wembube"^[f] is repeated throughout.^[30] "Mbube" borrows strongly from Western influences introduced by missionaries and white singing troupes, among which is the four-part harmony,^[19] with music historian Veit Erlmann asserting that the main body "displays only a few features which can be said to be rooted in traditional performance practice."^[31] These Western elements, argues journalist Lior Phillips, "gave 'Mbube' a chance globally".^[19] Erlmann notes that the song's triadic structure and harmonic progression resemble urban, Westernised genres^[32] and that, by contrast, the metrically-free introduction mirrors traditional dance music.^[33] The vocal lines are intended to evoke tin whistles characteristic of South African street music.^[19]

"Mbube" achieved widespread success. With over 100,000 copies sold in Africa over the next nine years,^[34] Erlmann considers it the first South African "hit".^[35] It made Linda "a legend in the Zulu subculture", and his band went on to dominate all-night song competitions, according to Malan.^[36] Nonetheless, he did not profit,^[37] as he sold his rights to "Mbube" to Eric Gallo for ten shillings^[38][b] just after the recording session.^[39] Seeing that Linda could not read^[20] and had no understanding of royalties,^[40] a South African court would, by 2006, deem this deal unfair.^[41] Gallo also paid Linda the equivalent of $2 for the first run of a few hundred records.^[19] The Evening Birds continued performing until 1948,^[42] remaining prominent till their disbanding.^[43] But Linda would never attain wealth or fortune. He lived in a household with a dirt floor coated in cow manure, and malnutrition took the life of one of his children.^[20] In 1959, Linda collapsed onstage, which doctors ruled a result of kidney failure.^[44] He died three years later aged 53.^[45] At the time of his death, his bank account contained roughly $40 in today's money.^[46][h] His family could not afford a tombstone.^[49]

"Mbube" defined contemporary South African music and the isicathamiya genre.^[50] Isicathamiya is a form of a capella choral song^[51] stemming from "elements of Zulu traditional music ... rehearsed and performed after hours in migrant workers' hostels", in writer Gwen Ansell's words,^[52] along with Western, Christian influences.^[53] The word mbube became shorthand for male a cappella choral singing in South Africa^[54][i] and lent its name to a distinct music style. This style, notes anthropologist David B. Coplan, "appealed across the class spectrum, melodised a growing African nationalism, created nostalgia for a lost society, and fused urban and rural values".^[42] According to Erlmann, "Mbube" became "canonic for an entire generation of performers".^[55] For instance, all subsequent South African music styles adopted its booming I-IV-V bass patterns.^[55]

Some years later, Gallo sent a bundle of records to Decca Records in the United States.^[57] They were about to be discarded before a Decca employee and ethnomusicologist, Alan Lomax, salvaged them; among these records was "Mbube". He handed the box over to folk singer Pete Seeger of the Weavers.^[58] A penniless banjo player, Seeger had entered the music scene after quitting university and accustoming himself with popular songs of the Great Depression.^[59] "Mbube" fascinated him,^[58] and he promptly transcribed it word for word,^[60] although he misheard the chorus as wimoweh.^[61] "What really grabbed Pete", writes Jeese Jarnow in his Weavers biography, "was the high, worldess falsetto that floated on top and—most especially—where it landed, in a secondary melody, sad and sweet".^[62]

Seeger convened the band at the Village Vanguard to record it. He attempted to describe the vocal parts of "Mbube" as he heard them, and the Weavers eventually settled on a repeated chant of "wimoweh, a-wimoweh",^[62] with Seeger performing falsettoes.^[63] As Malan writes, their recording "was faithful to the Zulu original in almost all respects save for the finger-popping rhythm".^[64] To broaden its appeal, the bandleader Gordon Jenkins composed a brass accompaniment to the recording, which stressed Linda's brief howl toward the end of "Mbube".^[65]

