71. Bob Marley and the Wailers, "Exodus"

 


On December 3, 1976, seven armed men burst into Bob Marley's house in Kingston, Jamaica.  They shot Marley's wife Rita in the head while she was parked in the driveway.  Bob himself was shot in the chest and arm, and two others present were also hit.  Thankfully, no one died.  Although the motive is obscure, it was strongly suspected to be political, as Marley supported the People's National Party and it was believed that the hit was ordered by the head of the rival Labour Party.  (Another rumor placed the blame on the CIA, which is always a good possibility).

Recovering from his injuries, Marley took the band and left Jamaica for London.  The attempt on his life was surely in Marley's mind when he wrote "So Much Things To Say":

But I'll never forget no way: they crucified Jesus Christ
I'll never forget no way: they stole Marcus Garvey for rights
Oo-ooh!
I'll never forget no way: they turned their back on Paul Bogle
Hey-ey!
So don't you forget (no way) your youth
Who you are and where you stand in the struggle

Like a lot of this album, the song carries a message of struggle and liberation couched in the smoothest, most langorous music around.  This album starts easygoing, with a fade-in to the sly and sinuous beat of "Natural Mystic," which, btw, has an incredible vocal melody.  It build towards the title track, which you probably know from Legend, the Marley album that almost everyone in a certain age range - mine - has owned at one point or another.  "Exodus" is a propulsive, 133 beats per minute classic - basically thrash metal speed for reggae - brilliantly instrumented and produced.  It was released as the first single and was an immediate hit, despite being more than 7 minutes long.  It's literally about Marley and the band fleeing from Jamaica to London and metaphorically about finding the promised land after exile in Babylon.  The first reggae song to get widespread airplay on black radio in the US, it's not hard to see why, since the song incorporates disco and funk into the reggae fold.

The second side of the record turns to more personal themes.  "Jamming" presents as a simple song about the pleasures of music, but that violent invasion rears its ugly head again:

No bullet can stop us now, we neither beg nor we won't bow
Neither can be bought nor sold
We all defend the right; Jah - Jah children must unite
Your life is worth much more than gold

"Three Little Birds" might have one of the most well-known (and memorable) choruses in music history.  You can probably sing it right now ("Don't worry about a thing/'Cause every little thing is gonna be alright").  It's so thoroughly suffused through the culture that I overheard my daughter singing it one day, and she was about 7 and definitely didn't own this record.  Oh, and "One Love" is on here too.  I mean, come on.

In 1999, Time magazine named this record the Best Album of the 20th Century, and it makes sense, because it's not just a brilliantly executed album of really fantastic songs; it's about universal themes of suffering and the desire for freedom and belonging.  What a wonderful album.

Is this album in my personal Top 500? No question.

Comments

  1. StephenOctober 13, 2022 at 12:21 PM

    Here's where I challenge not the RS listing, but yours. I appreciate that this is partially an exercise in music appreciation, and keeping an open mind. Good on ya. But your top 500? I have previously said that for something to be in the RS top 100, something has to be someone's favorite band. I guess my equivalent would be that for something to be in the TK top 500, he would have had to have listened to it (independent of FtF obligations) sometime in the past 30 years. Hell, *wanted* to listen to it would count. I have trouble believing that in the past 30 years, you've thought, "you know what I wanna hear right now? Some Bob Marley." Of course, maybe this Marley fandom has just been hidden from me all this time. IN SUM, I think you are having a reasonable experience of thinking, "hey, this is pretty good, a rightful classic" but I don't think it is really TK top 500. Now, I may also be underestimating either or both of what a big number 500 is, and how this exercise is reshaping your tastes.

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. TKOctober 13, 2022 at 1:09 PM

      I totally get what you're saying! In fact, I have listened to Bob Marley regularly in the past 30 years (although to be fair, it's fallen off some in the past 15). I would say my peak Marley years were early-mid 90's, so it's just at the tail end. Anyway, I owned 2 Marley albums on CD - this and the famous Legend. And 500 is a lot of albums!

      But I also take your point and I think that now that we're in the last 70 or so, my personal Top 500 does not mean what it once did. Accordingly, going forward, I will use Top 100 as the metric. This album would not be in my Top 100.

      Delete

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