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Reggae and Revolution: the Role of Bob Marley

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Reggae and Revolution: the Role of Bob Marley ! I r) I { National Library of Jamaica NATIONAL LIBRARY OF JM'\Al -.... -1,: • (-:' • '- 1 • . ..,. ' < ""-: � - -·- . G r:: .. l REGGAE DR THE ROLE OF satirical at times; often cruel; TO TRANSCEND COMMENT ROOTS- 'UP ROOTED' but its troubadors are not AND ASSF.RT RIGHT? TO Within the Third World, afraid to speak of love, of FIND THE ANSWER TO there is a unique social pheno­ loyalty, of hope, of ideals, THIS YOU MUST E-NQUIRE: menon. It was created by one of justice, of new things and DID BOB MARLEY RE�-;"EEM of the terrible diaspora of new forms. It is thi� assertion HIS IDENTITY BY RE­ history. The slave trade, of revolutionary possibility CROSSING THE MIDDLE stretching in the main from tliat sets reggae apart. It has PASSAGE AND RE-ENTER­ the 17th to the 18th Cen­ evolved from the original folk ING THE KINGDOM OF HIS twies, uprooted millions of form of the MENTO. From PAST? HE WHO KNOWS Black Africans depositing this there sprang SKA which HIS PAST CAN BELIEVE them throughout the ·Carib­ began a sort of marriage· be­ THAT THE FUTURE IS THE bean� the United States and tween American Rhythm and TERRITORY OF HOPE. HE .the ore northerly regions of Blues, Gospel and the indi­ WHO KNOWS NOT HIS PAST Latin America. There our genous mento form. The FINDS THAT IN SPITE OF ancestors were- subjected to mento itself often was driven HIMSELF, HIS FUTURE IS, the most systematic and sus­ on the strong beat of the dig­ IN HIS MIND, A BURIAL tained act of deculturisation ging song which helped the GROUND. FAITH BEGINS in modem history. Here was workers t.P survive the mono­ WITH AN ACCEPTANCE OF no oppression of a people on tony of long hours with the THE POSSIBILITY OF CON­ their native soil. The slave had pick-axe. It was unlikely, TINUITY. IF YOU CANNOT no familiar ancestral earth therefore, that the beat of SURVEY A CONTINUITY into which to plant his feet Jamaican music would be INTO YOUR OWN PAST, and dig his toes while waiting more than infl1,1enced by Rhy­ YOU CANNOT BELIEVE IN for the tide of oppression to thm and Blues and would A CONTINUITY INTO recede or the opportunity for certainly never entirely YOUR OWN FUTURE. rebellion to present itself. The succumb to it. In due course, MARLEY HAD THAT FAITH slaves were uprooted, detribal­ S K Ayielded to ROCK ised, de-named, de-humanised. STEADY, the entire· period of RASTA­ The only thing the oppressor transition providing its heroes THE FAITH could not take away was their like the late great trombonist humanity. How did Bob Marley DON DRUMMOND. But we · successfully undertake this Through it all, music was were still in transition. Then it one of the means through journey into his past which all came together with released him to a belief in which the slave held on to the REGGAE. past and endured the present. his people's future? The Any discussion of the BLUES, answer is: Rastafarianism. I the CALYPSO, the REGGAE enter into no controversy begins at this point. Like all about people and their faith. folk music, it is all essentially When one listens to every­ To each his own. But it is commentary; but what is uni­ thing from mento to reggae, inextricably a part of the que about this commentary is one sees in instant reflection psychodrama in which the the dilemma of identity. The that it reflects in every l':trong A:fri,..an root i .. th.o:t!<>, black of the diaspora are en­ L-._...__.,._-tJ:.__��- � mu;;�h.au mesnea tnat tHeir traditional, · ' particularly in the rhythm and pulse, something to do with Christian faith is visualised in the use of drums. But so great survival and accommodation. white terms. Inevitably and was the act of cultural destruc­ The children of the diaspora obVfously, a religion that was tion that all of the infinite struggle for a place in society spawned at the very centre subtlety· and sophistication to this day. Worse, they of white civilisation expresses which sets African drumming struggle for· their identities, its faith through familiar sym­ apart, is 'missing. I can remem­ mislad as the slave ships made bols. If the servants and child­ ber the first time I heard an their way to the New World ren of God are white, they will authentic African drummer, I through the MIDDLE PAS­ think of both God and Christ was astonished and for a while SAGE. Therefore, their com­ in terms of self-image. There­ had difficulty in understand­ mentaries must deal with these fore, the God that emerges ing what was going on, so realities. · will be imagined to be white. intricate were the variations, Every church has its sculp­ so complex the rhythmic CALYPSO ture and its painting expressed embroidery around the central in white terms. So the children driving beat. In Jamaica, only THE CALYPSO, exclusively of the slaves begin -with a the central beat has survived. Trinidadian, is cynical, satiri­ visual contradiction. To com­ EVEN THIS SURVIVAL IS cal, amoral and often savage.