By now you may have heard of, watched or are looking forward to viewing the latest in a string of documentaries attempting to unravel the music and life of reggae superstar Bob Marley. So what can the new documentary ‘Marley’ reveal to us that others have not covered?
As a hardcore Bob Marley fan for over 30 years, I sat in great anticipation hoping to finally get an honest and truthful account of the life of one of my musical icons. So why was I disappointed after two and a half hours of watching what was supposed to be the definitive film on the life of Bob Marley? Perhaps having seen most documentaries on Bob, read the majority of biographical accounts, listened over and over again to all of his albums including demos, concerts and interviews – from the outset I expected certain facts to be mentioned in the film and they were not. So I decided to research what was the goal of the film. What did the director Kevin McDonald hope to achieve?
The goal of this documentary was to find out as the director put it: “Why does he (Bob) still speak to people around the world and why does he speak to people so much more profoundly than any other rock artist or popular music artist?” Marley’s son Ziggy who approved of the film being made, when asked what message he thought people should take from the film said “I don’t think there’s a specific message. I want people to feel an emotional connection to Bob, a human connection as a friend, as family.”
So with this in mind I begin my critique of the documentary ‘Marley’ that once and for all promised to reveal to us the real ‘Bob Marley’. ‘The most personal Bob film any one will ever see. You will cry and smile’ we were told.
The Maafa
The documentary begins with us being taken to Cape Coast slave dungeon in West Africa – Ghana (a horrific place that I have visited), where kidnapped Africans were held before being taken across the turbulent seas of the Atlantic ocean onto the Caribbean and Americas. We are told (by the tour guide) that in this country alone the population was decimated by the loss of sixty million lives to the Trans Atlantic Slave Trade in Africans. We then walk towards ‘the door of no return’, and emerge onto the stage with Bob Marley yelling ‘Jah Rastafari!’ as the atmosphere is charged with the repatriation song Exodus. Powerful! Hopefully this would set the stage for the viewer to understand how Africa through Rastafarianism fuelled the music of Bob the revolutionary African Rasta man.
“Cause we’re moving right out of Babylon
and we’re going to our father’s land’….
…Africa, Unite ’cause the children wanna come home,
yeah yeah”…Bob Marley (Africa Unite)
This is the first scene used by the directors to create emotional affinity between Bob and the viewer i.e. he was stolen property (no one wants to be stolen property). But unfortunately that is as far as the historical context of Africa’s link with Jamaica goes.
From the stage we travel to the stunning countryside of St Ann’s Jamaica, Bob’s birthplace. It is a world shrouded in deep and spiritual mysticism – rich in African spiritual traditions with a wisdom that would colour much of Bob’s music and understanding of the world throughout his life; especially given that his Grandfather Omeriah was a spiritual healer who shared some of his knowledge with his grandson. The film captures the mystic feeling of St Ann’s very well (through striking cinematography of the landscape) that eerie feeling of ‘other worldly’ presence and also the poverty of the region.
This was a world still reeling from the legacies of slavery where Blacks could not hold high social positions like policemen and bankers. For the most part they would do labour intensive jobs, working mainly in agriculture. It is in this caste system based on racial subjugation that beliefs of White superiority or having White blood or features was seen as a blessing whilst blackness was seen as inferior. This is the first context that the film misses out on, this world which shaped Bob’s world. We are not given a chance to understand or engage with this world – we bypass it.
However, using interviews with Neville ‘Bunny’ Livingstone aka Bunny Wailer and Bob’s cousin ‘Sledgo’ Peart we are taken into another world – Bob’s immediate surroundings, the home on the hill that he was born in, the school he went to, and the family that allegedly ‘rejected’ him. Yet this world is secondary and not the primary world that we need to understand if we are to form a connection with Bob the boy and the man that he became. A world shaped by the legacy of the British colonial experience which he often addressed in his music.
“I and I build a cabin
I and I plant the corn
Didn’t my people before me
Slave for this country
Now you look me with a scorn
Then you eat up all my corn…
…Build your penitentiary, we build your schools
Brainwash education to make us the fools
Hatred your reward for our love
Telling us of your God above”…Bob Marley (Crazy Baldheads)
Rejection
Within the first ten minutes of the film we are informed that Bob, the product of a sixty plus year old colonial civil servant, and a sixteen year old country girl was rejected by his Black family for being the son of a White man. This is the second point made to help us “connect emotionally” to Bob as many people can re-count stories of rejection from loved ones in their childhood, and perhaps this draws us closer to Bob.
