On February the 6th in 1945 a star was born under the carribean sky on a little island called Jamaica. Presumably with dreadlocks and a get up stand up attitude right from birth. He is one of the most iconic and well-known musicians all over the world. Posterboy and main representative for weedheads all over and a musical legend. His name was Bob Marley, of course. He unfortunately left this world way too soon at the age of 36 in 1981, when he died from lung cancer.
While a lot of people aren't really familiar with his revolutionary and spiritual messages and know him mostly from pop cultural references, whre he is often reduced to a punchline of a weed or Rastafari joke. But that‘s to be expected I guess:)
He was however a true rebel and his lyrics are spiked with all kinds of wisdom and great messages. He has becoming a symbol for the fight against oppression and inspired a number of political activists and musicians all over the world. He even raised Barack Obama's awareness apparently.
When it comes to Bob Marley I could literally pick from over a dozen really great songs. The man is known to have been prolific with 19 original albums and 11 children or more (the official website acknowledges 11 children but it is rumored he had quite a few more:). Some of his children like Damien and Stephen Marley have become successful musicians in their own right.
However my favorite Bob Marley song is Jammin, from his perhaps most famous album Exodus. So get your friends together and start Jammin...
"We're jammin':
I wanna jam it wid you.
We're jammin', jammin',
And I hope you like jammin', too.
Ain't no rules, ain't no vow, we can do it anyhow."
Here is another one of his older songs from the album Rasta Revolution recorded with The Wailers Band featuring The Upsetters and produced by another (still living!) reggae legend and wonderfully alien and weird Lee Scratch Perry .
I particularly love the dub on this song and the lyrics of course.
'Mr. Brown is a clown who rides through town in a coffin.
Who is Mr. Brown? '
Looking for a youtube video of him I stumbled across some great quotes of his from interviews. Check it out. I will defenitely be sampling some of those quotes.
Bob Marley on Richness and Money:
maybe some of the people on here should have a listen....:)
His Patois is sometimes difficult to understand, especially if you‘re not a native spaker, but it sounds awesome:)
Bob Marley's last words to his fans...
My favorite quotes:
"We‘ll free the people with music "
"My Richness is life... forever"
Thanks to @vandigital, his post reminded me that it is Bob Marley‘s birthday today.