In December 1951,^[56] the Weavers released "Wimoweh".^[64] Seeger later remarked that it was "just about my favorite song to sing for the next forty years".^[58] Shortly after its release, Gallo sold "Mbube" to the American Richmond Organization in exchange for the rights to administer "Wimoweh" in some bush territories.^[39] Even though records of "Mbube" contained the words African Music Research Copyright Control, Richmond claimed it was a folk song.^[65] All songwriting credits were thus given to the fictitious "Paul Campbell", a tactic enabling the Weavers to claim royalties on songs from the public domain, even if "Mbube" was not in the public domain.^[66] Such a practice was common at the time.^[67] Royalties for "Wimoweh" were split two ways: half went to the Weavers' publishers—Howard Richmond (of The Richmond Organization) and Albert Brackman—and their manager, Pete Kameron, and the other half to the Weavers.^[68] None went to Linda.^[69]

"Wimoweh" reached No. 6 on the US charts,^[70][j] but this success was briefly derailed when Harvey Matusow, a prolific informer of the McCarthy era, accused three of the Weavers of being affiliated with the Communist Party.^[72] Nevertheless, it became a Weavers standard.^[73] The song's profile was raised when they performed it at Carnegie Hall in 1957.^[74] Jimmy Dorsey^[75] and the Kingston Trio recorded covers around this time.^[74]

Malan writes that by the end of the 1950s, "almost everyone in America knew the basic refrain" of "Wimoweh".^[75] After hearing a live Weavers performance of the song,^[78][k] the Tokens, a teen doo-wop group from Brooklyn, decided to record their own version.^[80] They had already attained a hit, "Tonight I Fell in Love", and signed up with RCA for a three-record contract effectively commencing in 1961.^[81] While their first two records, "When I Go to Sleep at Night/Dry Your Eyes" and "Sincerely", struggled commercially, their third would fare better.^[82]

For their third attempt,^[82] the Tokens approached the musician George David Weiss and solicited an overhaul of "Wimoweh" to "give it some intelligible lyrics and a contemporary feel".^[79] He purged the song of its shrieks and hollers, while leaving the chant unchanged,^[79] and made Linda's final improvised notes the new tune.^[21] Thirty-three words were added as English lyrics,^[83] beginning with, "In the jungle, the mighty jungle, the lion sleeps tonight".^[84] Jarnow notes that the lyrics were based on "a vague understanding of ["Mbube"]'s title".^[85] The Tokens then recorded Weiss' version, with Jay Siegel performing falsettos, the rest of the band chanting "wimoweh", and guest opera singer Anita Darian "[diving] in the high heavens" with her "haunting" countermelodies, in Malan's words.^[83][l] Accompanying them were an orchestra, a percussionist on timpani, and session musicians on guitar, drums and bass.^[83] Hugo Peretti and Luigi Creatore produced the piece.^[82] Ultimately, the Tokens were not particularly enthralled with "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", and it was released in October 1961^[87] as a B-side.^[83] Linda received no credit.^[88]

While the A-side "Tina" failed,^[83] "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" surged to No. 1 in the US charts^[43] and in numerous other countries.^[8] Many covers of the song found similar success in the years to come.^[22] According to the writers Marti Smiley Childs and Jeff March, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was the first African song to top the US charts.^[82] The Tokens subsequently became music producers, and while their fame as performers waned—only managing to land their next top 40 US single four years later—they flourished in their new role. Among their productions was the Chiffons' "He's So Fine", a No. 1 hit.^[82]

By the mid-2000s, "Mbube" had been recorded by over 150 artists worldwide^[101] and played a role in more than thirteen movies.^[20] Many are covers of the Tokens' version, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", including Robert John's, which rose to No. 3 in the US a decade later,^[102] and Tight Fit's, which topped the UK charts in 1982.^[103] Beyond the English-speaking world, a cover by the Swedish pop group the Hounds became a large hit in the Nordic countries in 1967,^[104] and French and Japanese covers achieved chart success in the 1990s.^[105] Miriam Makeba performed "Mbube" at President John F. Kennedy's 1962 birthday.^[106] In 1994, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" rose to the spotlight when it featured in the Disney film The Lion King.^[107] The film would gross nearly $1 billion^[19] and produce many soundtrack CDs.^[108] It was later included in the 1997 staged musical of the same name,^[40] which remains the highest-grossing Broadway show of all time.^[19] The 2019 Lion King remake also used a version "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" sung by Seth Rogen and Billy Eichner.^[109]