The legacy of slavery has indeed left deep scars of racial inferiority in its victims. If indeed Bob did feel rejected because he was mixed-race, it should be looked at within this wider context and along with the possibility that the family may have been angry that a much older man (as often happened to Black women during slavery) had impregnated their sixteen year old daughter.
To verify the validity of Bunny Wailers statement that Bob Marley had allegedly been rejected by his family, perhaps it would have been more appropriate if Bob’s mother, Cedella Booker and Aunt Amy were asked to expand upon the assertion that he was rejected by the family, or was it just Bunny’s perception! But it is afforded no discussion in the film and therefore paints a rather distorted picture.
Cousin Peart tells us that their grandmother Yaya (Katherine Malcolm) called Bob a ‘German boy,’ yet this is something Jamaicans are known to do, call people names according to physical features or character traits – it does not mean that she rejected him because he was half-white. For example, if you are born with one eye in Jamaica and many other parts of the Caribbean like Barbados, it is very likely that you will always be referred to not by your birth name but as ‘one eye’.
When asked by the interviewer if Bob was teased as a child Bunny Wailer informs us that he was “more than teased, he was rejected. His uncles,” he continues “made him work twice as hard because of his skin colour.” In a previous documentary (Rebel Music, 2000) Wailer tells us “I wouldn’t say Bob wasn’t wanted as such, he was more on the side.”
This is not to say that Bob did not feel out of place at times but whether he felt he was rejected (particularly by his Black family) because of his skin colour is questionable. Certainly it has been said by his school teacher ‘Miss Bushay’ ‘that some of the children could get jealous of Bob if given more attention than them because he was red (lighter in skin tone),’ and maybe he got picked on. If this was the case, Bob never ever mentioned it in any of his interviews that I am aware of. Miss Bushay also tells us that although Bob was shy he was a very popular boy with many friends. In fact, the discrimination Bob faced is best explained by Jamaican author Kente Mwilima:
“While this (faced hostility in Trench town) very likely did occur, a more accurate description, is that he mainly encountered such problems not simply because of his racial background, but because he was also poor! One cannot imagine Blacks of Trench Town or any other underprivileged area deriding a rich brown young man because of his complexion or mixed-heritage. And one cannot imagine a rich brown person, whose colour gave him/her a status and inbuilt advantage way above the masses of underprivileged Blacks, being vulnerable to any form of derision by rich Blacks let alone poor Blacks. Ironically, though not unexpectedly given the history of the region, Rita Marley said she also got derided for having a very dark complexion…”
In interviews, the only rejection Bob spoke of was from his father. On one occasion Bob’s father took him to Kingston under the pretence that he would live with him and be schooled, but instead Norval Marley left his son in a poor downtown neighbourhood in Kingston, (promising to return but he never did) to work as an errand boy, unknown to his worried mother who came to his rescue.
Of his country upbringing, we hear Bob speak positively about his experiences. He also spoke of how his grandfather Yaya’s husband was someone who really cared for him. His uncle, Clarence Malcolm a famous Jamaican guitarist in the 1940s also spent some time teaching him how to play the guitar. My point is that the interviews did not provide an alternative or wider look at his relationships with other family members and how they treated him.
“I live amongst country, in ah country me live amongst
which part people meet you ah morning time and
seh ‘good morning uncle Nes how yuh do
God bless you my son’, me live amongst dem people,
me nuh live amongst people
weh get up and cuss cuss everyday”…Bob Marley
To paint a Jamaica in people’s mind’s in which darker skinned Blacks are somehow ‘racist’ against lighter skin Blacks is to display a lack of understanding of what racism really means and how colour works in the Caribbean – the idea is laughable. Light skinned Blacks and Whites are at the top of the pecking order across the Caribbean with dark skinned Blacks at the bottom of the social order. That is how the system was set up and how it is maintained to this very day. The current epidemic of skin bleaching (darker skin men and women wanting to be lighter in Jamaica), would not exist if the racist concept of Blacks as inferior did not exist. Rastafarians sought to enable Blacks to overcome their self-hatred and embrace all things African, and many of Bob’s songs attest to this.
On Nobody’s Side
After we get a glimpse of Bob the boy, we meet Bob the man. This is another “point of connection” when Bob says in the film “my father is a white, and my mother black, now them call me half-caste or whatever. Well me don’t deh pon nobody’s side. Me don’t deh pon the black man’s side or the white man’s side. Me deh pon God’s side. The man who create me who cause me to come from black and white”
This was an interview taken whilst he was playing football at his home (Hope Road, Kingston), and there is no context as to what the interviewee asked to prompt Bob’s response. This paints a picture of a more neutral Bob that may make it easier for white audiences to relate to him.
