Bob Marley: unpublished recordings found 40 years later

Discovered in the basement of a London hotel last year, these soundtracks from European concerts dating back to the 1970s have been restored for a high-quality result.

Here's what will delight Bob Marley fans. Recordings of the Jamaican musician who died in 1981 (he allegedly celebrated his 72th birthday on Monday, February 6th), believed to have been lost, have just been restored, reports the Guardian. The soundtracks were found in cardboards in the basement of the Kensal Rise, a hotel in northwest London where the Tuff Gong and his Wailers acolytes were accommodated during a stay in the English capital.

Known as "the lost masters" by the fans, these cassettes were believed to have been lost after being damaged by the moisture in the basement for about forty years. However, after more than twelve months of meticulous work, the reels have been remastered for a high quality result. Of the 13 tapes found, 10 could be saved.

These soundtracks come from European concerts dating back to the 1970s and contain tubes from the reggae icon like No Woman No Cry, Exodus, Jammin 'and I Shot the Sheriff. These songs were recorded during concerts at the London Lyceum (1975), the Hammersmith Odeon and the Rainbow also in London (1976), and at the Paris Pavilion (1978) with a 24-track recorder lent by the Rolling Stones.

"A high-quality result"

The recordings were "saved" by Joe Gatt, a businessman fan of Bob Marley, after receiving a phone call from a friend assuring him to have found reels from the Jamaican artist. "He was doing a housework in the building and fell on these tapes of the 1970s. I could not stay there to let those objects, damaged or not, be destroyed, so I asked him not to get rid of it" , Gatt told the British daily.

From there, Gatt provided the tapes to his friend Louis Hoover, a jazz musician in residence at the Ronnie Scott club in London, and Martin Nichols, a sound technician at the White House studios. "They were in such a bad condition that they should have been thrown away, but I spent hours and hours cleaning them thoroughly so that they were ready to be played without any risk "said Nichols, adding that" the final result is really amazing, because they are now in digital format and of great quality ".