Karl Denver, born in Glasgow, Scotland, spent much of his youth at sea and eventually served in the Korean War.^[110] He was wounded; while recovering, he practised the guitar and became interested in folk and country music.^[111] Upon settling in Lancashire, England, he performed in pubs and clubs.^[110] His hallmark piece was a cover of "Wimoweh", which Spencer Leigh of The Independent notes for its "octave-spanning acrobatics" and "electrifying" nature.^[110] He claimed to have learned "Wimoweh" in South Africa as a seaman.^[111] Denver's recording of "Wimoweh" was held off from being released for some time, until 1961,^[111] shortly after the Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" came out.^[110] It reached No. 4 in the UK and remains his best-known song.^[110]

The Canadian group The Townsmen reached No. 70 in Canada with their version released by Regency Records in October 1966. ^[112]

As a child, John engaged with street-corner doo-wop groups; he first achieved chart success at age twelve. In the 1960s, he partnered with the songwriter Michael Gately, with whom he wrote the hit "If You Don't Want My Love" and other songs, including for other artists.^[120] His solo efforts "took off", in music journalist Jon Blistein's words, when he covered the Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight"^[120] in 1971.^[121] It reached No. 3 on the Billboard Hot 100^[121] and sold over a million records.^[120] However, since Atlantic Records kept him from producing an album, John then broke from singing, before returning in the late 1970s.^[120]

Tight Fit's cover of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was the UK's fourth best-selling single in 1982. That year, their rendition of "Fantasy Island" was also of the best-selling UK singles.^[136] In its review of the band's eponymous 1982 album, Pop Rescue notes the song's "tom-tom-laden drums and Tarzan-like vocals".^[137]

Conflict over songwriting credits and royalty payments has engulfed "Wimoweh" and "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" ever since their release. The earliest dispute dates to around 1951. Upon learning that Solomon Linda was not to be granted any songwriting royalties, Pete Seeger objected, insisting that Linda, as the "true" author of "Wimoweh", should receive his due. He directed his publisher to send Linda the royalties, at one point dispatching a $1,000 check himself,^[158] but Linda's daughters later denied that consistent payments for "Wimoweh" had been made since the 1950s.^[159] Nonetheless, Seeger eventually stated that "I never got author's royalties on 'Wimoweh'. ... I assumed [the song's publishers] were keeping the publisher's fifty percent and sending the rest".^[160] In 1971, The Richmond Organization acknowledged that the song was based on "Mbube", and since then, Linda's family has received royalty payments totalling 12.5 percent of "Wimoweh"'s overall earnings.^[161]

The next dispute concerned the Tokens' revision. Hugo Peretti, Luigi Creatore, and George David Weiss credited "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" solely to themselves, thinking that the Weavers' tune was based on traditional African music and thus could not be copyrighted, but this was not the case.^[160] As the song was achieving widespread success, Howard Richmond insisted that the trio cede publishing rights back to the Weavers. They complied, and the Tokens retained full songwriting credits.^[44]

However, the conflict was still unresolved. In 1989, the copyright on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was about to expire, and Weiss demanded Richmond and Brackman pay him and his fellow songwriters a generous bonus, lest he renew the song's copyright without crediting them at all. Richmond and Brackman accused Weiss' team of plagiarising the Weavers' recording, but they retorted that they had received permission to adapt the song in 1961.^[162] The dispute made its way to court a year later.^[163] Here, litigants representing The Richmond Organization argued that the 1961 permission was "inaccurate" and attempted to expose Weiss for adapting Linda's "Mbube" without making due payments to Linda's family.^[164] The court eventually ruled in favour of Weiss' team,^[165] with Judge John Keenan declaring their adaptation of "Wimoweh" a separate composition.^[166] While Weiss' team retained rights over "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", the court ordered that they send ten percent of performance royalties—profits made whenever the composition was broadcast^[167]—to Linda's family.^[105] By 1992, Abilene Music had acquired the rights to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".^[168]