Bob’s above statement can be explained as follows:
For Rastafarians to work to elevate the masses of Africans out of oppression is to be on the side of God. In that sense it does not stop people from caring about humanity whilst working to unify and uplift one’s race. It is in this context that Bob’s statement “I am on the side of God” should be taken and understood. However, in the film it is misrepresented to give us a politically racially neutral Bob – which he never was. The famous Marcus Mosiah Garvey a Jamaican Black Nationalist and one of Bob’s heroes advocated strongly for ‘race first’; yet also spoke about the brotherhood of man and justice. Dudley Sibley, a close friend of Marley, who appeared in the documentary, has said in a previous interview that Bob always spoke about Marcus Garvey.
Bob sings:
“I’ll never forget no way, they sold Marcus Garvey for rice, oo-ooh!
I’ll never forget no way: they turned their back on Paul Bogle, hey-ey!
So don’t you forget (no way),Who you are and where you stand in the struggle.”
…Bob Marley (So Much Things To Say)
A picture of Marcus Garvey can often be seen in the backdrop; of Bob’s performances. Remember now the aim of the documentary, according to the director, is to see why Bob reaches so many people and is so popular with so many people. He also wants us to connect emotionally to Bob. So it is being suggested by the director that Bob reaches so many people because he saw no colour!
Bob and Poverty
So far, we have several aspects of Bob’s life that enable us to ‘emotionally connect’ to him: he was stolen property, he was allegedly rejected by the Black side of his family, his father was absent, and he (Bob) apparently saw no colour. The fourth theme used to connect us emotionally to Bob was the poverty that he grew up in.
“No sun will shine in my day today
The high yellow moon won’t come out to play
Darkness has covered my light (and has changed,)
And has changed my day into night
Where is this love to be found, won’t someone tell me?
‘Cause life, sweet life, must be somewhere to be found,
Instead of a concrete jungle where the livin’ is hardest
Concrete jungle, (concrete jungle jungle) oh man,
you’ve got to do your best, yeah.
No chains around my feet, but I’m not free
I know I am bound here in captivity”…Bob Marley (Concrete Jungle)
From the green countryside of St Ann’s we travel to the slums of Trench Town, Kingston; an area where slaves were once taken, which as a result Bob informs us “carries a heavy vibration”. We meet Black men, women and children living in utter poverty – a poverty caused by British colonialism.
The songs ‘High Tide, Low Tide’ and ‘Trench Town Rock’, conveys the idea that Bob was indeed in pain as a child. Families often went to bed hungry; and children played together with no shoes on their feet. Families were torn apart because one or both parents had to travel overseas seeking employment, creating further pain for children as they sometimes felt abandoned. This is ‘concrete jungle where the living is hardest’; people are bound in the captivity of poverty, mental enslavement, these were a disposed people, unwanted, unloved, uncared for and forgotten by the very establishment who once used their bodies and minds to amass great wealth for themselves.
From the very day we left the shores
(trodding on the winepress)
of our Father’s land (rebel),
We’ve been trampled on (rebel),
Taken for granted
Oh now! (we’ve been oppressed, yeah!)
…Bob Marley (Babylon System)
We also see Bob travelling to America, but what we do not learn about are the experiences he encountered whilst there which helped to shape his growing consciousness. It is in America that Bob encountered racism in its most extreme form – physical violence. He became acquainted with the Black struggle and saw the oppression of his people, and the marches and demonstrations against injustice. However, all that we get to see on the documentary is the jobs he did, his love of music and his ‘illegally’ growing ganja.
The 1960s, and 70s were times of great social upheaval and political organisation in many parts of the Black world (America, Caribbean, Africa and Britain etc). The frustration of the people often times met the establishment (in the form of police) on the streets. People were taking action and demanding justice and equality. There was also a great support for the independence struggles of Black countries across the Black world along with an exchange of ideas and strategies. These were years of growing awareness amongst many Black youths across the world, which had been fuelled by people like Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Leonard Howell, Walter Rodney and Malcolm X whose books were widely read. In an interview, Bob once said of Angela Davies (Black Panthers), that she was his type of woman – she was strong and intelligent. This is a testimony to his identification with the struggles of Black America and his connection with the Black power movement in America.
