bob marley musical

mms

sometimes
xactly who is heading the bob marley affirmation as an important cultural icon bandwagon..?
 

matt b

Indexing all opinion
mms said:
xactly who is heading the bob marley affirmation as an important cultural icon bandwagon..?

are you suggesting he's not an important cultural icon?
 

mms

sometimes
not at all, i think he is, but he's not the kind of cultural icon who's life should be turned into a west end musical, i'm talking about the kind of thing that celebrates his life in the most vapid way possible.
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
Thing is with Bob Marley, without him, would reggae have really been all that different? I mean there were 'nuff roots people out there already, his early ska career (Simmer Down) was influential but again not exactly trail blazing.

Of course he did a lot of highly important tunes, but he was one of many rather than one alone, wasn't he? Marley is the king of reggae, Dennis Brown is the prince, but there were many many others.
 

mms

sometimes
well, i think he was an icon to alot of people beyond reggae and he has considerable respect for his symbolic unting of Seago and Manley and also for taking a bullet, as well as being amn ambassador for rasta and also reggae to an international audience.
Without his popularity roots reggae would probably not have achieved success. the virgin frontline thing might not have happpened as well as a few other examples of majors championing Jamaican music.
He's also the patron saint of stoned kids who put his poster next to their take me to your dealer poster and my mums only serious delve into reggae music, but no mind for that if people enjoy it.
 

Diggedy Derek

Stray Dog
All true, he brought reggae to the global audience of course. I just feel the course of reggae in Jamaica didn't radically change course, despite him doing some great tunes etc.
 

mms

sometimes
yeah, i think his productions were alot different from the jamaican producers as well, better recorded obviously but also more nice slide guitar, female backing and a deeper rhythm section. More palitable to the people they were trying to hit up for sales i guess, the bluesy people, the dylan fans and the stoners.
 
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matt b

Indexing all opinion
in jamaica, it seems that he is looked up to more because he is seen as a sufferah who got out of the ghetto, rather than on his music alone. after all, 99 times out of 100, when you tell someone you like reggae they ask/make questions/statements relating to bob marley- he has world wide recognition.

when he signed to island chris blackwell made him into an 'album artist', something that reggae wasn't/isn't really about, in order to sell it to white middle class liberals. it worked.

at this point his music became somewhat irrelevant in JA.
 
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