In spite of the song's immense fame, Linda's family had earned very little in royalties,^[20] and Linda himself had been all but forgotten.^[41] Due to this,^[78] in 2000, South African journalist Rian Malan penned an essay for Rolling Stone which shed light on the origins of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".^[84] He told the story of "Mbube", its eventual rise to success, and the struggles faced by Linda's daughters,^[169] and concluded that "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" had earned some $15 million in royalties.^[170] Two years later, fellow South African François Verster composed a documentary about Linda and "Mbube", A Lion's Trail.^[171] In writers Håvard Ovesen and Adam Haupt's view, it "seeks to obtain justice for a man marginalised by his status as a black African musician in a racist and exploitative environment".^[172] Both Malan's essay and Verster's documentary publicised Linda's history.^[18]

At the turn of the century, Linda's family was still desperately poor, living in what BBC News described as "a tiny township house of three rooms, an outside toilet, and an asbestos roof without a ceiling".^[174] Five of his eight children had died.^[175] However, with Malan's article sparking public interest in their condition,^[176] they decided to take action. They started publicly calling for the royalties from "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" they, in their view, were due. The South African government supported their cause, and the Gallo Record Company vowed to pay their legal fees.^[174] Some time later, in July 2004,^[177] they sued Disney for $1.5 million for its use of the song in The Lion King.^[46][m][n] The family also demanded 6 million rand from three South African companies profiting from royalties.^[177][o] Owen Dean, a South African lawyer who steered their case,^[109] argued that they received some $15,000 in royalties from 1991 to 2000, roughly spanning the period of The Lion King's success, while the song earned an estimated total of $15 million.^[101] "There has ... been a misappropriation of South African culture—the song is thought to be American", he stated.^[178]

However, the fact that Linda's wife, who was illiterate, and their daughters signed away the rights to the song on three separate occasions complicated their case.^[20] Disney pledged to fight the suit,^[179] responding to the family's accusations of copyright violations thus: "Solomon Linda's widow assigned all rights in Mbube to [a music publisher] more than 20 years ago and did so with the assistance of legal counsel".^[180] It also maintained that Abilene Music, which held the US copyright to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", had given it the rights to use the song.^[178] While acknowledging that Disney's statement was correct,^[181] Dean argued that Abilene Music was still liable for copyright infringement since, under the 1911 Imperial Copyright Act,^[182] the rights had reverted to Linda's heirs 25 years after his death.^[183] The case garnered attention all over the world,^[109] and a trial was set for February 2006.^[184]

However, shortly before the opening date, the case was settled.^[184] Abilene Music agreed to pay the family a lump sum representing royalties earned from 1987 onward,^[20] as well as grant them a share of future income until 2017.^[109][p] While the amount was not disclosed, the family's lawyers claimed that the family "should be quite comfortable".^[20][q] The profits were to be collected in a trust.^[185] Linda was recognized for his work and received a cowriting credit on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".^[109] According to Dean, the settlement allowed that:

• The Linda heirs will receive payment for past uses of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and an entitlement to future royalties from its worldwide use.
• "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" is acknowledged as derived from "Mbube".
• Solomon Linda is acknowledged as a co-composer of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and will be designated as such in the future.
• A trust will be formed to administer the heirs' copyright in "Mbube" and to receive on their behalf the payments due out of the use of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight".^[184]

The case set a precedent that, under British copyright law, "heirs of authors who are not benefiting from the copyrighted works of their forbears [could] obtain remuneration arising from the exploitation of such works", not just in South Africa, but in any former British colony where the 1911 Imperial Copyright Act was law.^[184] Prior to the settlement, the court had acknowledged that Linda probably sold "Mbube" under unfair circumstances.^[41] South Africa's East Coast Radio suggests that the case stirred on other families of artists, such as Bob Marley's, to consider legal action.^[186]