For many youths in Jamaica music became a way to escape the poverty and it is covered very well in the film. But there is no explanation as to why Bob along with fellow band mates Bunny and Peter who were becoming hot local acts, threw away their suits and combs and became Rastafarians. Money was there to be made; it was a ticket out of poverty. Yet, why did they feel the need to change and throw away their chances for the limelight?
We are told in the documentary that Bob who was ‘allegedly’ often made to feel like an ‘outcast’ for being half-white, met Mortimer Planner which ‘automatically gave him acceptance’ says Danny Sims (even though by this stage Bob was well accepted on the Jamaican music scene). In the film Bob himself informs us that when he came to Kingston at the age of 17-18, he met other people who thought like him i.e. other Rastafarians. He mentions nothing of becoming a Rasta because he felt rejected, or turning towards Rastafarianism because he found his real father in Selassie.
One of Bob’s early music producers, Lee ‘Scratch’ Perry tells us that the ska music which Bob had been performing was about, “dancing and drinking beer”, it “wasn’t spiritual music,” and “reggae music was about spirituality”. But this is still not enough to inform us on why they (Bob, Peter and Bunny) made the switch. This section of the film does not address the intrinsic reason as to why Bob became a Rastafarian, or Bunny or Peter for that matter and therefore misses out the most crucial part to understanding Bob as an artist.
The poverty and sense of captivity experienced by many in Jamaica forced some to search for answers in alternative paradigms. You get fed up of looking at the sky through holes in your roofs; you wonder why the sunshine that shines so brightly and hot in the day does not bring the same warmth and richness into your life. Bob was one of hundreds of youths embracing Rastafarianism. He, like other Jamaican men and women of his age were seeking truth and self-knowledge. They were seeking to find their true cultural identity, to know who they were, where they came from, to understand why society rejected and despised them and to discover why opportunities in society were limited for them.
Truth seeking questions were also being asked including those long sought after questions by philosophers like “was the bible telling the truth?”, “who is God?”, “were the schools teaching the truth?” and “why wasn’t Black history being taught?” It was Rastafarianism that provided them with the answers they were searching for. The ideology equipped them to fight the ‘Babylon System’ of oppression, deception, falsehood, mental and spiritual enslavement. It was Rastafarianism that got them to use reggae music as a weapon to channel their frustrations and liberate the people. It was far more than just living in ‘peace’, ‘love’ and ‘unity’ and seeking happiness, as we are told in the film, although an important aspect of Rasta philosophy.
The Rasta narrative is what is lacking, and what is depicted in the film does not give the whole picture. After all it was Rastafarianism that gave us the Bob we have now come to know. It is in finding his African identity through Rastafarianism that Bob found himself. One would think that the ideological teachings, revolutionary nature and livity of Rastafarians would have been dealt with more comprehensively and given a more prominent hearing in the film, and from the voice of an experienced Rastafarian. Bunny Wailer, Rita Marley or even a prominent Rastafarian such as Mutabaruka would have been the best to address this, yet instead we hear from Cindy Brakespeare – a former beauty contestant.
One Love
The other theme used to ‘emotionally connect’ us to Bob is the idea of ‘one love’, a concept that has been used over and over again to sell Bob as a ‘one love – one world’ artiste. Thirty minutes into the film, we are told that Bob found his true father in Selassie says the film’s consultant Neville Garrick and that he no longer saw himself as half white or half black, it was just ‘one love’ says Rita Marley. Viewing audiences can easily connect with the idea of ‘universal love’ amongst all people. However, was that what Bob’s music was about? Was he trying to be everything for everyone? Was Bob’s music influenced by the experience that he was ‘allegedly’ rejected by both black and white society?
The rejection message is once again conveyed in the film, but this time by I Three singer Judy Mowatt. She tells us that because Bob was rejected by his white family “I think that what happened to him, that rejection that is why he was able to reach the world, and I think there are so many people out there that are hurting, so many people out there that have felt what I have been through and I have a message that can bring change and transformation.”
As a young Rastafarian Ms Mowatt travelled the world with Bob and The Wailers, singing backing vocals as part of the I-Threes. Today she is a devout Christian and gospel singer now immersed in the world of the church which in Jamaica shuns all things Rastafarian. Having turned away from her former faith it may indeed have influenced her answer i.e. it downplays that Bob sought to spread the message of Rastafari.