· pound the problem, the parti­ A MIRACLE IN THE CIR­ The Trinidadian masses surviv­ cular expression of Christian­ ed at least until the 1960's CUMSTANCES. ity was first the creature of most fundamental by a collective disregard of The the oppressor. Yet, the child­ question that arises about both the laws and the values ren of the slaves need faith reggae is: ho.w did it become of the oppressor. The indi­ and have f�th. They are sure so explicitly and positively vidual spirit endured its degra­ there is a God and they are political. The greatest of the dation and transcended its sure that somewhere that God calypsonians, the MIGHTY hopelessness by laughing at is their God rooted in the land SPARROW has journeyed into everything including itself. But of the past and visualised in political commentary; but this was not the laughter of terms of their self-image. ­ even he, quintessentially a part gentle good nature, illuminat Rastafarianism is a true of the Trinidadian environ­ ing a comfortable companion­ faith in the sense that its ment, although born in Gren­ ship. This was laughter like believers have taken that step ada, has stopped short of the a weapon, like a rapier or a beyond mere rationali� into assertion of rights, has not razor honed in centuries of the acceptance of a view of surviving. essayed a positively revolu­ the unknown, unknowable tionary call. BY CONTRAST, md unprovable which is faith. BLUES THE GREATER PART OF To them Haile Selassie is the BOB MARLEY IS THE LAN­ THE BLUES have some of symbol of God on earth and GUAGE OF REVOLUTION. this but are more reflective of God himself is as revealed in the consciousness of oppres- the Holy Scriptures. The true sion. Perhaps, CLAIMING the American Rastafarian, therefore, has black has always known A FUTURE his traced his identity beyond situation to be closer to the Middle class intellectuals mere history and geography hopeless. had claimed a future for the to the ultimate source of all REVOLUTIONARY Caribbean.. But this was not things, for the believer, the POSSI Bl U TV refl�cted m the spontaneous Creator himself. BUT HE '\ music of the ghetto. HAS ARRIVED AT HIS Of them all, the REGGAE WHAT GAVE MARLEY CREATOR THROUGH THE is the most explicitly revolu- THE COURAGE TO GO BE­ IMAGES AND THE SOIL OF tionary. It is commentary; YOND MOCKERY TO HOPE: AFRICA. BY THAT ACT HE HAS RE-DISCOVERED THE SELF THAT WAS MISLAID IN THE MIDDLE PASSAGE LUTI RY FAITH.... BOB MARLEY by Michael Manley AND HE them? Everybody listened to COULD DO IT ALL WITH Marley· and his school of ROBERT NESTA MARLEY AN UNSELF-CONSCIOUS reggae protestm;s. Certainly, I O.M. CONVICTION THAT MADE listened and was reinforced in HIM A KIND-OF SPONTAN­ the -con�iction that we had to NESTA <R OBERT EOUS, UNCOMPROMISING STRUGGLE FOR CHANGE. of Merit MARLEY, Order REV 0 L UTI 0 NARY, (O.M.), super star, father and UNTOUCHED BY WEALTH, · of reggae, REGGAE definitive exponent UNFAILINGLY GENEROUS, a He had GONE was Rastafarian. ETERNALLY UNSPOILT. taken that journey. By that INTERNATIONAL act he had solved his identity I AND I crisis. He had become a The invention of the.grama­ complete human being. In I first knew Bob Marley phone, the radio and televi­ his completeness he could sing in 1971, in the days of sion have created a mass songs of compassion: "No "Trench Town Rock". At this market for contemporary Woman, Nuh Cry"; he could stage his music was still like music. Where the symphony spit revolutionary defiance: visceral protest carried on the "War"; he could embrace pro­ wings of a relatively uncompli­ orchestra became the principal letarian internationalism: cated, commentary on the instrument for the dissemina­ tion of the great music of the "Zimbabwe". ghetto. Throughout that year, classical European traditiop, he used to perform as part simpler forms of music woulq of a group of artistes who travelled all over Jamaica now have international cur� rency. · Technology Jnought with me as the Party which I led prepared for the General into the market the broad �lections of 1972. Until that masses of the people virtuhlly-. ti¢e.my own political percep­ everywhere on the globe. tions had reflected a mutually So there is no mystery about reinforcing marriage. On the the means by which Bob one hand, there was the poli­ Marley's music, and reggae tical theory which I had ab­ along with it, have become sorbed from my Father as a familiar to the peoples of youth and had developed into Europe, Africa and the Amer­ explicit Socialist doctrine as.
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