In an act separate from the case in September 2004, The Richmond Organization admitted to not paying enough royalties to Linda's heirs for a version of "Mbube", promising to donate $3,000 annually and finance a memorial to Linda.^[187] Musicologist Carol A. Muller notes that Linda enjoyed no legal rights as a black South African in the pre-apartheid years of segregation. However, by the time his family filed a lawsuit, apartheid had been abolished, and South Africa had become a democratic nation.^[188] In 2012, "Mbube" fell into the public domain in South Africa.^[189] According to a grandson of Linda, the family made approximately between $20,000 and $65,000 per year from "Lion Sleeps Tonight" while the settlement terms were active,^[109] while another source indicates that each daughter earned around $250,000 in the decade following the settlement.^[88]

As of 2020, "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" continued to cause legal conflict.^[189] The Linda family's settlement with Disney became void in 2017, keeping them from profiting from the 2019 film The Lion King, which sampled an alternate version the song.^[109] Linda's grandson stated, "There was no courtesy of informing the family about inclusion of a new version of the song in the movie. And we are not convinced the family is not supposed to derive revenue from the use of a new version of 'The Lion Sleeps Tonight' and are currently in the process of procuring legal advice".^[109] Nonetheless, Rolling Stone estimates that Linda's heirs would have only received a few thousand dollars in royalties from the 2019 film.^[109]

"Mbube" is one of the most commercially successful pop songs in history^[171] and according to Malan, the most famous melody born in Africa.^[191] It and its covers have been recorded by well over a hundred artists around the world:^[101] Glen Campbell, R.E.M., Bert Kaempfert,^[22] Yma Sumac,^[15] the Mahotella Queens,^[189] among others. More than thirteen movies sample it.^[20] Malan additionally describes the Tokens' "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" as an "immortal pop epiphany".^[22]

However, its legacy is more complicated. Because of the copyright issues surrounding it, the journalists David Browne and Simon Robinson deem "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" one of pop music's most contentious tunes.^[192] The song's association with long-running racial and, in Ovesen and Haupt's view, capitalist,^[172] exploitation has been discussed in several articles and papers.^[193] Malan likens Linda's story of perceived injustice with that of other black musicians such as Huddie Ledbetter, who "lost half of his publishing to his white 'patrons'".^[194] At the same time, he points out that Linda had sold "Mbube" by choice and that the deal was legal.^[194]

Some scholars parallel the family's legal victory and eventual recognition of Linda's efforts with South Africa's transition away from apartheid and into democracy.^[195] According to Carol A. Muller, "Mbube" "[opened] the doors to South African music and musicians abroad in the twentieth century", as displayed by Paul Simon's 1986 album Graceland that incorporates elements from isicathamiya.^[18] Ovesen and Haupt's view is more nuanced. They contend that, while justice ultimately seems to have been served for Linda, "the power structures that enable the continuation of huge socio-economic disparities are still in place".^[196]

The history of "Mbube" and the plight of Linda's daughters have been chronicled. Beyond Malan's essay and Vester's documentary,^[171] they were covered in the 2019 Netflix documentary ReMastered: The Lion's Share.^[197] Beyoncé's 2020 musical film Black Is King partially came into being after she learned of how Linda was not recognised for his contributions to "The Lion Sleeps Tonight". In the film, the original "Mbube" rather than the Tokens' version is used.^[198]

Since 2018, the first few seconds of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" have featured in a genre of Internet meme or remix, when a video is paused at a still frame of a character immediately before a traumatic event befalls them, accompanied by the opening refrain of the song.^[199] In October 2025, social media user "xerias_x" used a longer excerpt of the song in an AI-generated video, featuring the face of Donald Trump superimposed onto the body of a lion, and the faces of various Democratic Party figures superimposed onto other animals.^[200][201] In February 2026, Trump shared a video on Truth Social that included a brief clip from this AI video, depicting Barack and Michelle Obama as apes; "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" was audible in the clip.^[202][203]

• "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", performed by the Tokens
• Cover of "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", performed by Ladysmith Black Mambazo and the Mint Juleps

• Commentary on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" and the legal dispute and settlement surrounding it, by Richard Silverstein
• 2010 BBC podcast on "The Lion Sleeps Tonight", hosted by Paul Gambaccini
• Video comparing "Mbube" and "The Lion Sleeps Tonight" by VYIMBVBE
• Documentary on Solomon Linda by VYIMBVBE