This is not to suggest that Bob was against multi-racial unity or that he did not care about the plight of other people in the world. However, it was not ‘one love’ or ‘a sense of rejection’ that made Bob a Rastafarian, drove his music, or even gave him a sense of mission. It was the entire ideology of Rastafarianism that captivated his heart.
“I was a Rasta for 22 years and I was genuine. I embraced the objectives of Rastafari, knowing that one of the aims and objectives were to repatriate to the land of our ancestors. And also to make music to let people be aware of who they are as a people and knowing that the western hemisphere is only a place for them to pass through,
but we should return to our father’s land…” Judy Mowatt interview
It is amazing and indeed inspiring that Bob’s music reached and touched so many people, and shows the genius and power of his musical gift. Using music he sang to bring peace and love amongst Jamaicans. For example the song ‘one love’, produced in 1965 and originally titled ‘All in All’, was made to bring the warring factions on the streets of Kingston together as one. What was the uniting factor? It was ‘one love, one heart, one aim, one destiny’ as Marcus Garvey before him had preached. Later on in his career, he also wanted to do the same for Africans and African Americans, which was all part of the Rasta ideology to unite the worldwide Black family. That is why Africans could relate so easily to the song ‘War’ initially a speech by Emperor Haile Selassie addressed to the United Nations. Bob used it to spread the message of Selassie his spiritual leader. It was a message that said Bob and other African freedom fighters were prepared for war against Babylonian oppression if that is what it took to bring about freedom.
“My (Bob) music comes from the inspiration of his majesty (Haile Selassie)”
Relationships
In his life Bob had several relationships from which he had fathered at least eleven children. Rita Marley played an intrinsic part in his life from approximately 1964 until his death. He had proposed to Rita and they married in 1966. His mother has often spoken of Bob’s love for her. However in the documentary his love for Rita in the early days of their relationship is downplayed even though he wrote several love songs for her including ‘Stir It Up’. On the other hand his relationship with Cindy Brakespeare which spanned approx two years is given greater credibility. Although we are aware that he was never faithful to any woman, it is never shown or acknowledged that he cheated on Cindy on numerous occasions, becoming a father of two children in the process.
Bob had so many women in his life who could have been interviewed. Women like Nancy Burke and Diane Dobson his lawyer who both appeared in the film but no mention was made of their sexual intimacy with Bob. However, we do get to meet for the first time Pat Williams mother of his son Robert Marley, addressed not as ‘girlfriend’ but as ‘baby mother’.
We also do not get to understand the more intimate relationship that he had with Princess Pascalene from Gabon. Note that they did not mention her royal status in the film, or even display her full title. Instead we hear that her father was a dictator – a statement that served to detract from her status. It was Pascalene’s presence in Bob’s life that finally ended his affair with Cindy. It is with Princess Pascalene that he had his last serious relationship.
The Death of An Icon
Last, but not least, we arrive at the most emotionally charged part of the film. This is a very sad moment in the documentary as Bob’s career is about to go to another level, everyone can identify with that feeling of ‘success’. To get to that moment and then not be able to fully grasp it can be painful. This is what finally ‘connects’ us to Bob, that vulnerability that we fear the most; the unknown over which we have no control.
The year is 1981; Bobs days are numbered. He and Cindy are no longer in a relationship having separated, in 1979. It would have been interesting at this point in the film to have heard from Princess Pascalene as she was more present in his life at that time, and was with him in his final days. But the director had other ideas, by this stage he had already set the tone through Neville Garrick that she was more interested in Bob than he in her, thus making nothing of their relationship.
Additionally, as Rita and his mother were his main caretakers it would have been more attention grabbing in my opinion to have heard more from Rita especially leading up to the final moments just before Bob passed. She had just left the hospital room to get Bob some carrot juice and upon her return he had passed away, as explained in her book. Rita could have also given some insight as to what she saw happening around Bob, as it is known that things were done to him that she and others were upset with. She also believed that other people’s demands and the pressures upon him were sidetracking Bob was from his mission.
“I don’t think that Bob have cancer. If Bob have cancer,
I think it was injected in him in some way.
I really do think so. I don’t think he really had cancer.
I don’t think so. But that’s what they say.”
Bob’s mother…” Cedella Booker
Like his family and entourage, Bob suspected foul play i.e. that he was being poisoned. It was important for the viewing audience to at least be informed that not only was he hurting and in great pain from his illness but he believed he had been targeted. Chris Blackwell in earlier interviews said the CIA approached and told him that they had Bob under surveillance. They believed that through Bob’s growing influence he had the power to cause destabilisation to the government of Jamaica.
