25 December 2013
17 December 2013
Bob Marley by Mathilde Amory
My name is Robert Nesta Marley
and I will tell you the story of my life. I was born on the 6th of
February 1945, in the little town of Nine Miles in Jamaica. My mother was
Cedella Booker, a Jamaican woman who was a teenager when she got pregnant, and
my father was Norval Marley, a fifty-years-old Jamaican of English descent and
a Petty Officer. They planned to get married but my father left Kingston,
Jamaica’s capital, before it could happen. He died in 1955, seeing me only
once.
I grew up there and in my early
life I worked in the fields because I have four half-brothers and sisters and
my family was very poor. I couldn’t stand my way of life because I have always
loved music (I could sing and play the guitar) and I dreamt it could become my
livelihood. Therefore, even though I loved my mum, I decided, at sixteen, to
leave home and all the misery I had known, to go to the ghetto of Trenchtown.
And my daring was rewarded! I met the singer Neville Livingstone and I recorded
my first single of Ska music: "Judge not".
In 1963, with Peter Tosh, I
created the famous Reggae band called “The Wailers”. I became the leader and
famous as Bob Marley.
We emigrated to the United States
and there found fame with our album “Rastaman
Vibration” in 1973. I later went back to Jamaica. I won’t detail all my
long career because I’m already famous as a singer (I seem to be quite
conceited with this sentence, but actually I swear I’m not). In fact, I would
like to tell you all the little things which made me the man that I am now.
My music helped me to do a lot.
For example, the world really discovered Reggae thanks to my band. This kind of
music descends from Ska and the Blues, and it’s the ancestor of Dub and Rap.
And with Reggae, also called Rasta music, we were the spokesperson of
our religion : Rastafarism. We consider the Emperor of Ethiopia, Hailé Sélassié
1st, as the Messiah or the reincarnation of God on Earth, called “Jah
Rastafaraï”. My lyrics are often inspired by my religion. A myth arose from
that. Some people thought (and some still think) that I am a prophet of Jah! Of
course it’s not true, I am just a religious and loving man. My lyrics almost
all talk about universal love, peace and unity. And if they don’t, they are
engaged politically and talk about dignity, rebellion and freedom. I am proud
of them, because Reggae is often thought of as disreputable, part of a marginal
movement, but in fact if you pay attention to the lyrics, you’ll see that we
are just kind and idealistic people!
I earned a lot of money thanks to
my discs (more than 200,000 were sold in my lifetime!), but I never needed all
this money, so I gave it to people around me. Moreover, I was being true to my
songs by my acts, but this was not understood by everyone. In 1976, the
political context in Kingston was very strained due to the upcoming elections,
and I was shot in my own house, but did not die. I took seven bullets. Two days
later, I gave my open-air concert “Smile Jamaica”. Nevertheless, I wasn’t safe,
so I flew away to London. There, I signed a rebel pact with the Punk movement
by recording the single “Punk Reggae Party” (more Reggae than Punk!). Two years
later, I came back to Jamaica to give another concert, the “One Love Peace
Concert” and succeeded in gathering together two political enemies on stage.
What an event!
But my great career had to end
some day... In 1976, I got a cancerous tumor on my big toe on an old football
injury. I refused to amputate my toe because it was against my religion. The
cancer spread to my stomach, lungs and brain. However I continued my world
tour, I couldn’t give up my music, my reason for living. Ironically, I had to
stop the world tour for my album “Survival”, and I finally died in Miami on the
11th of May 1981.
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