So as we near the end of the film somewhat drained and maybe feeling in some sort of emotional pain that Bob has died, you may even have even shed a tear or two as my friend did – we hear Bob say “I don’t really have no ambition, I just have one ting, I would like to see mankind live together Black, White, Chinese everyone live together, that’s all”. This is again taken out of context of the Rastafarian philosophy and drives home what the director has been trying to convey to us all along that Bob was race neutral. Other interviews with Bob paint an entirely different picture of what he had hoped to achieve, and who he wanted to reach. He also spoke of plans for example to build a studio in Africa and eventually repatriate there.
Conclusion
The overall portrayal of Marley is not the Bob that I grew up with and has come to know more intimately over the years. Bob Marley ‘half-white, rejected because of his colour, poverty stricken, one love messenger come to unite all people’s of the world’ may indeed by a message that Kevin McDonald wants to sell us, and one that the Marley family might embrace, but the fact remains that people have yet to be shown who the true Bob Marley is.
The film still has me asking: what is Rastafarian philosophy all about, how did Rastafarian philosophy; vision and worldview truly inspire Bob, and impact upon his music? For as Jamaican author Kente Mwilima writes “Indeed, this area is arguably the most important of all. For without it there would be no Bob Marley in the way he became. He would not have impacted on the world as he has done… The power, nature, feel and tone of his music all stemmed from this…that is Bob Marley the Pan-African/Revolutionary/Rasta man! It was his revolutionary convictions that often determined the tone or pitch of his voice and/or the approach of his singing. The righteous anger often contained in his voice, his stage postures… His reflective moods and anticipation of Armageddon stems from being a Rasta… Recall that Marley (along with many others) both on stage and in the studio was not a mere performer, but a man at war, fighting against injustice and the oppression of Black people around the world. Such would not be becoming of a crooner or mere singer of love or dance songs.”
It is dangerous and damaging to assume that the oppression and racism faced by many across this world is one that can be solved with ‘One Love’. At best it is politically naive and at worst deceptive. For Bob’s message and actions show us clearly that it takes effort to eradicate injustice and if films continue to portray Bob as a ‘one love, one world’ artiste then they are only adding to the injustice that Bob fought so hard to fight against; rather than truly identifying what he stood for and highlighting what we can learn from him in our attempts to continue to work to bring about truth, justice and rights. It is also a blatant denial of the reality of the world that we live in and how the legacies of colonisation and neo-colonisation still live with us today.
For those who have studied the man, his music, and the philosophy of Rastafarians, we know exactly who Bob is, and this is the man that perhaps western film makers are reluctant to portray; a man who channelled his musical talent towards the African liberation struggle to paraphrase Bob ‘if my life is just for me alone then I don’t want it, my life is for the people.’
The Marley film is not the definite story of Bob Marley; it is digestible yes, but truthful or accurate? Not from my perspective. How are the younger generations going to learn about revolutionary figures like Bob Marley and be inspired by his mission, and take inspiration for their own life journey if they are not told the truth? The film also did not present much new material, 95% of the film footage has been seen in other films – over and over again.
Perhaps Bob’s story would be best told by film directors such as Spike Lee, Haile Gerima, John Singleton, and Owen ‘Alik Shahadah, who would easily understand and identify with the story and struggles of Bob Marley and do it far more justice than has been done in the Marley film.
Today Bob Marley is still the most visible representation of Rastafarianism and African Liberation worldwide. No amount of editing, sanitising, white washing, de-Africanising can change this, and I do believe that Bob would not want that either. I am sure if you check Bob’s music catalogue he has a song somewhere for such attempts and if I may be bold enough to make a suggestion, I think it goes something like this: “Don’t let them change ya oh!
Or even rearrange ya! Oh, no!” (Could You Be Loved).
If you would like to learn more about Bob Marley you may want to start with Ghanaian-Jamaican author, Kwame Dawes: ‘Bob Marley (Lyrical Genius)’.
EDITORIAL NOTE: THE FOLLOWING CREDIT MUST APPEAR AT THE BOTTOM OF THE ARTICLE
This article may be reprinted with permission so long as the following credit appears: © 2012 Ankhobia Carvalho, Broadcast Journalist and Radio Producer.
If you use this article, you must include the reprint credits that are shown on the top and the bottom of the article. If you wish to modify any aspect of the reprint credit or article, you must first contact [email protected] to request permission. Only the above article may be reprinted without express permission. Permission for use of any other content must be obtained in writing.
